Topics

1

[Max] Bug Reporting / Environment overrides + Sky volume effect = solid color stripe

« on: 2021-09-06, 09:13:37 »

Hi
Scene Environment overrides + Sky volume effect gives solid horizon stripe on rendered pictures. The height of this stripe could be affected by altitude parameter of Corona Sky map, the color of it could be affected by Turbidity.
Max file attached. Put any 360 panorama map to the Map#2

Max 2021.3, Corona  8 (DailyBuild Aug 10 2021)

2

[Max] Bug Reporting / Deleting active camera unlocks "View to Render"

« on: 2021-08-21, 21:00:05 »

Corona 8 DB 10.08.21

Steps to reproduce:

Choose any viewport for render, lock "View to Render", Create Corona camera, switch to this camera in chosen viewport, then delete this camera from any of viewports - in this moment "View to Render" gets unlock

EDIT
It is so for Max 2021.3
Max 2014 doesn't unlock "View to Render" in same scenario

3

General CG Discussion / Viewport lagging when coordinate display updates - solved

« on: 2021-03-22, 20:21:33 »

Hi

I have had some problems with viewport performance/lagging in Max 2016, 2019 and now have the same kind of problems with Max 2021. Run Max as administrator helped with Max 2016 and 2019 (posted here about it some time ago), but not always help to make performance better with Max 2021. Recently visited 3ds Max forum and found this post, where author is describing the same issue I had/have, but unlike me he noticed connection between viewport lagging and cursor position in coordinate display.

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/3ds-max-forum/viewport-lagging-when-coordinate-display-updates/td-p/8971945

Problem in my case is connected with mouse settings, solution from that thread helped me. So if you have the same kind of issue it could be helpful for you too.

4

General CG Discussion / Help - how to disable info about snapping coordinates in the bottom of Max UI?

« on: 2021-03-09, 09:23:17 »

Hi

I've asked the same question in Autodesk 3DS Max forum, but didn't get any respond from there. So I decide to post this question here, hope some of you can help me with this.

I use 3DS MAX for many years. I'm architect and working with architectural objects use snaps in my workflow almost all the time. There is one thing in UI which bothers me every day. I'm talking about small window in the bottom part of the Max window where you can find some tips what to do, something like the one you can see on attached screenshot. It's ok when snaps are OFF, but if they switched ON information about current point of snapping (type of snap and coordinates of the snapping point) appears in the same line replacing the tip for a 0.1 sec, after that tips appears again and they replace each other each 0.1 sec. On screen it looks just like blinking of that line even if I stop the mouse and some snap preview is shown on screen. This blinking actually does nothing, it's just annoying element which doesn't have any use for me.

Is it possible to disable this information about snapping coordinates at all still having snaps active?

5

General CG Discussion / Keep HideUnusedNodeslots in SME "on" by default

« on: 2021-03-03, 09:39:24 »

Hi!
Is it possible to change somewhere settings of SME in a way it keeps HideUnusedNodeslots (H) option active by default for all new opened materials?
I tried to change this parameter in SME.ini file from HideUnusedNodeslots=0 to HideUnusedNodeslots=1, but it didn't change anything.
I make it active for all maps/materials I work with in order not to blow up space used by materials on SME field, so it would be nice if this option will be active by default.

6

[Max] Bug Reporting / Max 2021.3 SME material preview update takes longer time

« on: 2021-01-29, 02:49:09 »

Hi
Max 2021.3, Corona 6, Corona 7 DBs.

If I have empty scene - no problem with any material update in SME. It takes less than second to get preview updated.
If I have couple of objects in a scene - update of material which is not assigned to any object takes less than second, if I assign this material, update takes just slightly more time.
But if I have amount of objects as in normal working archviz scene, then update of material preview takes up to 7 second even after some basic changes such as diffuse color change or reflection on/off in material with empty map slots. Not assigned material update takes less than second.

I supposed that it connected with viewport representation of materials, but this behavior doesn't depend on any viewport settings and  shading method, it's the same in wireframe or different shaded modes. Besides that it doesn't matter how many object are represented in viewport - it's the same even if a single object is isolated and I change material assigned to another object.

There is no this problem in Compact ME, but I prefer to work in SME.

I've done same kind of tests in Max 2014 - there is no this kind of problem at all.

7

[Max] Bug Reporting / Glossy reflection + light material bug

« on: 2020-12-07, 00:11:56 »

Hi

Simple scene - room, cylindrical background with light material applied. Please, check the reflection on the wall opposite to the wall with windows.
Wall material - reflection glossiness from 1 to 0.7 makes reflection of the background object darker, from 0.7 to 0.6 makes it brighter, lower than 0.6 values do not affect the reflection brightness.
Max scene attached

Tested with Corona 6 and Corona 7 DB 2020-12-01, Max 2021 and 2014

8

[Max] General Discussion / Max 2014 - how long support will continue?

« on: 2020-12-03, 09:40:25 »

Hi

Need your answer ASAP, please.

For how long time you are going to support Max 2014?

9

[Max] Feature Requests / Transfer the picture rendered by docked IR to Corona VFB

« on: 2020-11-29, 22:11:38 »

Hi
Few versions of Corona ago there was possibility to get picture which was rendered by docked to viewport IR to Corona VFB.
It was so - start docked IR, stop docked IR, open Corona VFB and rendered by docked IR picture appears in VFB.
That was good. But nowadays VFB opens blank after docked IR stopped.
Would it be possible to get this feature back in newer versions?
Alternatively, could the picture rendered by docked IR stay in viewport with some notification that IR is actually stopped (which will not be baked to the picture if I decide to save/copy the image)?

10

General CG Discussion / Help - Max is changing layers setting while merging objects

« on: 2020-11-17, 18:02:08 »

Can somebody help me, please?
Situation is so - if I have some list of layers in my current scene (like an always Trees, People, Cars...), and I merge objects from another scene which has the layers with the same names (doesn't matter from which layer), Max automatically changes the settings (hidden/frozen/renderable/color) of the layers in my current scene to the settings of the same layers from the scene where I merged objects from... It's pretty annoying when I have up to 15 layers to change settings back each time I merge something from the same kind of scenes because I do that a lot and use layers settings a lot in my workflow.
It wasn't so ever, but from some moment it changed (IDK what it connected with). I want to change it back, but can't find any place in Max with this kind of settings.

Max 2014

11

[Max] General Discussion / Render region excluded from adaptivity - can it be done?

« on: 2020-11-05, 00:59:08 »

Hi
I like the idea of adaptivity, it works really well and it's really nice to have possibility to limit render time by the quality of rendered picture. But it can easily multiply render time by 2 if some noisy looking object takes part in a scene. For example if some regular interior scene with plain background picture needs about 10 minutes to render small size image with 3% noise level, then the same scene with 3D-tree behind the window takes 17-20 minutes to reach the same noise level on render. In fact this tree looks the same after 10 minutes of rendering the whole picture with adaptivity OFF. The same increasing of render time takes place if there is some "noisy" looking rug on a floor or any other "noisy" object represented in a scene.
At the moment when I'm in hurry in order to save some time for rendering I render picture with adaptivity ON excluding regions with trees, grass or other "noisy" objects, after that I render "noisy" areas with adaptivity OFF, then compose results in PS. I don't like this way, that's why I'd like to ask -
IS it possible to make this exclusion by Corona tools? In theory - is it possible at all?
If it could be done, excluded from adaptivity region could be selected the same way as "Render selected" works. In this case certain object(s) could be excluded from adaptivity and rendered the same way as they would be rendered if adaptivity OFF, which can save pretty much time for rendering preliminary or even final images.
What do you think about it?

12

General CG Discussion / Add watermarks to your renders inside 3DS Max

« on: 2020-10-30, 10:47:35 »

Hi
VFB+ 3DS Max plugin has the tool called Stamper, where you can add multiple layers of texts or image based watermarks with adjustable tiling to your renders.
Good thing, that you can use it even if your primary VFB set to Corona VFB - if you have VFB+ installed, it will copy each stopped (not cancelled) rendered picture with all Corona VFB's adjustments and denoising in to it's Render History buffer and could be recalled simply pressing standard Max's Show Rendered Frame Window button, so you can save your image with all Stamper's layers from there manually, or it can save rendered images automatically to the hard drive if 3DS Max output is enabled .

Text layers can contain technical information about the rendered image such as render time, scene name, time, CPU info, etc.

Plus that you can add watermarks to existing pictures - VFB+ has option to load image in it.

BTW I love VFB+'s Render History - it can compare 2 different size images in it's VFB. It's really good to have it as additional tool.

VFB+ is now free of charge plugin - thanks to Rotem Shiffman - which I used all the time for pretty long time before Corona and Vray developed their own VFBs to their current level. But even now it provides some useful features such as Stamper, Render history and it's own Tone mapping that can be used additionally to Corona's VFB features.

http://www.monotoneminimal.com/vfb

P.S. Don't change text color, if you have Corona Improved Color picker enabled in Max preferences - it will crash Max. You can switch color picker to Default one and change the text color then.

13

[Max] Feature Requests / Invertable Render Region option or include/exclude for render switcher

« on: 2020-10-29, 23:33:48 »

Hi
Some times I need to render almost whole picture and keep small areas as they were rendered previously. At the moment in these cases I have to use multiple regions to cover most part of the image keeping those small areas which shouldn't be rendered unselected. I think it would be nice to have an option to invert selected area for render, or it could be called include/exclude area for render. In this case I will need to draw couple of regions, click invert region (or exclude from render) button and it will do the trick.

14

[Max] Feature Requests / Render Region mask element

« on: 2020-10-29, 23:31:00 »

Hi
Would be nice to have a render element (something like Render Region mask), which will provide the mask were white color is covering rendered regions and black color is covering the rest of the image. it will be useful in cases when multiple regions should be rerendered and composed in PS or other program with previously rendered picture. I suppose this feature will be even more useful for animation production

15

[Max] Bug Reporting / Not correct rendering time estimation

« on: 2020-09-16, 09:37:48 »

Hi
Corona 6 doesn't estimate remaining rendering time correctly. Here is my example.
Pretty regular interior scene, image size 1200x900, no caustics, adaptivity ON, no lightmix, the only extra element is CShading_albedo, all Performance settings set to default except 4k cache (actually it's the same is with UHD cache), noise limit 4%, no any other CPU load during the rendering.

- 1st rendering time estimation (elapsed + left = total)
0:01:17 + 0:11:34 = 0:12:51

- 2nd rendering time estimation (elapsed + left = total)
0:11:34 + 0:07:09 = 0:18:43

- 3rd rendering time estimation (elapsed + left = total)
0:22:00 + 0:00:00 = 0:22:00

- final result is 0:22:50, where denoising is only 6 sec

So real total rendering time is almost 2 times longer than estimated rendering time from the beginning. Larger picture - bigger this difference in minutes. This is really bad for time planning. I don't remember such a big difference between estimated and real rendering time in previous versions of Corona

Max 2014