3DSMax 2017

PolyHertz

Looks like Max 2017 is being shown off by some users over at the Area (the trial is up on their servers, but they haven't added the page yet, cue drama): http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/3ds-max-3ds-max-design-general/still-no-news-about-3ds-max-2017/td-p/6017190/page/15

Here are some of the changes they've listed:
- Viewport navigation: Orbit point of interest / Orbit subobject
- Viewport zoom is now infinite
- Local Aligned coordinate system for subobjects. Verts and edges have local coordinate systems.
- mirror tool now has geometry mode - adds geometry modifier
- UV editor; flatten by material id
- UV editor; flatten by smoothing groups
- A lot of new tools in curve editor + buffer curves
- Offset controllers
- Camera sequencer
- Physical material
- Slate material editor can now pick mats from legacy editor sample slots via RMB
- New render added - ART. Seems like it's the same raytracing engine used in 360, but with animation ability.
- Mental ray is now installed separately (as a sub-component).
- Scene converter - converts scenes to ART renderer.

The UI has undergone a bunch of changes, and is apparently very fast but also very unstable (particularly if user tries to customize it) atm.

thomasp

faster UI sounds good and orbit point of interest should have been in there long ago but what is up with those gigantic icons surrounded by lots of whitespace in the rollouts? didn't anyone tell them text buttons is where it's at, not cryptic symbols you have to hover over to get their meaning. seriously looks like you'd have to create your own custom rollouts for real this time to be able to stay sane. which btw would be 'insanely great' as a customization feature, taking a cue from zbrush.

i'm not up to date with the last few max versions but was there every any notable viewport speed increases, program stability improvements and so on? what's the state of using shaders in the viewport these days?

loggie24

Hope they fixed random Windows 10 crashes that i suffered from, ended up having to roll back to 2015..

JedTheKrampus

Neat.

almighty_gir

Yes!

Finally, the year i switch to modo has come! I'd set aside this years license money early and was waiting to see what Autodesk did. And they didn't do enough.

Byebye!

bounchfx

I can't help but feel disappointed by the level of upgrades they put into their products. both max and maya seem like they have such minor updates each year.

PolyHertz

It's not too surprising really, considering they tend to fire many of their devs after they reach a certain level of experience/pay. It's hard to make any significant changes to an app when your staff largely consists of programmers still getting to grips with it, and with few (if any) old hats around to ask about many of the sections of legacy code.

RobeOmega

Although Autodesk currently have market share in games art, I feel this may change over a long period as products such as MODO get regular updates that have beneficial features and Autodesk keep releasing updates that do not much as much difference and make the product less stable. 

monster

The update is actually much more substantial than this. These are just the features that people have noticed first. Also...

- A lot of new tools in curve editor + buffer curves

This feature is actually designed after my Key Tools released a few years ago.
http://polycount.com/discussion/57061/maxscript-curve-editor-tools-lots-of-gifs
AD and I traded e-mails and they sent me builds often to make sure they got the tools just right.
*HIGH FIVES* all the animators!

beefaroni

Flatten by smoothing groups would be nice to have if I was still using max. Should be an easy quick way to test the normals on a low poly model and roughly see how the UVs will look like. Could do that and then bring it into Headus. 

0xffff

PolyHertz said:

The UI has undergone a bunch of changes, and is apparently very fast but also very unstable (particularly if user tries to customize it) atm.

Max? Unstable? I don't believe you.

artquest

Sigh.... 3ds max. If only autodesk decided to developed new useful features for it. I'm convinced that maya has blown past 3ds max in almost every way because that's where autodesk has put all the effort. They could both be good... but why would a software company want two or three major competitors in the same market? (Cough XSI...) 

3ds max 2017 gets a UI update and a new renderer that no one will ever use. And lets be real, the UI update is just a facelift that doesn't really improve the UI at all. Everything is in the same spot and is still just as clunky as it was 3 years ago.
meanwhile in maya development land....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7WbSIRtpgU

Epic things are coming soon.


EDIT: I don't mean to make this thread about Maya. I'm just more then a little disappointed since we use 3Ds max at work.

cptSwing

Not unexpectedly, a lot of "meh" going on in here. I wonder if they're going to push MCG a little more..

PolyHertz

It's a way to create your own modifiers via a node-based system.

oglu

http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/chris/introducing-max-creation-graphs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2Pv2-zjHD4

Zack Maxwell

oglu said:

http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/chris/introducing-max-creation-graphs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2Pv2-zjHD4

You'd be better off just using Houdini. Same idea, just fully fleshed out.

oglu

if you pay the lics and the houdini TDs we are in...

Mark Dygert

monster said:

The update is actually much more substantial than this. These are just the features that people have noticed first. Also...

- A lot of new tools in curve editor + buffer curves

This feature is actually designed after my Key Tools released a few years ago.
http://polycount.com/discussion/57061/maxscript-curve-editor-tools-lots-of-gifs
AD and I traded e-mails and they sent me builds often to make sure they got the tools just right.
*HIGH FIVES* all the animators!

Yeah! *HIGH FIVE*!
It only took three years of me posting your tools in their beta forums, before they finally took action on it...

It shouldn't be that hard to get awesome tools implemented. Still I count it as success.

PolyHertz

Apparently the new UI is Qt based.

thomasp

Shaz_Snow said:

Qt based... What does that mean?

it's a pretty common UI framework. probably makes developing interfaces for addons that much easier.

relieved to see they didn't go and add icons on all the rollouts everywhere. so it would seem that if you kill the ribbon with fire like i always have then you can still work with a reasonable interface.

swann

Shaz_Snow said:

Qt based... What does that mean?

Less learning. Houdini, Maya, Modo are using QT for UI. And now Max. More power for the Python.

thomasp

the only way to get that for max is if someone develops it as a plugin that then can be bought out.

pior

This UI demo video shows micro glitches and input delay for pretty much every button being pressed ... Not a good sign !

thomasp

JasmineJasmine said:

They have had more than a year...if this release isn't absolutely mind blowing they should fire the whole team and start over...fire everyone, including any superstars who were brought in to make everything cool again.

i don't think they have attempted anything like it at least since they bought out their competition alias and softimage.

what would be mind blowing is a solid release where you can use features with confidence and not wear out CTRL+S on your new keyboard within days.

JedTheKrampus

pior said:

This UI demo video shows micro glitches and input delay for pretty much every button being pressed ... Not a good sign !

I mean, previous versions of Max had plenty of that for me too.

pior

Indeed ... One would hope that a new UI system would help with that but it doesn't seem to be the case.

Fusion360 suffers from the exact same problem - it really makes me wonder if they are even paying attention to this sort of things at all ...

Moltar

UVW edittor: Fatten by material ID or smoothing group, has everyone ignored how amazing this is?

beefaroni

beefaroni said:

Flatten by smoothing groups would be nice to have if I was still using max. Should be an easy quick way to test the normals on a low poly model and roughly see how the UVs will look like. Could do that and then bring it into Headus. 

Wrote it right here

Although I should add that Modo 10 just added this as well! Awesome to see regardless. 

spacefrog

It's just the first step to transform the previous mix of UI techs in Max over to Qt. Essentially the interface is based on Qt now in a way, which somehow keeps legacy UI code ( which is plain Win32 based ) compatible . This is pretty important, otherwise the porting effort for Max plugin developers would skyrocket tremendously ( though Max 2017 is an SDK breaking release anyways).
And forget about those Max 2017 videos, they are rubbish, incomplete and amateurish ( i hope i do not have to mention that they aren't official videos )

huffer

Moltar said:

UVW edittor: Fatten by material ID or smoothing group, has everyone ignored how amazing this is?

Isn't this already in 3dsmax 2015? Or does it behave differently?

McGreed

JasmineJasmine said:

They have had more than a year...if this release isn't absolutely mind blowing they should fire the whole team and start over...fire everyone, including any superstars who were brought in to make everything cool again.

I believe that's actually one of the things that people has said was a big problems with them, that they have let go a lot of people, who knew the software code, and hired new people who don't have that in depth knowledges, resulting in more spaghetti code.

Zack Maxwell

McGreed said:

JasmineJasmine said:

They have had more than a year...if this release isn't absolutely mind blowing they should fire the whole team and start over...fire everyone, including any superstars who were brought in to make everything cool again.

I believe that's actually one of the things that people has said was a big problems with them, that they have let go a lot of people, who knew the software code, and hired new people who don't have that in depth knowledges, resulting in more spaghetti code.

Supposedly it's a regular thing; they higher less experienced programmers for a lower rate, and let them go when they become more experienced and would require more pay.

VelvetElvis

McGreed said:

JasmineJasmine said:

They have had more than a year...if this release isn't absolutely mind blowing they should fire the whole team and start over...fire everyone, including any superstars who were brought in to make everything cool again.

I believe that's actually one of the things that people has said was a big problems with them, that they have let go a lot of people, who knew the software code, and hired new people who don't have that in depth knowledges, resulting in more spaghetti code.

That explains why things that have worked in Max since the dawn of time are breaking in 2016. Things like all of the bugs related to groups, FBX linking, etc. What gets fixed in SP1 gets broke in SP2. I could see if groups was a new feature, but to have issues with that now? Come on man.

it's almost as if they want to make sure 2016 is a perpetually broke product so people don't sit on it and are forced into the subscription model.

PolyHertz

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O614QlC02Jk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1w5Gk-E0Nk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHYXgZuTVhE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lb7TXBBWRek

m4dcow

Already a few crashes in the NAB stream lol.

ExcessiveZero

utterly facepalm worthy, I loved max, but this has been a slow process of rotting and its hit the core at this point.

Pizdos

ExcessiveZero said:

utterly facepalm worthy, I loved max, but this has been a slow process of rotting and its hit the core at this point.

I am quite amazed that peoples still use Max and pay big money for it. Probable is just because a few big studious force employers to use it. Otherwise I am not sure what to say.

Minato

For the people who are actually interested to know what has been added to Max in the past year,  read this blog carefully (it lists many improvements that aren't mentioned elsewhere, for some reason ), also click on the Extention 1 and Extention 2 links towards the end for the rest:

http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/max/introducing-3ds-max-2017

Here I'll just paste the "Misc" section of the post:

Miscellaneous

Of course, throughout the year, we work on a number of Small User Requested Features and little enhancements. Besides the features and benefits listed above, here are some of the things our Charter and Beta customers have been talking about. Special thanks to Changsoo Eun for compiling the list.

Viewports

• 200% Faster deforming mesh prformance (New GPU Based Mesh Builder for DX11 mode) 
• Increased playback and interactive performance using node transform caching
• GPU backface cull for deforming object
• Shadow cache for better/faster shadow 
• Darker Edge mode for backfacing wireframe
• New viewport navigation mode : Orbit Point of Interest
• Customizable viewport tooltips by preViewport Tooltip callback
• Per Pixel Camera Map support for nitrous
• Reorganized viewport label
• Viewport configuration presets
• Viewport material override
• Performance shader for viewport
• New DX mode
• Hidden/Frozen/Display as box object will not evaluate/load map
• Gamma corrected background playback slowdown fixed
• Viewport switching when maximized fixed
• More readable viewport label
• Thinner and shaper selection outline 
• Viewport Statistics have been realigned for larger numbers.

Modeling

• Place Pivot Surface: Direct access working pivot from quadmenu
• Mesher Particle Flow 5 million face limit removed

Modifier Stack

• Copy/Paste modifiers to multiple objects at once.

Motion Panel

• Empty Tracks and Assigned Controllers can be reset to their default controller type
• Controllers can by copied and pasted via the right click menu in the controller tree view

IO

• .Obj poly export UV fix

Time Configuration

• “Rescale keys to whole frames” checkbox to force quantization.

Skinning

• Holding SHIFT for paint/blend weights mode change

New Map Types

• Color map
• Shape map (Ext 2)
• Text map (Ext 2)
• TextureObjMask map (Ext 1)

State Sets

• Track modifier ON/OFF in viewport and render
• Expansion of Composite view to create a new node based render pass system
• -Nodes can be dragged out to more easily view your State changes
• -Nodes can be created from scratch for a more direct render pass management workflow without tracking/recording
• -Support for basic Render Parameters, ART, Vray, Object collections, Object Properties, Material Assignment
• Persistent Composite View (you no longer loose your work on close)
• Track Vray VFB checkbox for better render element support with Vray
• Camera Sequencer Lock Animation Parameter to allow for scaling camera animation when tracks are scaled
• Return of Record button by default (can be switched back in preferences)
• All docked dialogs now open in their own new tab by default

Alembic Updates

• Performance mode support for any object
• Proper deformation export when spacewrap applied
• Any point3, float, integer support for arbitrary channel import
• UV1 animation support
• UV2+ vertex order fix
• UV channel ID preserved
• Material/Face ID preserved
• Topology changing mesh does not break material ID
• Object name preserved
• Full MXS exposure - range, nth frame exposed
• Alembic container object icon
• Alembic Performance mode Force Caching option

Scene Explorer

• Remember visible/frozen state of nested layers when overridden by parent layer
• Child layer cannot be turned on when parent layer is turned off
• Nested layer sort order : layer will be at the top
• Hide/Unhide all layers button
• Freeze/Unfreeze All layers button

Also, this rather cool feature seems to have fallen completely through the cracks.

Pizdos

Shinigami said:

Whats so hated about max? Its still one of the best stuff out there. I mean the last updates arent the best but still. Can't understand the hate

Not sure where you got that. Ever touched 3DStudio? Well.. I feel that Autodesk did not put to much into it since then.

Visum

2017 Murders Maya in this case
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdMsTV7S0pQ

Shrike

Shinigami said:

pior said:

Indeed ... One would hope that a new UI system would help with that but it doesn't seem to be the case.

Fusion360 suffers from the exact same problem - it really makes me wonder if they are even paying attention to this sort of things at all ...

wat.. 3ds maxs ui is perfect. ok not perfect but much better than any other imo

Its like a collage from 100 different persons all put together into a giant patchwork monstrosity nobody knows anymore how it works underneath



Hey let me put this extension right there
But its nice to see that they try updating some parts of it at least, even if its only visuals for now

Edit: Tidalblast accidentally linked this concept image, really would love that 3Ds look , although the usability did not really change (and many things are missing I suppose) but that looks sweet

Jerc

These UV improvements are all I've been waiting for for the past 5 years.

thomasp

Visum said:

2017 Murders Maya in this case
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdMsTV7S0pQ

not bad!
especially that it does not slow to a crawl when they are switching to editable poly which is the one everyone seems to actually be using. would be interesting to see if this is down to some clever caching for the transform operation or if all the modelling tools (connect, etc) perform at this rate on that type of mesh.

no crash either - this must be a different max from the one i know.

spacefrog

Here's another video i did which shows some nice handling of ultra high poly counts.
"The Other Package" always died on me when trying to import the CAD file ( from a STEP file )
Just look at the scene statistics i toggle on half through  the video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lfoj3n0mFV4

And Here's a general deforming mesh performance comparison session from Max 2017 down to Max 2011 ( and "The Other Package" ). The results in short:
Benchmark results  ( runtime in secs / avg. Fps):

-- Max 2017 ( Nitrous ):  37.693 / 8.48964 ( Wireframe 12 fps )
-- Max 2016 ( Nitrous ):  63.916 / 5.00657
-- Max 2015 ( Nitrous ):  77.421 / 4.13325
-- Max 2014 ( Nitrous ):  79.021 / 4.04956
.- Max 2013 ( Nitrous ):  50.634 / 0.631986
-- Max 2012 ( Nitrous ):  48.029 / 0.666264
-- Max 2011 ( D3D):          57.57 / 0.555845

-- Latest Maya:                               4-5 FPS   ( Wireframe 12-14 FPS)

The Max scene uses a Flex deformed FFD box which drives the mesh deformation depending on the animation ( kind of cheap softbody deformation). The Maya scene scene used a keyframed Lattice deformer which is  definitely less processing intensive than the Flex based approach ...

https://youtu.be/L2tnRrv6bUw

cptSwing

Minato said:

For the people who are actually interested to know what has been added to Max in the past year,  read this blog carefully (it lists many improvements that aren't mentioned elsewhere, for some reason ), also click on the Extention 1 and Extention 2 links towards the end for the rest:

http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/max/introducing-3ds-max-2017

Here I'll just paste the "Misc" section of the post:

Miscellaneous

Of course, throughout the year, we work on a number of Small User Requested Features and little enhancements. Besides the features and benefits listed above, here are some of the things our Charter and Beta customers have been talking about. Special thanks to Changsoo Eun for compiling the list.

Viewports

• 200% Faster deforming mesh prformance (New GPU Based Mesh Builder for DX11 mode) 
• Increased playback and interactive performance using node transform caching
• GPU backface cull for deforming object
• Shadow cache for better/faster shadow 
• Darker Edge mode for backfacing wireframe
• New viewport navigation mode : Orbit Point of Interest
• Customizable viewport tooltips by preViewport Tooltip callback
• Per Pixel Camera Map support for nitrous
• Reorganized viewport label
• Viewport configuration presets
• Viewport material override
• Performance shader for viewport
• New DX mode
• Hidden/Frozen/Display as box object will not evaluate/load map
• Gamma corrected background playback slowdown fixed
• Viewport switching when maximized fixed
• More readable viewport label
• Thinner and shaper selection outline 
• Viewport Statistics have been realigned for larger numbers.

Modeling

• Place Pivot Surface: Direct access working pivot from quadmenu
• Mesher Particle Flow 5 million face limit removed

Modifier Stack

• Copy/Paste modifiers to multiple objects at once.

Motion Panel

• Empty Tracks and Assigned Controllers can be reset to their default controller type
• Controllers can by copied and pasted via the right click menu in the controller tree view

IO

• .Obj poly export UV fix

Time Configuration

• “Rescale keys to whole frames” checkbox to force quantization.

Skinning

• Holding SHIFT for paint/blend weights mode change

New Map Types

• Color map
• Shape map (Ext 2)
• Text map (Ext 2)
• TextureObjMask map (Ext 1)

State Sets

• Track modifier ON/OFF in viewport and render
• Expansion of Composite view to create a new node based render pass system
• -Nodes can be dragged out to more easily view your State changes
• -Nodes can be created from scratch for a more direct render pass management workflow without tracking/recording
• -Support for basic Render Parameters, ART, Vray, Object collections, Object Properties, Material Assignment
• Persistent Composite View (you no longer loose your work on close)
• Track Vray VFB checkbox for better render element support with Vray
• Camera Sequencer Lock Animation Parameter to allow for scaling camera animation when tracks are scaled
• Return of Record button by default (can be switched back in preferences)
• All docked dialogs now open in their own new tab by default

Alembic Updates

• Performance mode support for any object
• Proper deformation export when spacewrap applied
• Any point3, float, integer support for arbitrary channel import
• UV1 animation support
• UV2+ vertex order fix
• UV channel ID preserved
• Material/Face ID preserved
• Topology changing mesh does not break material ID
• Object name preserved
• Full MXS exposure - range, nth frame exposed
• Alembic container object icon
• Alembic Performance mode Force Caching option

Scene Explorer

• Remember visible/frozen state of nested layers when overridden by parent layer
• Child layer cannot be turned on when parent layer is turned off
• Nested layer sort order : layer will be at the top
• Hide/Unhide all layers button
• Freeze/Unfreeze All layers button

Also, this rather cool feature seems to have fallen completely through the cracks.

Interested in the new boolean features as well. Looks like an average-to-good release this time around, the viewport perfomance increases are certainly good. Now let's just back away from the subscription model, eh AD?

Visum

Shrike said:

Edit: Tidalblast accidentally linked this concept image, really would love that 3Ds look , although the usability did not really change (and many things are missing I suppose) but that looks sweet

You can make max look very similar to this in 5 minutes.
Just customize colors and move windows.

Visum

Tidal Blast said:

The readability, I agree, would be a lot better. But I think 2017 comes with new UI improvements?

Max 2017 looks very similar to your concept.

cptSwing

http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/the-3ds-max-blog/3dsmax_2017_update1

Blended Box Mapping and fancy mesh-driven shizzles I don't fully comprehend. But Blended Box Mapping finally!

huffer

Anyone else have this issue? If I add an Unwrap under a Symmetry modifier, seams are not visible in viewport.

monster

It works if I add an Unwrap and then a Symmetry. But it breaks the viewing of seams when I move the unwrap above then below the Symmetry mod.

I'm on the beta so I'll report that issue right now.

coven

monster said:

It works if I add an Unwrap and then a Symmetry. But it breaks the viewing of seams when I move the unwrap above then below the Symmetry mod.

I'm on the beta so I'll report that issue right now.

Thanks for logging this Juan. We will take a look.

Also, if anyone has in questions regarding the update, fire away!

Martin