2012 is fine yes. Though if you only care about doing shaders, an older version that starts and runs faster is more interesting (It's amazing how fast Max 9 starts on current machines). Keep in mind if you want shadows, these only appeared in Max 2008 and got upgraded in Max 2009. They are buggy and application specific…
I'm sure you have all read enough questions on this kind of thing (hell, I've read enough of them trying to find answers) but I just wanted some extra input on the matter. I am interested in learning hlsl for shader programming, but I am struggling to understand where I need to start. I am currently getting used to…