v5.x Chaos V-Ray for Maya – Perpetual License

V-Ray for Maya Key Features

Rendering

Extended USD support

Work natively with USD to exchange information between DCC tools. Load and edit large amounts of data in no time.

ACEScg Color Management

For color-accurate workflows, ACEScg has become the new standard for professional production. When ACEScg is enabled, V-Ray automatically converts the colors of textures, light temperatures, sun and sky, etc. to the correct color space.

CPU and GPU Rendering

Highly-optimized CPU and GPU rendering for the best combination of fast rendering and superior image quality. V-Ray® GPU CUDA renders on CPUs as well as GPUs to take full advantage of all hardware.

Denoising

Cut render times by up to 50% with the V-Ray denoiser, or use the denoiser plugin for Nuke in post production. The NVIDIA AI denoiser is also available for rendering and delivers a noise-free image instantly in V-Ray IPR.

Resumable Rendering

Continue your render where you left off or iteratively refine quality.

Debug Shading

Render isolated textures and materials in large shading networks in IPR.

Memory Tracking

Easier to optimize your scene with new memory usage reports for textures and objects for V-Ray and V-Ray GPU.

Distributed Rendering

V-Ray supports rendering over multiple computers — utilizing all available machines to make creative decisions faster.

Light Mixing

Explore different lighting options from a single render. Interactively adjust lights, without rerendering with the LightMix render element.

Layered Compositing

The new Layer compositor lets you fine-tune your images directly in the V-Ray Frame Buffer — without the need for a separate post-processing app.

Chaos Cloud

Render scenes directly to the cloud with a push of a button.

Automated Shading Sampling

V-Ray automatically determines the shading sampling in the scene, so you can spend more time on being creative, without worrying about settings.

Render Output

V-Ray supports many single-channel and multi-channel formats, including Deep images.

Lighting & Illumination

Adaptive Lights

Faster and more accurate rendering algorithm that speeds up rendering in scenes with many lights.

Accurate Lights

Render natural, artificial and image-based lighting with a wide range of light types, shapes and controls.

Global Illumination

Choose from ray traced and hybrid global illumination methods for the perfect balance of quality and speed.

Cameras and Optical Effects

Lens Effects

Fast and accurate simulation of real-world camera lens effects like bloom and glare with dust and scratches. Available as a Nuke plugin to add directly in compositing.

Point & Shoot Camera

Perfect renders are as easy as taking a snapshot with the Automatic Exposure and White Balance settings.

Photorealistic Cameras

Real-world camera controls let you work like a photographer. Render images with detailed depth of field and cinematic motion blur.

Virtual Reality

Experience your project in virtual reality. Create content for popular VR headsets with 6×1 cubic and spherical stereo camera types.

Materials

Material library

Browse from a library of over 500 render-ready textured materials including metals, glass, wood and more.

New V-Ray Material translucency

Create true translucent materials with the updated V-Ray Material. Now with built-in volumetric random walk subsurface scattering, it’s easier than ever to render realistic skin, plastic, wax, and more.

Physical Material

Create any type of physically-based material with multiple layers.

Unique Shaders

Choose from a collection of specialty and purpose-built shaders for SSS, hair, car paint, utility shaders and more

Alsurface Material

General-purpose shader with layered SSS and glossy fresnel reflections — popular for skin.

Physical Hair Material

Render more realistic-looking hair with accurate highlights and glint and glitter controls.

Metalness

The V-Ray Material supports PBR shaders with Metalness reflection controls.

V-Ray Toon Shader

Easily create non-photorealistic, cartoon and cel-shading effects.

Shading Languages

V-Ray Supports OSL and GLSL shaders, as well as NVIDIA’s universal Material Definition Language format.

Chaos Scans Material Library support

1000+ scanned materials. Import and render directly in V-Ray.

Material Presets

Save time creating common materials with presets for aluminum, chrome, glass and more.

Textures

Stochastic Tiling

Automatically remove texture tiling artifacts with the new Stochastic tiling option in the VRayUVWRandomizer.

Dirt and Weathering

Give surfaces a weathered look. With the improved V-Ray Dirt texture, you can add dirt to cracks and crevices, create procedural streaks, or cover an entire surface.

Blue-noise Sampling

Blue-noise shows less noise but with the same amount of samples. As your render resolves, depth of field and motion blur will appear smoother with less samples.

Memory-Efficient Textures

Work with multi-resolution tiled textures from top applications MARI, Mudbox and Zbrush.

Triplanar Mapping

Quickly apply seamless textures without UVs.

Texture Randomizations

Add variety to your scene with the new VRayUVWRandomizer map and enhanced VRayMultiSubTex controls.

Bercon Noise

Better control in both the noise and fractal type with the V-Ray Bercon Noise Texture.

Texture Baking

Create texture maps with all the lighting and material information for your scene objects.

Geometry

V-Ray Decal

Easily apply decals to any surface without altering the underlying material or adding UVs. The new V-Ray Decal makes it easy to add stickers, labels, cracks, stains, scratches, and more.

Proxy Geometry

Render massive scenes with proxy objects. V-Ray proxies also support layered alembic files and efficiently replace complex scene geometry and load only at render time.

Layered Alembic Supprt

Supporting Alembic 1.7 and layers for efficient handling and updating of Alembic data.

Hair & Fur

Render realistic hair with support for Maya hair and fur, procedural V-Ray Fur, XGen, Ornatrix, and Yeti.

Rounded Corners

Generate perfectly smooth edges at render-time — with no extra modeling.

VRayscene Assests

Offload entire scenes to our .vrscene format and reuse them as assets containing geometry, animation, materials, textures and lights.

Specialty Geometry

Create unique geometry like infinite planes, isosurfaces, particles, and object cutaways with render-time booleans.

Atmospheric and Environmental Effects

Volume Rendering

Render fog, smoke and atmospheric effects that respond correctly to light. Bring in volumes from Houdini, FumeFX, Chaos Phoenix and OpenVDB caches.

Aerial Perspective

Blazing fast simulation of natural-looking skies with realistic atmospheric depth.

Render Elements

Render Elements

Output a complete set of beauty, utility, and matte passes for total control in compositing.

Light Path Expressions

Output any lighting contributions with Light Path Expressions for fine-grained control in compositing. Use boolean operations to easily combine LPEs, or quick start with built-in presets.

Cryptomatte

Automatically generate ID mattes with support for transparency, depth of field and motion blur.

Please make sure that your system fulfills these requirements before installing V-Ray. Note that V-Ray is only supported for 64 bit operating systems and 64-bit versions of Maya.

V-Ray for Maya 5 System Requirements: Windows

V-Ray for Maya 5 System Requirements: Linux

V-Ray for Maya 5 System Requirements: Mac

* The Autodesk Maya system requirements can be found here page: http://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/troubleshooting/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/System-requirements-for-Autodesk-Maya.html

For additional information on hardware, see the Hardware Recommendations article.

Notes

1 – CUDA compute capability and card reference

V-Ray 5, update 2.2

Official release

Date – Apr 20, 2022

Build 5.20.02

New features

V-Ray

• Adaptive bucket splitting;
• Maya 2023 support;
• Added a transparency_level output to Sampler Info node and TexSampler plug-in;

V-Ray GPU

• Objects Receive Shadows attribute support;

Bifrost/USD

• Support for rendering Bifrost USD graphs;

USD

• Support for importing V-Ray materials from USD to Maya nodes;
• Support for importing cameras from USD to Maya nodes;
• UI for exporting V-Ray materials to USD in the V-Ray>Tools menu;
• vrayExportUsdMaterials command for exporting V-Ray materials & displacement directly to USD;
• Support for in-memory only USD stages coming from plug-ins;
• Support for VRayLightMesh;
• Support for UsdGeomPoints particles;
• Support for USD BasisCurves hair;
• Support for USD Skel;
• Support for VDBs in USD;
• Initial support for rendering USDPreviewSurface node in Maya;
• MayaUSD 0.15 and 0.16 support;

USD/VRayPhysicalCamera

• Support for V-Ray physical cameras from Maya to USD;

Ornatrix

• Support for “user color attributes” from Ornatrix;

Denoiser

• Added an option to not denoise alpha;

Chaos Vantage

• Vantage Live-Link;

Modified features

VFB

• Made ON/OFF state in buttons in VFB2 visible;

USD

• Fixed certain lights in USD not rendering correctly;

V-Ray

• Automatically add Render Setup layer override for the enabled attribute of toggled Render Elements;
• More robust IPR change detection while mouse dragging;

Bug fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed crash with reflection exclude list in VRayObjectProperties;
• Fixed textures not updating in IPR when changing file path;
• Fixed loading a .tx textures with UDIM crashing Maya;
• Fixed illegible symbols in memory tracking log on Linux;
• Fixed a server-side distributed rendering crash involving Light Mix;
• Fixed an issue with standalone installation preventing starting a distributed rendering server on MacOS;
• Fixed a rare crash when using Alembic proxies in IPR;

USD

• Fixed memory leak when rendering USD
• Fixed error with MDL material;
• Fixed crash with instanced transforms in USD;
• Fixed wrong import of USDPreviewSurface;

VRayTriplanar/VRayProxy

• Fixed wrong local object projection on instanced proxies;

VRayToonMtl

• Fixed difference between IPR and Production rendering;

Cosmos

• Fixed drag & drop asset position on MacOS HiDPI displays;

Installer

• Fixed standalone installation incorrectly proceeding while Maya is running;

Texture Baking

• Fixed baking of more than one object through the V-Ray Baking Options;

VRayScene

• Fixed unnecessary “Preview for Node” error messages;

VFB

• Fixed an issue with lens effects sometimes being computed wrong;

V-Ray 5, update 2.1

Official release

Date – Dec 21, 2021

Build 5.20.01

New features

V-Ray GPU

• Support for the texture mode of the lens distortion option in Physical Camera;

VRayDecal

• Added an option for back side projection in VRayDecal;

Modified features

Cryptomatte

• New more robust Cryptomatte implementation;

Material importer

• Added support for real world scaling when importing Cosmos materials;

Chaos Cloud

• Changed defaults for cloud submit window to be single camera and single layer;

V-Ray GPU

• TotalLight Render Element now available with V-Ray GPU;
• Reduced kernel compilation times by up to 60%;

V-Ray

• Changed the default Compensate Energy in VRayHairNextMtl to OFF;

USD

• Improved the V-Ray chaser UI;
• Support for exporting VRayDisplacement via chaser now available in the UI;
• Support for exporting light texture files to USD;

VRayLightDome, VrayLightIES, VRayMeshLight

• Show Atmospheric contribution controls in GPU UI for V-Ray lights;

Viewport 2.0

• Updated the local anisotropy axis for VRayMtl in Viewport 2.0;

Chaos Cosmos

• Proxies from assets are now with a nicer name;

Bug fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed V-Ray not utilizing more than 64 threads in some cases on Windows 11;
• Fixed reversed bump in reflections;
• Support UDIM textures with more than 99 tiles in one dimension;
• Fixed unnecessary prompt for EULA in Maya 2018;

VRayScene

• Fixed Preview for Node not supported error when loading vrscene;

Installer

• Fix font style in the installer on MacOS;

VFB

• Fixed crash with VFB Clear log when a search is open;
• Fixed crash with IPR rendering and VFB Log set to All when using High DPI scaling;
• Fixed VFB2 log verbosity level resetting to 0 after crash;

Chaos Cosmos

• Fixed assets imported with wrong offset and translate frame placement attributes;
• Fixed materials category in Cosmos disappearing when multiple Maya sessions are open;
• Fixed button for minimizing of the Cosmos Browser disabled on Linux and macOS;
• Fixed Drag and Drop of Cosmos assets to the Maya Viewport on Linux and MacOS;

USD

• Fixed rendering an anonymous USD layer;
• Fixed error when rendering empty USD layer;
• Fixed crash when rendering different USD files with VRayScene and mayaUsdProxy in the same scene on Linux/MacOS (regression);

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed black Light Cache prepass on high resolution renders;
• Fixed standalone from Maya installation failing to render with GPU;
• Fixed crash with multiple instances of VRayDecal;
• Fixed crash in V-Ray GPU IPR when moving camera;
• Fixed memory leak with Light Cache Subdivs;
• Textured VRayDecal does not work with on-demand-mip-mapped mode;
• The Light Mix render element does not work correctly on GPU when Auto Exposure is enabled;

V-Ray GPU/LPE

• Fixed LPE not capturing scattered self illumination of EnvironmentFog or VolumeGrid;

V-Ray GPU, VRayDirt

• Fixed VRayDirt objects casting shadows even with shadows disabled;

VRayHairNextMtl, V-Ray GPU

• Fixed different GI results with enabled/disabled render elements and HairNextMtl;

V-Ray 5, update 2

Official release

Date – Nov 11, 2021

Build 5.20.00

New Features

Cosmos

• Added Cosmos asset browser
• Cosmos Materials support

VRayDecal

• An easy way of projecting one material on top of another

Chaos Cloud

• Option to submit all render layers and cameras to Chaos Cloud

USD

• Support for exporting V-Ray lights to USD
• Support for V-Ray lights in USD
• Support for exporting V-Ray Displacement to USD via the MayaUSD chaser API
• Added support for MayaUSD 0.13

VRayScene/USD

• Viewport preview for USD files in a VRayScene node

VRayMtl

• Physically correct GGX/GTR anisotropy
• VRayMtl thin-walled mode

VFB

• Added a Sharpen/Blur post effect layer
• Integrated rendering log in VFB2
• Option to create an “effectsResult” channel when only Lens Effects layer is enabled (no Denoiser)
• Batch image processing in VFB2 for vrimg files
• Ability to add color corrections to the VFB Background layer
• Added a functionality for adding VFB color corrections to all render channels

VRayHairNextMtl

• Added a Compensate Energy option for faster and more realistic rendering of white or bright hair and fur

V-Ray, Material importer

• Add support for real world scaling when importing Cosmos materials

VRayLightDome, VrayLightIES, VRayMeshLight, VRayRectLight, VRayLightSphere

• Atmospherics contribution option for lights

VRayLayeredTex

• Ability to rename the layers in VRayLayeredTex

VRayDirt

• Added Streaks blur option to VRayDirt
• Added Streaks density to VRayDirt
• Added Ignore bump option to VRayDirt
• Added Thin mesh mode to VRayDirt

VRayMtl/V-Ray GPU

• Implemented the thin-walled mode of the VRayMtl on the GPU
• Implemented the new volumetric translucency modes of the VRayMtl on the GPU

Modified Features

V-Ray

• Notarized installation on MacOS
• Discontinued zip builds on MacOS
• Anima AXYZ animated textures are now working
• Added an option to force infinity color to black for ZDepth
• Updated Embree to 3.13.0
• Removed the GPU Light Cache option, it will now be always ON
• Made the proxy filter update on keystroke
• A prompt for EULA for interactive rendering after a zip or automated install
• Removed the Clamp Output option
• Removed the Sinc AA filter
• Removed the World Scale option for Light Cache
• Help link for Post Translate Python Script available in toolclip on hover
• Automatically add extension when adding tokens for Light Cache and Irradiance Map to match saved files
• Report time spent tracing photons during rendering with progressive caustics

Chaos Cloud

• Added support for VFB2 OCIO color corrections when exporting to Chaos Cloud
• Calling Cloud and Archive Scene windows when already open now brings them on top

VRayCurvature

• Curvature texture support for isolating Convex or Concave values
• Ignore bump options

VFB

• Apply color corrections to the RGB channel when saving
• Extended vfbControl with commands for V-Ray VFB2 layers
• Better control when deleting layer groups

V-Ray GPU

• Use small buckets when rendering with CUDA CPU Only
• Calculate LC only on the GPU when V-Ray GPU is used
• Added support for tiled textures with large amount of tiles on V-Ray GPU

VRaySun

• Renamed the Improved Sky model to PRG Clear Sky

LPE, VRayScannedMtl

• Support for the coat layer in VRayScanned materials

V-Ray, Chaos Cloud

• Ability to export multiple renderable cameras to vrscene

VRayBlendMtl, VRayLayeredTex

• Removed map button for non-texturable opacities in VRayLayeredTex and VRayBlendMtl

VRayDirt

• Hid the Invert normal parameter for VRayDirt

VRayProxy

• Added number of voxels to VRayProxy info tab
• Fixed wrong viewport preview with alembic instancing
• Visibility rules working in preview mode

VRayScene

• Set the flip axis option to Auto for VRayScene nodes

USD

• Fixed lights from USD are all positioned at (0, 0, 0) in some USD files

VRayToonMtl

• Fixed animated Toon Edge Priority not working

Full release notes

V-Ray 5, update 1.2

Official Release

Date – Sep, 2021

Build 5.10.22

New features

USD

• Support for MayaUSD 0.10.0, MayaUSD 0.11.0 and MayaUSD 0.12.0

Modified features

V-Ray SDK

• Fixed faulty compilation of C++ third-party plug-ins ins since 5.10.20 causing random crashes;

Bug fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed export and import of render elements from the V-Ray settings;
• Fixed runtime error with Python 3 when creating absolute override for visible layer;

VRayMtl

• Fixed wrong result with Refraction Affect shadows when Refraction is textured;

VRayToon

• Fixed toon outlines disappearing when zooming in with orthographic camera;

OpenSubdiv/VRayDisplacement

• Fixed wrong results and random crashes when combining OpenSubdiv and VRayDisplacement;

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed V-Ray GPU IPR not rendering default orthographic views properly;

VFB

• Fixed a crash when reading VFB2 JSON property;

VRayMeshLight

• Fixed VRayLightMesh not respecting Legacy Render Layer Overrides in batch;
• Fixed Crashes with Mesh Lights and Legacy Render Layer Overrides in batch mode;

LPE

• Fixed wrong render elements output when LPEs are used;

Viewport 2.0

• Fixed wrong viewport preview with VRayLayeredTex used for Reflection Glossiness;

VRayScannedMtl

• Fixed undeterministic result with triplanar and scanned material in Maya 2020;

VRayLayeredTex

• Fixed wrong render with mayapy;

V-Ray 5, update 1.1

Official Release

Date – July 19, 2021

Build 5.10.21

New feature

V-Ray

• Maya 2022 Python 2 support in the stable nightlies;

Modified features

V-Ray Material Library

• Downloader tool support for Linux and MacOS as well;
• Support for drag’n’dropping library materials in the Hypershade and anywhere in the viewport;
• Adding the same material twice is now possible through “Add to scene”;
• Applying the same material to another object is now possible through “Apply to selected object(s)”;

Bug fixes

VFB

• Fixed a freeze when loading a background image after rendering;
• Fixed single-channel EXRs not saving corrections;
• Fixed errors with test resolution when no VFB is used;
• Fixed “Clear Frame Buffers” option not working;
• Fixed purple banding with OCIO;

VRay2sidedMtl

• Fixed crash with black translucency in specific scenes;

V-Ray

• Fixed some V-Ray metadata not written to EXR with batch rendering;
• Fixed regression with non-ASCII characters in vrscene path with standalone;
• Fixed Image format options UI opens on fullscreen in Maya 2022;
• Improved rendering speed for Alembic files on many-core CPUs;

VRayBerconNoise

• Fixed world texture mapping floating when camera is animated;

VRayBlendMtl

• Fixed default viewport preview color for non-textured mode;

V-Ray/USD

• Fixed instanced USD files not rendering properly;

VrayToon

• Fixed incorrect inner edges with opacity;

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed GPU light cache error when aborting render;
• Fixed crash with ExtraTex and GPU light cache;
• Fixed fireflies with refractive materials;

V-Ray 5, update 1

Official Release

Date – Jun 17, 2021

Build 5.10.20

New features

V-Ray

• Cryptomatte in progressive;
• V-Ray Material Library in Maya;
• Progressive caustics mode;
• Maya 2022 support;
• New Opacity cutout command;
• Added an option to switch between world units and pixels as photon lookup radius for the caustics photon map;
• Now exporting pivot and parent transforms information in vrscene files for Vantage and V-Ray for Unreal;

VRayEnvironmentFog

• Environment Fog colored transparency;

V-Ray/USD

• Initial support for rendering USD files through VRayScene and Maya USD Proxy;
• Initial support for in-memory rendering USD stages in Maya;
• Support for animated and deforming mesh geometry animation with motion blur;
• Support for V-Ray displacement from USD;
• Support for V-Ray shaders encoded in USD;
• Support for USDPreviewSurface;
• Export V-Ray materials and shaders to USD;
• Export displacement from shading group to USD;

V-Ray/GPU

• Light cache calculated on GPU;
• Added support for tiled textures with large amount of tiles on V-Ray GPU;
• Rounded corners support with Out-Of-Core geometry
• Support for VRayDirt and VRayCurvature with Out-Of-Core geometry
• Support for VRayFastSSS2 with Out-Of-Core geometry
• Support for VRayALSurfaceMtl with Out-Of-Core geometry
• Support for VRayClipper with Out-Of-Core geometry

VRayMtl

• New translucency modes for VRayMtl (based on VRayScatterVolume);
• Thin-walled refraction option;

VFB

• VRayStandalone with VFB2 support;
• Now possible to change or remove VFB2 shortcuts;
• Layers masking based on Cryptomatte, integer and color render elements data;
• Added stamp layer support;
• Custom White Balance support for color picker and tint;
• Support for animated sequences for Background layer using <frameNum> tag;
• Added an option to bake the RGB primaries conversion;
• Added horizontal/vertical offset for Background layer;
• Image Info for the history images;
• Added the frame number to the VFB History image info overlay;
• Save color corrections to a LUT file;

LPE

• Changing light path expression now updates in IPR;

V-Ray Material Library

• Added drag-n-drop support into the Maya viewport;

V-Ray/vdenoise

• Integrated Intel Open Image Denoiser;
• Added an option to select denoiser engine for IPR;

VRayRectLight, VRayMeshLight, VRayLightSphere

• Added “Occlude other lights” option for V-Ray lights;

VRayProxy

• Created vrayImportVRmeshGeom command to import proxies as Maya geometry;

V-Ray/VRayProxy

• Added a filter for searching VRayProxy hierarchy;
• Added import/export of VRayProxy material rules;

VRaySun/V-Ray GPU

• Added support for blending the sun with the horizon with the Improved sky model;

VRayPluginNodeMtl

• Support for float textures;

Material importer

• Add support for importing float texture opacity map;
• Add support for importing blend_method parameter of TexTriPlanar;
• Add support for importing TexNormalBump;
• Add V-Ray extra attribute for filter blur to the file node;
• Add support for importing “out_intensity” and “out_alpha” texture output parameters;
• Add support for importing plugin node float textures;
• Add option to disable Maya-style alpha detection on file textures;
• Material importer support for bitmap extra V-Ray attributes;
• Support for VRayUVWRandomizer in material importer;
• Added .vrmat support in material importer;

Viewport 2.0, Material importer

• Add support for the ColorCorrection plugin as a Maya node;

Improvement – Viewport 2.0, VRayPluginNodeMtl

• Passthrough viewport preview for some PluginNode textures;

V-Ray/VFB2

• Added buttons for the R, G and B channels to the VFB2 toolbar;

V-Ray GPU

• Added support for normal maps in world space;

VRayMultiSubTex

• Added random by scene name to MultiSubTex;

Viewport 2.0

• Added support for sheen and coat in Viewport 2.0;
• VRayLayeredTex basic viewport preview;

Modified features

V-Ray GPU

• Optimized CUDA CPU performance;
• Changed the default min/max subdivs values for V-Ray GPU Bucket rendering;
• Support for back side material IDs;
• Optimized IPR scene updates with OptiX;
• Implemented displacement in world space;

V-Ray

• Move all V-Ray dll/so files to V-Ray’s bin folder;
• Dropped support for Maya 2017;
• Material labels now work consistently with layered materials;
• Support new texture colorspace in Maya 2022;
• Calling the V-Ray Material Library browser when it already exists should bring the window to front;
• Faster initialization of meshes with static 3D displacement in Standalone;
• Failing to write to output image folder should be an error;
• Now ignoring “Don’t save image” option when submitting to Chaos Cloud;
• Allow arbitrary values for the motion blur’s interval center parameter;
• Mixed filtering option for ZDepth;
• Don’t include the GPU stats when copying to clipboard from the VFB;
• ExtraTex should no longer affect sampling by default;
• Network assets will be used when local caching fails;

Improvement – V-Ray

• Removed the auto scale buckets option;

VFB

• Remember the last used location and format when saving an image from the VFB;
• Keep VFB2 window in front/on top of Autodesk Maya;

VRayDirt

• Added a multiplier for the radius in VRayDirt;

VRayMeshLight

• Made VRayLightMesh available in Maya light editor;

VRayTriplanar

• Replaced the “scale” parameter of the VRayTriplanar texture with “size” dependent on the scene units;

V-Ray/V-Ray GPU

• Improved volume intersection & shading;
• Added the IPR performance statistics to the VFB 2 Stats panel;

XGen

• Deprecated the legacy XGen vrscene exporter;

Material importer

• Load the lookdevKit if it is not loaded when importing a material;
• Import TexLayeredMax to native node;
• Native import for most used nodes;
• Deduplicate identical shading graph parts;
• Import VRayLayeredTex from VRayScene as a native Maya node;

V-Ray/USD

• VRayLightMaterial is not exported to USD;
• Render animated USD list attributes;
• Render USD with multi material geometry exported from Maya;

Chaos Cloud

• Vrscene packing should now relies on cloud client file naming;

V-Ray/VRayProxy

• Undo support for proxy material overrides;

VRayCarPaint2Mtl/VRayFlakes2Mtl

• Proper UI for Flake Random Color and Flake Scale Triplanar in Carpaint2/Flakes2;

V-Ray GPU/VRayDirt

• Add support for dirt and curvature attached to extra tex when OOC geometry is enabled;

Bug fixes

Material importer

• Fixed empty UVWGen warning on importing Float textures;
• Fixed importing UVWGenObject when connected to auto generated VRayPluginNodeTex;
• Fixed Material importer flaw for materials with embedded bump attributes;
• Fixed importing the “gtr_gamma” attribute in the BRDFVRayMtl plugin;

V-Ray

• Fixed VFB History loading very slowly when OCIO configuration is used for display;
• Crash when rendering empty USD layer;
• Different color space in USD file with bitmap for VRayMultiSubTex and VRayLayeredTex;
• Wrong result from vfbControl when Display Correction is None;
• Crash rendering USD file with VRayBlendMtl;
• Fixed random artefacts on USD materials;
• Fixed VRayUpdateAE error when selecting nodes from USD hierarchy in the outliner;
• Fixed Dark coat over refractive VRayMtl;
• Fixed color management configuration not working in 2022;
• Fixed render settings startup JSON presets not working;
• Fixed slower rendering and excessive memory usage with user attributes as bitmap tags;
• Fixed slow carpaint2 and flakes2 swatch rendering;
• The UVWGenRandomizer should not transform the UVs in any way when mode 0 is selected;
• Fixed error building Embree voxel tree when “Conserve memory” is enabled in certain scenes;
• Fixed Deadlock when building image planes for MipMap buffers;
• Fixed output EXR and VRIMG files being written with the wrong group permissions on Linux;
• Fixed scenes containing OSL shaders saved with V-Ray older than 5 giving an error;
• Fixed difference between glossy and mirror caustic reflections from metallic surfaces;
• Fixed Slow rendering with duplicated textures;
• Fixed difference in DOF between in DR vs local;
• Fixed Custom Color render element not working for alpha;
• Fixed VRayCarPaintMtl2 coat IOR <1 not consistent in V-Ray and V-Ray GPU;
• Viewport IPR: Fixed resizing Maya window changing camera zoom, depending on camera scale;
• Fixed crash with corrupted PNG files;
• Fixed Intel Open Image Denoise producing artefacts in the alpha;
• Fixed crash with Instancer and Velocity RE;
• Fixed wrong VRayMtl normal map in tangent space;
• Fixed Incorrect LPE light selects with light cache (CPU);
• Fixed OSL error with UNC include paths;
• Fixed create Render Node window remaining on top when creating VRaySphereFade;
• Fixed different TexRandom by face index between Windows and Linux/OSX;
• Fixed open map with Irradiance Map Viewer not working;
• Fixed memory leak when rendering vrscene which has been exported with VFB2;
• Fixed scene with alembic hair and motion blur hangs on compile geometry phase;
• Fixed wrong VRayDirt render when another node passes a value to textured parameter;

V-Ray/IPR

• Fixed IPR not refreshing when manipulating MASH on instancer mode;

VRayProxy

• Fixed the option for “Assign shaders by name” in VRayMeshMtl not working properly;

VFB

• Fixed error when opening VFB2 for the first time;

V-Ray GPU/VRayBlendMtl

• Fixed fireflies in additive mode with multiple coat layers;

V-Ray/USD

• Fixed support for in-memory rendering USD stages in Maya;
• Fixed <UDIM> tags not working;

VRayMtl

• Fixed wrong render with thin-walled refraction option;

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed slow GPU LC preview when moving the scene in IPR;
• V-Ray GPU fails to load and render tiles texture with Mudbox filename format with lowercase $u and $v;
• Fixed Light select and GPU light cache not rendering correctly;
• Fixed crash with GPU Light cache from file on second render;
• Fixed GPU Memory leaks after IPR updates when there is capraint2 material in the scene;
• Fixed crash with RTX when deleting a map in VRayDisplacementMod during V-Ray GPU IPR;
• Fixed texture on objects with normal displacement appearing smudged in GPU production renders with on-demand mipmapping;
• Fixed specific opacity texture is often rendered incorrectly on GPU when mipmapped;
• Fixed unhandled exception with V-Ray GPU IPR;
• Fixed crash with Dome light, cpu light cache and bucket sampler;
• Fixed darker GI with matte objects when matte for refl/refr is off;
• Fixed artifacts when changing the region in IPR and using Adaptive lights;
• Black artefacts on objects with mipmapped hi-res textures;
• Fixed empty buckets with Hybrid rendering and LPE;
• Fixed Matte is not working correctly with shadow linking;
• Fixed RTX producing fireflies with specific scene;
• Fixed crash on consecutive rendering with VRayClipper and VRayTriplanarTex;
• Fixed consecutive SunLight updates crashing interactive CUDA renders;
• Fixed crash with 32k textures in full size mode;
• Fixed UVWGenChannel use_double_sided_mode option ignored by the GPU engine;
• Fixed crash when using vrmesh file with more than 16 material and UV maps;

VRayCarPaintMtl

• Fixed crash with VRayCarPaintMtl with flake size 0;

Viewport 2.0

• Fixed V-Ray lights are not hidden in the viewport after being set to be hidden;
• Fixed environment reflection viewport preview;
• A hidden dome light no longer visible in viewport reflections;

VRayPluginNodeMtl

• Fixed list items with defaults in VRayPluginNode disappearing after saving to Maya scene;

VRayProxy

• Fixed animated alembic not caching the animation with the new proxy;
• Fixed VRayProxy not packaged in a Maya archive;

VRayStochasticFlakesMtl

• Fixed Carpaint2 and Flakes2 crash when updating material swatches;

vrimg2exr

• Fixed vrimg2exr crashing in GUI mode on Linux when overwriting an existing file;

V-Ray 5 for Maya

Download

New features

Installation

• Embed the License Server and the Cloud Client installations in the V-Ray for Maya installer
• Integrate the new installer in V-Ray for Maya

VFB

• New VFB with light mix and compositing capabilities
• Old VFB can be re-enabled with VRAY_VFB2_ENABLED=0 environment variable

V-Ray

• Added LightMix render element in Maya
• Added new render elements for VRayToonMtl
• Added JSON-formatted Light Select metadata to EXR files
• Added render elements presets based on intended compositing workflow
• Implemented blue-noise optimization for the DMC sampler
• Implemented “Improved” sky model
• Improved post translate Python script control
• Light Path Expressions
• LPE boolean operations ^, &, | and – on expression
• Support ACEScg renderer color space

VRayProxy

• New VRayProxy node

VRayMtl

• Added a clear coat layer to VRayMtl
• Added a sheen layer to VRayMtl

VRayBlendMtl

• VRayBlendMtl with dynamic layers

VRayDomeLight/V-Ray GPU

• Ground projection for Dome Lights

V-Ray GPU

• Added support for Cryptomatte mode by Node Material Name
• Initial support for Out-of-Core codepath
• Initial Matte Next implementation
• Per-device GPU memory tracker
• Support for Environment and Self Illumination contribution for Light Selects
• Support for the Spline interpolation types of Maya ramps
• Support for Random by Name mode of VRayMultiSubTex
• Support for the Secondary matte projections on the GPU
• 2D Displacement support

V-Ray Denioser

• Denoising devices can now be selected with an environment variable

VRayVolumeGrid

• Maya Mesh support for Cached Playback in Maya 2019 and 2020

V-Ray Scene Converter

• Convert lights for V-Ray

Modified features

VRayProxy

• Added an option to export full path names for proxies
• Automatic conversion to the new VRayProxy node
• Check if the folder where the proxy will be saved exist before the export starts
• Enabled “Optimize for instancing” for proxy export by default
• Renamed the “One voxel per mesh” label for proxy export to “Optimize for instancing”
• Renamed -vrscenePreview to -vrsceneWholeScene in the ply2vrmesh option list
• Speed up the proxy export

V-Ray

• Light evaluation UI improvements
• GI settings clean up
• Cleaned up the Light Cache settings
• Improved access to often used items in V-Ray menu
• Removed “Generate render elements” option from Denoiser Render element UI
• Enabled texture cache by default
• Added support for Sheen and Coat parameters in VRayMtl to material importer
• Removed the Auto Volume Shader option for Maya Fluids
• Removed the Embree settings from the UI
• Removed the skylight portal options for lights
• Removed the Irradiance Map GI engine
• Removed the Linear Workflow option
• Enabled GI by default
• Cleaned up the UI for lights
• Removed the V-Ray Quick Settings
• Removed the local subdiv settings and use automated shading sampling
• Do not adjust intensity when changing light units for mesh lights
• Improved drag and drop default connections onto the V-Ray Mtl material override extra attrbites
• Added support for V-Ray list parameters in VRayPluginNode
• Faster instancer export
• VRayScene: Render Stats / Wrapper for Instancer2
• UserAttibuteValue should not truncate integers larger than 24 bits
• Volumes in VRaySwitchMtl should only use the volume plug
• Removed V-Ray Swarm from the UI
• Bitmap filenames from user attribute tags should not append project path

V-Ray GPU

• Make V-Ray GPU use the memory of the Meshes directly from V-Ray containers without copying
• Implement picking objects/materials for Optix
• EXR and TIFF files are now referenced in memory based on hash metadata
• Ability to enable or disable the global hair tree
• Added support for instancing hair on GPU
• Faster first startup on multi-GPU machines
• Reduced memory usage when using RTX
• Improved volume intersection and shading
• Added log messages for NVLink usage
• Updated the volumetric rendering on V-Ray GPU to be able to handle Volume grid and Environment Fog primitives simultaneously
• Improved time-to-first-pixel when there’s lots of nodes with user attributes
• Reduced memory usage with OptiX when rendering with bucket sampler and on-demand textures

VRayProxy/ V-Ray IPR

• Improved responsiveness when moving proxies in IPR

VRayHair3Mtl

• Removed VRayHair3Mtl

VRayMtl

• Energy preserving Metalness for colored reflections
• Removed the exit colors and soften edge advanced options from VRayMtl

VRayToonMtl

• Removed soften edge and exit colors from VRayToonMtl

V-Ray IPR

• Removed the out-of-process IPR option

Viewport 2.0

• Apply color management for file textures connected to lights in Viewport 2.0
• Removed the Viewport display options for textures of lights

VRayFastSSS2

• Removed the front and back lighting options from VRayFastSSS2

V-Ray/VRayProxy

• Improved proxy loading performance

• Improved alembic import times

VFB

• Collapse the individual color corrections rollouts by default

VRayLightMtl

• Greyed out the compensate exposure option of LightMtl when direct illumination is enabled

VRayVolumeGrid

• Added support for explicit texture coordinates for the Texture sampler in Maya/Standalone

Bug fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed slower render when started by clicking the VFB “render last” icon
• Fixed wrong bounding boxes on VRayScene preview
• Fixed new hair material not being affected when AcesCG color space is selected
• OSX: Fixed Installer failing to remove firewall exception
• Fixed artifacts with the adaptive dome light in the attached scene
• Fixed wrong object translations with flipAxis enabled in the VRayMesh preview
• Fixed very high memory usage when playing with VFB color corrections and the vfbControl command
• Fixed wrong VRaySun viewport preview when parent transform is scaled
• Fixed fatal error when rendering a refractive material in a specific scene
• Fixed OSL shader not taking into account the connected multiplyDivide node
• Fixed importing plugin object parameters for VRayPluginNode not working
• Fixed skipExistingFrame breaking the dome light texture when the first frame exists
• Fixed having V-Ray AppSDK installed prevents python in V-Ray for Maya working
• Fixed rendering hair ignoring per vertex map channels
• Fixed using uninverted normal bump option resulting in strange/wrong rendering
• Fixed error for swatches of file textures with filenames containing tags
• Allow longer names of render elements when saving in a .vrimg file from the VFB
• Fixed user attribute syntax with spaces around attribute name not working
• Fixed segmentation fault with alembic file on Linux
• Fixed instanced hair crashing when using VRayHairMtl
• Fixed error on importing vrscene with vrscene in geometry mode inside
• Fixed the Locator scale parameter not working on sphere and rectangular V-Ray lights in Viewport 2.0
• Fixed V-Ray could crash if reading maximum memory snapshot after plugins have been unloaded

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed crashes when rendering with CUDA CPU
• Fixed crashes when rendering with OOC and a dynamic mesh has velocity channel
• Fixed crashes if it fails to initialize devices
• Fixed crash during vray mesh export
• Added support for more than 8 light select render elements when using light cache
• Improved GPU loading time on scenes with many materials
• Do not allow NaN colors read from EXR files into the renderer
• Fixed wrong hue shift when using the colorCorrect node in Maya
• Fixed random crashes when there is a particle system in the scene
• Fixed Gamma and Alpha controls in the Maya colorCorrect texture not working on the GPU
• Fixed crash with VRayBlendMtl additive option
• Fixed crash when rendering very tiny hairs with length close to zero
• Fixed rendering on GPU with NVLink crashing in specific scenario
• V-Ray may crash when rendering with GPU and the GPU fails during initialization
• Difference between Full Light Select RE and RGB with VRayFastSSS2
• V-Ray standalone prints garbage on the first progress print
• Artifacts in consecutive renders after modifying texture used in both displacement and shading
• HDR Textures with really high values attached to lights can cause fireflies
• Material index overflow on GPU causes artefacts in specific scene

VRayALSurface

• Fixed SSS not computed for VRayALSurface materials seen through glossy refraction

V-Ray IPR

• Fixed crash with Lens Effects and IPR set to interactive update

VRayBerconNoise

• Fixed VRayBerconNoise Color1 and Color2 missing in Lookdev Hypershade template
• Fixed Bercon Noise rendering differently in Maya 2015, 2016, 2016.5 and 2017

VRayProxy

• Fixed crash with Maya’s Evaluation Cache when changing VRayMesh preview type

VRayMultiSubTex

• Fixed VRayMultiSubTex not looping through texture ids correctly

V-Ray GPU/VRayBlendMtl

• Fixed random incorrect render of VRayBlendMtl with sub materials with bitmaps

V-Ray Next, Update 2.2

Official Release

Date – Apr 16, 2020
Download – Build 4.30.02

New features

V-Ray

• Added V-Ray Scene export through the Maya export menu;
• Notifications for new V-Ray versions;

VRayScene

• VRayObjectProperties can now be used with VRayScene objects;

Modified features

VRayMtl/Viewport 2.0

• Improved viewport performance

Maya Fluids

• Ability to control the light emission of Maya fluids when rendered with the Phoenix shader;

VRayHairSampler

• Added output for the distance across the hair width;

Bug fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed deep EXR always using 16-bit floats;
• Fixed scene resetting in mayapy when loading V-Ray;
• Fixed packing to vrscene to work when offline;
• Fixed a slowdown with the ramp texture with textured ramp positions;

VRayAlSurface

• “Consider all objects” now only considers other objects with VRayAlSurface applied;

VRayProxy

• Fixed slow playback of proxies from network share;
• Fixed V-Ray Proxy not working correctly with named UV sets;

V-Ray IPR

• Fixed a crash with RTX in IPR in the viewport when no devices are selected for rendering;
• Fixed a crash with debug shading when adding a texture to a Dome Light;

VRmat

• Fixed Vrmat not finding assets;

VRayOSLMtl/VRayOSLTex

• Fixed OSL shader ignoring a connected multiplyDivide;
• Fixed a crash when compiling OSL on i9 9980XE processors

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed a crash with GPU IPR with distributed rendering when unhiding an object;
• Fixed incorrect Anisotropy uvw transformation;
• Fixed a crash when rendering with NVLink with more than 2 cards;
• Fixed black render with the Bucket sampler when the AA Filter size is set below 1.41;

XGen

• Fixed light linking not working for xgen hair with .vrscene cache;

Viewport 2.0

• Fixed slow Viewport 2.0 performance on OSX;

VRayFastSSS2

• Fixed back-to-beauty compositing for the VRayFastSSS2 material;

VRayEnvironmentFog

• Fixed slow rendering with VRayEnvironmentFog with Scatter GI;

VRayMeshLight

• Fixed slow rendering with MeshLight in animation;

VRayFur

• Fixed a random crash with VRayFur;

V-Ray GPU/EnvironmentFog

• Fixed a crash with EnvironmentFog when switching from bucket to progressive rendering;

V-Ray GPU/VRayProxy

• Fixed a crash when rendering VRMesh files with more than 16 map channels;

VRayVolumeGrid

• Fixed relative cache paths not working as relative to the Maya project;

VRayRectLight

• Fixed fireflies when the light shape is set to disc;

V-Ray Next, Update 2.1

Date – Jan 22, 2020

Download – Build 4.30.01

New features

V-Ray

• Support for Maya 2020
• Ability to export .vrscene package archive with all asset files
• A tool for converting materials to V-Ray material

Modified features

V-Ray

• Ability to add rounded edges V-Ray attributes directly to VRayMtl, VRayAlSurface and VRayBlend materials
• Improved bucket rendering performance on 128 core NUMA machines

VRayBerconNoise/Viewport 2.0

• Bercon noise Viewport 2.0 preview is now disabled by default for faster shader compilation

VRayAlSurface

• “Consider all objects” in the VRayAlSurface material now only considers other objects with VRayAlSurface applied

Bug fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed crease artifacts in V-Ray subdivision with non-integer crease weights
• Fixed -skipExistingFrames option not working properly in Standalone
• Fixed post translate python with overridden VRaySettings node
• Fixed automatic installation with config file
• Fixed hash detection for EXRs files from OIIO

VRayBerconNoise

• Fixed displacement with Bercon noise

VRayLayeredTex

• Fixed a bug with negative values

Chaos Cloud

• Abort submitting an incomplete animation to the cloud when the export was aborted by the user

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed a crash with motion blur on Linux
• Fixed the GPU Device Select options becoming unavailable
• Fixed a crash in Standalone on render end with textures with environment variables
• Fixed a crash in IPR with on-demand mip-mapping for textures connected to self-illumination
• Fixed artifacts with adaptive dome light
• Fixed a crash with RTX in IPR with VRayFur when deleting source geometry

V-Ray Next, Update 2

New features include:

• Full NVIDIA RTX support in V-Ray GPU — Make the most of the game-changing features in NVIDIA’s latest hardware.
• Hash map-based Light Cache — Take advantage of a new, simpler Light Cache mode with improved animation performance.
• Dust and Scratches lens effects — Simulate real-world lens effects with procedural dust and scratches.
• Distance Texture support on V-Ray GPU — Set up your scene’s shaders and render effects based on geometry with V-Ray GPU.
• Bercon Noise — Newly added support for the popular open-source noise texture.

V-Ray Next, Update 1 Build 4.12.01

New features

V-Ray

• Improved light sampling on scenes with thousands of lights
• Added memory tracking options to V-Ray Render Settings
• Added peak memory consumption in EXR metadata
• Added an option for consistent render elements for better compositing. Enabled by default on new scenes
• Faster translation of mesh geometry
• Added AppSDK with Python binding to installation
• Added Lighting Analysis Render Element
• Added efficient instancing for hair with “dynamic hair tessellation” and “stored in global hair tree” disabled
• Added matte backfaces output to the surfaceLuminance mode
• Added inverse exposure texture shader for compensating changes in physical camera
• Command line interface tool for selecting rendering devices
• Added an option to automatically exit vray -server if idle after a specified amount of time

Cryptomatte/VRayProxy

• Cryptomatte support for V-Ray Proxy sub-objects

V-Ray GPU/VRayAlSurface

• AlSurface support on GPU

Chaos Cloud

• Cloud window allowing direct submit from Maya

VRayLightSelect

• Added new light select indirect modes

V-Ray GPU

• Resumable rendering with GPU bucket sampler
• VRayCurvature support on GPU
• Support of Glossy Fresnel feature on GPU
• Added support for CUDA-CPU rendering to the GLSL and MDL plugins
• Added subpixel mapping checkbox for GPU bucket rendering
• Support for multiple map channels for TexBitmaps in MtlGLSL
• Support for the frame offset of the Maya file node when an image sequence is used

Cryptomatte

• Cryptomatte support for all deep merge modes

vdenoise

• Ability to apply lens effects in vdenoise

VRayMultiSubTex

• Added a random “Seed” and “Loop Textures” parameters to MultiSubTex

VRayMtl

• Added the anisotropy axis and anisotropy derivation controls to the VRayMtl

VRaySun

• Added the color mode option to the VRaySun

VRayToon

• Added support for VRayToon in glossy refractions

VRayFastSSS2

• Added “Color Mode” dropdown in the VRayFastSSS2 material

VRayMtl/V-Ray GPU

• Self Illumination GI for VRayMtl now visible in GPU-dependent UI

VRayToonMtl

• Added support for spline interpolation in VRayToonMtl ramps

Misc

• VRayTriplanar/Viewport 2.0 Triplanar texture projections support for viewport 2.0
• VRayOSLMtl/VRayMDLMtl Material select support for MDL and OSL

V-Ray IPR

• Faster updates in IPR when moving heavy geometry

Modified features

VRayProxy

• Optimized proxy visibility list controls for better proxy node performance in Maya
• The VRayMeshPreview node will be created during the vrayCreateProxy command, not on an idle callback, making scripting easier
• Removed unnecessary file reads when loading scene
• Shader names list generation no longer happens on idle and is now more script-friendly
• Removed the deprecated “use Maya shader” option from the VRayMesh node
• Fixed slowdown and many warnings printed when instancing a VRayMesh with missing filename
• XML material assignment override will now appear in the filepath editor
• The vrayCreateProxy command will now return a string with the newly created node
• The Maya Archive cmd will now take into account .vrmesh assets

Cryptomatte/VFB

• Cryptomatte data channels will not be visible in the VFB, only the preview channel

VRayAlSurface

• Fixed AlSurface GI contribution going into the SSS channel
• The global SSS toggle will now affect AlSurface

Chaos Cloud

• Pre/Post Render MEL scripts are now executed when exporting for Cloud

V-Ray

• Faster time to first pixel with V-Ray Fur
• Changed the default frame number separator char to . in PTex baker
• Automatic conversion from Color to AColor when using -parameterOverride in V-Ray Standalone
• Added extra attribute for controlling 3dProjection’s number of motion blur samples
• More informative error messages for image file errors
• In DR, automatically delete cache_info_portNum.txt on render end if VRAY_LOCAL_CACHE_LIMIT_VALUE=0
• Fixed inconsistencies with the merge by z-depth mode of deep rendering
• Temp files are now created with read/write permissions for all users
• Fixed VRayPlaceEnvTex Ground Projection not respecting Up Vector
• The Up Vector default value now respects Maya Preferences
• No longer force-switching to progressive sampler when changing the production engine to GPU CUDA
• Faster export of user attributes

VRaySoftbox

• Fixed Softbox not having a swatch preview

VRayMultiSubTex

• MultiSubTex indexing will start from 1 for new scenes, making randomization work correctly

VFB

• Save current channel from VFB no longer appends the channel name to the user-defined file name

VRayMtl

• Fixed some VRayMtl attributes not being listed in the channel box

V-Ray GPU/VRayEdgesTex

• Show the “Show subtriangles” option in VRayEdges texture on GPU

V-Ray GPU

• Dome lights will contribute to ZDepthRE

V-Ray IPR

• More responsive IPR for heavy scenes

Bug fixes

V-Ray IPR

• Fixed crash when stopping IPR while compiling geometry
• Fixed crashes when switching the viewport subdivisions ON/OFF while rendering
• Fixed a crash and wrong subdivision of geometry in specific cases
• Fixed changed material on instanced object not reflected in IPR
• Fixed a crash with IPR if rounded edges attribute is added to a mesh-clipper
• Fixed changing the “Use Image Sequence” parameter in IPR crashing Maya
• Fixed slowdown with viewport IPR caused by an animation rig
• Fixed flickering in IPR
• Fixed unhandled exception in IPR when VRayPlane is shaded with direct VRayLightMtl

VRayAlSurface

• Fixed incorrect render of ALSurface if lighting render element is enabled

V-Ray

• Fixed Streak particles having wrong transformation
• Maya on remote desktop crashes on loading specific file
• Fixed last user attribute not exported correctly in some cases
• Maya drag’n’drop: added a special case for Windows file share paths
• Fixed V-Ray not saving output image when data region is empty
• Fixed wrong export of referenced render elements in batch
• Fixed fatal error in some cases when starting DR if the host is not found
• Fixed V-Ray printing an incorrect success message for writing output image with a missing asset in DR
• Fixed noisy reflections with V-Ray Next for objects with cast shadows on, but visible in reflections/refractions off
• Fixed refractive objects rendering darker with photon caustics from a dome light
• Set a min limit of 1.0 to the AA Filter size
• Fixed incorrect reporting of primitives with embree hair
• Fixed crash when enabling/disabling reference scenes while running IPR
• Fixed OSL crashes on post-Haswell processors
• Fixed EXR files loaded in the VFB not having their integer REs displayed
• Fixed slowdown on many-core machines with light linking
• Fixed flickering of distant light sources with the adaptive lights and many light sources
• Fixed slower adaptive lights with V-Ray Next compared to V-Ray 3.6
• Fixed incorrect full light select element with VRayFastSSS2
• Fixed -velocityAttrName parameter of ply2vrmesh not working for Alembic input files
• Fixed resuming a bucket render resetting the progress to zero
• Fixed artifacts with matte (matte for refl/refr = off) and adaptive dome light
• Fixed super bright lens effects when using the NVidia AI denoiser
• Fixed crash when enabling Bloom/Glare in the VFB while A/B compare is also enabled
• Fixed bucket artifacts with adaptive lights
• Fixed error with AI denoiser “Optix does not support cross-frame denoising”
• Fixed DR may have watermarks if licenses are unstable
• Fixed transparent objects with “cast shadows”=off rendering black when there is a VRayDomeLight behind them
• Fixed “Direct visualization” option for caustics not working
• Fixed aborting render after the last bucket skips saving img_file, keeping unfinished resume file

Misc

• SamplerInfo Fixed Sampler Info relative coordinate system not working correctly

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed crash when baking textures with GPU
• Fixed wrong rendering of rounded edges in Next GPU
• Fixed wrong Cryptomatte in animation with V-Ray GPU
• Fixed Volume Grid crashes with VRayFastSSS2 on GPU
• Fixed missing secondary reflections on CUDA CPU with Stochastic flakes
• Fixed VRayClipper not working correctly with disabled clip lights geometry and dome light
• Fixed buckets different in sampling (noise level) with bucket sampling enabled
• Fixed unhandled exception loop on specific scene when rendering with IPR and turning off lights
• Fixed wrong worldNormals RE for SSS material hits in V-Ray GPU
• Fixed a crash when a V-Ray Fast SSS2 material is used inside a V-Ray Override material
• Fixed wrong normals of VRayLight Plane in V-Ray GPU normals render element
• Fixed hybrid rendering failing with AI denoiser
• Fixed Environment ZDepth color not matching V-Ray CPU
• Fixed crash on render end
• Fixed DiffuseFilter render element for FastSSS2 rendered incorrectly with V-Ray GPU
• Fixed crash with XGen

VRayLightSelect

• Fixed Light select not respecting alpha of a textured light when the texture is constant

VRayProxy

• Fixed crashes in proxy export of multiple meshes caused by missing UVs
• Fixed crash when loading huge alembic file with many color sets
• Fixed a crash when importing alembic with degenerate faces
• Fixed XML material assignment file not getting transferred in DR
• Fixed crash when opening a scene with alembic layers
• Fixed preview bugs with multiple proxies with different settings pointing to the same file

VRayLightDome

• Fixed error when using Resumable rendering with Adaptive Dome light

VRayMtl/VRayAlSurface

• Fixed compositing with BlendMtl not matching Beauty

Viewport IPR

• Fixed slowdown when Hypershade is opened
• Fixed slowdown when the “Selection Mode” is set to “Box”

VRayMeshLight

• Fixed artifacts with LightMesh and LightMtl with EnvironmentFog

VFB

• Fixed Lens effects settings not resetting on a new scene

VRayScene

• Fixed crash when V-Ray accesses UV-coordinates from an imported .vscene

V-Ray Next, Hotfix 1 Build 4.04.02

Bug fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed Deep output not working with fragment merge mode set to “Z-Depth”
• Fixed Deep output not working correctly with fragment merge mode set to “None”
• Fixed some UI controls missing on objects from referenced scenes
• Fixed different result between local and remote machines with certain UV setups in DR

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed artifacts when rendering displacement with VRay GPU
• Fixed artifacts with Adaptive Lights
• Fixed a crash in IPR when changing material in specific cases
• Fixed some lights not shining when more than 65K objects are present in the scene

V-Ray IPR

• Fixed slow rendering in isolate selected when dome light is deselected
• Fixed slow Viewport IPR with distributed rendering
• Fixed Viewport IPR not working in Maya 2016 Windows OpenGL strict profile
• Fixed artifacts and partial frames in certain cases when playblasting with Viewport IPR
• Overscan will no longer break Viewport IPR

VRayLightRect

• Fixed rectangle lights with texture and No Decay turned on emitting too much light

VRayScannedMtl

• Fixed a crash when rendering with mayapy with Maya 2015

What’s new in V-Ray Next for Maya (4.04)

New features

V-Ray IPR

• Added support for Maya’s playblast feature
• Isolate selected mode in IPR will now respect selected lights
• Added support for selecting node groups in isolate selected mode
• Added support for transformation changes of place3d nodes in IPR
• Added support for VRaySphereFade and VRaySphereFadeVolume in IPR

V-Ray GPU

• Bucket rendering now supported with Brute Force GI
• Added support for dispersion

VRayPhysicalCamera

• Rolling shutter effect option

Viewport 2.0

• Preview of VRayHairNextMtl dye color

VRayToonMtl

• Light blend intensity can now accept textures for better control and rim light effects

VRayScene

• Added support for user attribute overrides

V-Ray

• Sample C++ V-Ray plugins buildable with CMake shipped with the V-Ray SDK
• Added access to vertex colors in GLSL
• Added a slider for the opacity attribute of VRayLayeredTex
• Added a search filter option in the Create from V-Ray Plugin menu

V-Ray Menu

• Added tutorials and documentation links in the V-Ray Menu

V-Ray IPR/GPU

• Added support for sky model change in CUDA IPR

Modified features

V-Ray

• Removed the _x64 suffix from environmental variables and made old variables work with a warning
• Added denoise option to Object select render element
• V-Ray kSolidFractal will now render the same as in V-Ray 3.6
• Improved viewport IPR performance in Maya 2016.5
• Improved loading times of large Alembic files in specific cases
• Improved build time for embree dynamic geometry
• Improved VRayToon normal and overlap thresholds range
• Improved OptiX denoiser error messages

Misc

• Attributes added in newer V-Ray versions will now show up in older scenes
• V-Ray viewport buttons will now appear at the beginning of the layout

V-Ray GPU

• Improved GPU bucket rendering performance
• Better load balancing for Hybrid rendering with bucket sampler
• Adaptive Lights support for Brute Force rendering with Bucket sampler
• GPU-dependent UI for VRayObjectProperties
• GPU-dependent UI for VRayCarPaintMtl and VRayFlakesMtl
• GPU-dependent UI for V-Ray lights
• GPU-dependent UI for MtlWrapper
• Added device name in the kernel compilation log message

V-Ray Displacement

• Modified “Keep continuity” option to weld seams at vertices

V-Ray IPR

• Selection of sub-materials is now considered in debug shading
• Refresh IPR when VRayMetaball parameters are modified

VRayScene

• Material override will now affect Instancer

VRayScannedMtl

• VRayScannedMtl now shows diffuse and bump normals render elements and works better with denoising

VRayProxy

• Proxy node’s list of shaders was not available to scripts immediately after creation
• Invalid XML syntax for proxy material assignment file will now print appropriate error message

VRayToonMtl

• Updated the label and value range of line width in Toon Edges Override section

V-Ray Cloud

• No layer token will be created automatically for absolute paths for cloud rendering

MaterialSelect

• MaterialSelect render element now works with nested materials

Bug fixes

VRayProxy

• Fixed wrong preview of flip axis on proxy sequence
• Fixed wrong material export when there are gaps in the MeshMaterial shader array

Misc

• Viewport IPR buttons are not available on copied or hypershade viewport windows
• VRayLayeredTex was missing a scroll bar
• Orthographic Views are not working properly in IPR
• Double specular highlight when rendering VRscan car-paint in GPU

VRayFur

• Fixed fur behavior when not selected in isolate selected mode

V-Ray/V-Ray GPU

• Fixed various potential issues uncovered by code analysis

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed a crash when rendering in bucket mode with no lights in the scene
• Fixed a crash when deleting wrapped multi/sub- materials
• Fast SSS2 now renders correctly in VRayLightSelect render element
• Wrong render of VRayEdgesTex on subdivision surfaces
• VRayEdgesTex renders black with “show subtriangles” enabled
• VRayEdgesTex not showing in diffuse channel
• Rendering with bucket sampler and no scene lights was endless
• Fixed wrong GI scattering with environment fog gizmo
• Fixed crash when toggling “Render as subdivision surface” on mesh with V-Ray Edges Tex texture in IPR
• Fixed crash when changing alembic proxy visibility list in IPR
• Fixed crash on a specific heavy scene
• Fixed artifacts with adaptive lights in animation
• Fixed artifacts in IPR in specific cases
• Fixed VRayFastSSS2 material leaving artifacts with scatter radius is set to zero
• Affect background option will now work with bucket sampler on GPU

V-Ray GPU/GLSL

• Fixed crash with specific materials

V-Ray

• DR server will now fail with an error if an asset can’t be received
• Using paint color in specific VRayScannedMtl was not working properly
• Fixed overbright pixels with adaptive lights
• Fixed different DR buckets with auto exposure
• Fixed crash with VRayGLSLMtl
• Fixed crash when baking to ptex
• Fixed crash when an empty blendBumpTex is connected to VRayMtl

VRayScannedMtl

• Fixed crash with specific material setup
• Fixed artifacts with bump multiplier

VRayProxy/VRayDisplacement

• Fixed crash with keep continuity enabled on displaced proxy

VRayMtl

• Fixed compensate exposure for self-illumination

VRayLightSelect

• Fixed GI component of matte objects missing from LightSelect element Full type

VRayDomeLight

• Fixed darker result in isolate selected mode when rendering with dome light

VRScans

• Fixed a crash with a specific scene

VFB

• Blank framebuffer when comparing images from history after effectResult is generated

V-Ray/MDL

• Fixed crash on Skylake processors

V-Ray/Bifrost

• Fixed missing velocity due to changed velocity attribute name in newer Maya versions

V-Ray IPR

• Display Camera Plane now works in isolate selected with debug shading
• Fixed camera not updating in IPR in Light Cache Fly-through mode
• Fixed updates on float inputs connected to certain textures’ alpha
• Fixed objects in groups not updating their transforms when changing frame
• Fixed an error message when executing post translate python scripts in V-Ray Viewport IPR
• Fixed a crash when creating new objects very quickly
• Fixed a crash when creating light links in IPR
• Fixed VRayMtl fog color update in IPR
• Assigning a material to VRayPlane was not detected in V-Ray IPR

V-Ray VFB

• Frame stamp was not visible with output image formats with alpha channel

V-Ray GPU/VRayProxy

• Fixed crash with proxy mesh light with motion blur

V-Ray GPU/VRayEnvironmentFog

• Fixed incorrect alpha on environment fog gizmos

V-Ray GPU/VRayDomeLight

• Added support for the “Dim distance” parameter for dome lights on GPU

What’s new in V-Ray 3.60.02 for Maya

Now compatible with Maya 2018.1
Chaos Group have improved support for the Render setup in Maya 2018.1, and included a new option to set the maximum resolution for mip-mapped files to help speed up draft renders.

What’s new in V-Ray 3.52.03 for Maya

Here is the changelog provided by Chaos Group.

V-Ray

• Fixed a problem when creating output image directory in limited access situations
• V-Ray will no longer add an “rs_” prefix when using Render Setup with 2017 update 3

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed BlendMtl not rendering with OpenCL
• Fixed failing OpenCL compilation on Linux
• Fixed wrong UVs on bitmaps with driver versions 380 and up

V-Ray IPR

• Fixed a crash with light linking

VFB

• Fixed unresponsive UI with OCIO and IPR

V-RayMtl

• Fixed wrong SSS with glossy Fresnel enabled
• Fixed missing GI from self-illumination with glossy Fresnel enabled
• Fixed wrong alpha with mapped opacity and glossy Fresnel when seen in reflections

VRayAlSurface

• Now works with VRayLightSelect

VRayMesh

• Fixed a crash with Alembic file with no UV topology channel

VRayFastSSS2

• Fixed SSS surface ID not working properly

VRayFur

• Fixed wrong visibility in IPR when the base object is hidden

VRayScene

• Fixed wrong display of vrscenes in the viewport

Texture Baking

• Fixed crash when baking multiple objects

What’s new in V-Ray 3.5 for Maya

• Adaptive lights: Fast new lighting algorithm that speeds up rendering in scenes with many lights.
• V-Ray IPR: New in-process IPR starts instantly, updates faster and uses less memory. Changes to materials in the Hypershade Material Viewer are made in real time.
• V-Ray Frame Buffer tools: Speeds up look development on individual objects with the new Render Mask: Isolate select tool. Select objects, materials and camera focus directly in the frame buffer.
• alSurface material: General-purpose shader by Anders Langlands with layered SSS and glossy fresnel reflections — popular for skin.
• GPU rendering improvements: Render larger, more detailed scenes using a lot less memory with On-demand Mip-mapping. V-Ray’s fast GPU renderer adds support for a wider range of production features.
• Resumable rendering: Stop your render at any point and continue where you left off.

New in v3.4.05

New Features

V-Ray

• Support for half-float TIFFs

Modified Features

V-Ray

• Improved performance with dynamic geometry on machines with more than 32 cores
• More robust detection of changed files for the bitmap cache

Ornatrix

• Support for textured hair widths

Bug Fixes

V-Ray

• Tiff files weren’t closed properly on Windows
• Fixed MultiMatte not working in VRayBlendMtl without MultiMatteID
• Fixed crash with NURBS of first degree
• Fixed wrong rendering of UDIM textures with frame offset
• Fixed crash with viewport IPR panel in Hypershade

MayaLightDirect

• Fixed artifacts with soft shadows and shadow bias

Lighting Render Element

• Fixed “Lighting” RE not generating correctly

V-Ray IPR

• Fixed slowdown when mouse tracking is enabled

VRayDenoiser

• Fixed failure with hardware acceleration on very large images

VRayDisplacementSubdivision

• Fixed crash when baking to Ptex

Ornatrix

• Fixed Mac OSX support

VRayScannedMtl

• Fixed watermarks appearing even with a license

VRayVolumeGrid

• Fixed crash when loading a cache while IPR is running
• V-Ray maxRenderThreads setting will be respected during emissive lights creation
• V-Ray GPU Fixed bump issues with UDIM tiling

New in v3.4.04

New Features

V-Ray

• Support for Maya 2017
• Added support for licensed V-Ray Scanned materials

Light Lister

• Added “Solo light” option

Modified Features

V-Ray

• Improved High-DPI support
• EXR extra attributes now support the new render layer overrides

VRayObjectProperties

• Added drag&drop support for attribute overrides in the new Maya render setup

Bug Fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed image sequences offset and padding bugs
• V-Ray can now use more than one processor group in Windows multiprocessor configurations
• Fixed inconsistent ambient light behavior when hidden

VFB

• Fixed Maya Render View not hiding on OSX and in some other cases
• Fixed problems with non-ASCII symbols

VRayDomeLight

• Fixed viewport selection issues

Render Settings

• Fixed blank tabs when other renderers are loaded
• Fixed script errors when other renderers are loaded

New in v3.4.03

Bug Fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed image sequences with an index out of the sequence range not rendering
• Fixed crashes on old Maya versions on virtual machines and old GPUs
• Fixed wrong result with material environment override
• Fixed set driven keys not being exported correctly in some cases
• Fixed export of textures with multibyte character names
• Fixed outline appearing in the Matte shadow render element with certain sampler settings
• Environment overrides now have textured previews in viewport 2.0

V-Ray IPR

• Changes to the Rounded Edges’ corners parameter were not detected

VRayProxy

• Fixed wrong animation range in the UI
• Fixed mesh visibility lists not working after scene reload

VRayDisplacement

• Fixed issues with Ptex and vector displacement

VRayDirt

• Fixed UI issue with locked subdivs when “Use local subdivs” is disabled

VRayTriplanar

• Fixed different texture instances sharing the same UI control

VRayIESLight

• Fixed crash when toggling the target

VRayRectLight

• Fixed high CPU usage in Viewport 2.0

PartIO

• Fixed crash with PTC files and rgbPP expression

VRayLightSelect

• Now works with probabilistic lighting

VRayDenoiser

• The denoiser update button did not work after aborting denoise

VRayObjectProperties

• Fixed issues with objects with identical names

XGen

• Fixed crash when rendering archive

New in v3.4.02

New Features

VRayDenoiser

• Added Update button

vdenoise

• Added standalone denoise tool

Modified Features

V-Ray

• Support for material preview in Viewport 2.0 OpenGL core profile
• Support for VRayVolumeGrid preview in Viewport 2.0 OpenGL core profile

VRayDenoiser

• Prevented the denoiser render elements from saving as separate files

VRayOSLMtl / VRayOSLTex

• Sped up texture sampling

Bug Fixes

V-Ray

• Fixed slow IPR updates on old scenes with undersampling enabled
• Fixed incorrect rendering of materials with self-illumination with light cache

V-Ray GPU

• Fixed fireflies on scene with VRayFastSSS2
• Highlight glossiness rendered even if Trace reflections option was disabled

VRayLightDome

• Viewport representation was flipped in some Maya versions

VFB

• Clicking on the white area of the scroll bar in the color corrections window scrolls by just one pixel
• Toolbar icons were not stretched over the entire buttons when screen dpi is changed
• Fixed wrong positioning when zooming out

VRayDenoiser

• Fixed crash on OS X when hardware acceleration is enabled
• Fixed artifacts on images with fireflies
• Fixed black result on some computers with hardware acceleration

Texture Baking

• Fixed occasional freezes on objects with empty UV sets

VRayStereoscopic

• Fixed artifacts in the render

New in v3.4:

New V-Ray Denoiser

Removes noise automatically, cutting your render times by up to 50% with GPU acceleration. V-Ray’s denoising technology is non-destructive, giving you the original render and the denoised version for even more control in post. Denoising can be used progressively while rendering or after rendering, with support for animation and enhanced blending between frames with the standalone denoiser tool.

Works with Maya 2016 Extension 2

V-Ray 3.4 now supports the new render layers and motion graphics tools in Maya 2016 Extension 2.

GPU rendering improvements

• Procedural textures supported by V-Ray RT GPU can now be used as bump maps.

Aerial Perspective

• Control the color of atmospheric haze.

Faster Global Illumination

• V-Ray Light Cache calculations are up to 15% faster.

Textures

• New support for VRayMultiSubtex.

V-Ray RT improvements

• Update render regions on the fly – without restarting the render.

What’s new in V-Ray 3.0 for Maya?

Faster Ray Tracing and Rendering Performance – V-Ray 3.0 includes a number of overall speedups, and the new optimized ray tracing core performs significantly faster.

Faster Feedback – The new Progressive Image Sampler delivers instant feedback to artists and makes lighting and look development quicker and more intuitive.

More Powerful V-Ray RT – New in V-Ray 3.0, V-Ray RT renders directly in the Maya viewport and supports final frame rendering and animated sequences.

• V-Ray RT CPU uses the new Progressive Image Sampler and supports a full range of production features.
• V-Ray RT GPU now supports Render Elements.

Advanced Characters and Creatures – Improvements to character and creature workflows include optimized Hair and Fur, improved Subsurface Scattering and a new VRaySkinMtl shader.

Color Accurate Workflows – An improved V-Ray Frame Buffer adds Lens Effects and advanced color corrections for White Balance, Contrast, Hue, Saturation and Color Balance. The VFB is now dockable and supports LUTs, ICC, and OpenColorIO color management profiles.

Volume Rendering – V-Ray 3.0 includes optimized Phoenix FD volume shaders to render all types of volumetric effects including fluids, fire, smoke and heat haze. OpenVDB grids and Field3D voxel data can be imported and rendered as surfaces or volumes using the new VRayVolumeGrid node.

Production-Focused Tools – V-Ray 3.0 is designed to give artists more control and flexibility. New time-saving tools include Max Ray Intensity to clamp secondary rays, Probabilistic Light Sampling which determines optimized sampling based on lighting contributions and Render Mask to specify exact render regions using an object selection or image mask.

Pipeline Compatibility and Support for Open Standards

• Alembic 1.5 for data interchange
• GLSL for OpenGL shaders
• OpenColorIO for accurate color management
• OpenEXR 2.2 and Deep Images
• OpenSubdiv including support for creases
• OpenVDB and Field3D for volumes
• OSL for programmable shaders
• Ptex for UV-less workflows
• UDIM and UVTILE for advanced texture workfl

• Which 3D renderer should I choose?
• In Depth: Why Should I Use V-Ray?