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v5.x Chaos V-Ray for SketchUp – Perpetual

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Chaos V-Ray for SketchUp – Perpetual
  

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Real-time and photoreal rendering in one

Chaos V-Ray for SketchUp is the ultimate visualization solution for SketchUp artists and designers.

V-Ray for SketchUp is a 3D rendering software that combines real-time and photoreal rendering — all in SketchUp. From beginner to pro, V-Ray has all the tools you need to visualize your SketchUp projects from start to finish.

Chaos logo

Free 30-Day Trial

Try V-Ray, Phoenix, Vantage, Cosmos, Player, and Scans for free with a 30-day trial.

Tech support included.

See your designs in real-time.

Seeing your SketchUp designs in real-time has never been easier. Now with V-Ray Vision*, you can visualize your designs in real-time while you work in SketchUp. Move around your model, apply materials, set up lights and cameras — all in a live real-time view of your scene.

*V-Ray Vision for MacOS will be supported in an upcoming release.

Rendering that’s as real as it gets.

With true-to-life lights, cameras, and materials, rendering with V-Ray is as real as it gets. For any project, you can see exactly how it will look. It’s as close you can come to the real thing before it’s built.

Get a headstart on your next project.

V-Ray comes with hundreds of ready-to-render materials that you can apply to any scene and access to an extensive library of video tutorials, free technical support, and helpful forums. In fact, V-Ray has one of the largest visualization communities, with a world of community-created content that’s readily available.

V-Ray is the ultimate power-up for SketchUp.

Truly, V-Ray and SketchUp are the perfect team. SketchUp is the world’s most widely used 3D modeling software for architecture and design. And V-Ray is the world’s #1 rendering software for architectural visualization. The two together are the perfect combo to take your designs to the next level.

Purchase Additional Render Nodes Here


What’s new in version 5.2

With V-Ray® 5 for SketchUp, update 2, you can craft your best work faster and present or share it in more engaging ways. The new V-Ray Decal makes it fast and easy to place materials onto surfaces without disturbing the underlying material, for everything from packaging labels to IndyCars. Quickly enrich your design with extensive entourage with the new Scatter tool—without encumbering SketchUp or V-Ray Vision. And share your V-Ray Vision results via video or interactive 3D versions of your scene.

More info can be found on the Details tab.

What’s new in Version 5.1

Now, V-Ray® 5 for SketchUp gives you an essential collection of free ready-to-render assets and HDRI skies. Plus, we’ve boosted CPU denoising with Intel Open Image Denoise support and introduced more functionalities in V-Ray Vision and the VFB Compositor.

Enter the Chaos Cosmos.

Bring scenes to life with ease.

The new curated 3D content library, Chaos® Cosmos, brings essential entourage to share your vision in a captivating way. With carefully selected assets from categories such as people, vehicles, plants, furniture, and accessories, you can stage any interior or exterior.

Searchable through the new Cosmos browser, the assets can easily be placed anywhere in your scene and will be visible through any viewport you chose to work with. Spend zero time on geometry optimization or the material setup. In other words, the Cosmos assets are always render-ready and deliver high-quality results.

Learn more about Chaos Cosmos >

Improvements in V-Ray Vision.

  • Transparent material reflections. Surfaces such as glass or water now reflect other scene objects in screen space.
  • Improved anti-aliasing. Present the finer texture details and small geometric elements like plants or facade ornaments with better clarity with the new Temporal Anti-aliasing method.
  • Triplanar textures and randomization support. Take advantage of the Triplanar texture projection and Stochastic texture randomization features in Vision.
  • Soft Sun shadows. Enable the new high-quality shadows mode so objects cast soft shadows depending on the Sun Light size multiplier.

And more

  • More precision in post. Use any mask render element from V-Ray to select and color correct specific areas of the rendered image directly in the VFB.
  • Faster denoising for CPU. The new Open Image Denoise engine is perfect for interactive rendering. Don’t be constrained by specific hardware. V-Ray runs on any CPU configuration!

Archilime case study

Based in the UK, Archilime call themselves the architectural storytellers. An early V-Ray 5 for SketchUp adopters, they have been actively using and bringing the new V-Ray features into their workflow. Learn how features like the Light Mix, Light Gen, and V-Ray Vision help them and their clients work more efficiently.

Features

Rendering

Real-time rendering

With V-Ray Vision*, you can visualize your designs in real-time while you work in SketchUp. Move around your model, apply materials, set up lights and cameras—all in a live real-time view of your scene.

*V-Ray Vision for MacOS will be supported in an upcoming release.

CPU, GPU & Hybrid Rendering

V-Ray comes with two powerful rendering engines. You can choose between super fast GPU and CPU or Hybrid rendering to best suit your project needs and requirements.

Denoiser

Remove noise and dramatically cut the render times. With V-Ray Denoiser, you can denoise each render element in post-production. And with the NVIDIA AI Denoiser, V-Ray delivers instant feedback with less noise, while you design interactively.

Interactive Rendering

Render interactively while you design. Fine-tune lights and materials and see the results right away. View the render result directly in the SketchUp viewport.

Chaos Cloud

Rendering on the Cloud is just one click away.

Learn more about cloud rendering in SketchUp

V-Ray Swarm

Powerful and scalable distributed rendering system that’s simple and fast. Get an extra speed boost with V-Ray Render nodes.

UI

Smart Asset Editor

Create, edit and manage all of your assets including lights, materials, textures, geometry and render elements all in one place. All assets are structured in an intuitive folder structure.

File Manager

Manage all of your scene files in one place. Set file paths, create scene archives, and keep track of assets like textures, IES files, and proxy objects.

V-Ray Color Picker

A powerful color-picker allowing you to choose the exact color you need with the right hue and saturation. Provides RGB color values and a Kelvin temperature slider corresponding to every color slot.

V-Ray Frame Buffer

Track render history and fine-tune color, exposure, render elements and more, directly in V-Ray’s frame buffer.

Universal Asset Preview

Preview your materials, lights, textures and render elements in a single viewer. Observe how parameter changes affect the appearance of the asset in a specific isolated setting.

Lighting

Light Gen

Light Gen is a new V-Ray tool that automatically generates thumbnails of your SketchUp scene each one presenting a unique lighting scenario. Choose your favorite look and you’re ready to render.

Light Mixing

Adjust the lights in your scene even after you render. With Light Mix, once your scene is rendered, you can interactively adjust the brightness and color of any light without having to render again.

Adaptive Lights

Faster, cleaner and more accurate rendering in scenes containing many lights and image-based environment lighting.

Global Illumination

Render photorealistic rooms and interiors with powerful and fast global illumination.

Accurate Lights

Render any type of natural, artificial, or image-based lighting with a wide range of built-in light types.

Sun & Sky

Simulate realistic daylight, sunrise and sunset, even as the sun dips below the horizon, for any time and location. SketchUp sun animation is supported.

Lighitng Analysis Tool

The new Lighting Analysis render element makes it easy to visualize the real-world illumination (Lux) values of any scene.

Camera

Real-world camera

Work like a photographer, with controls for exposure, white balance, depth of field and more.

Virtual Reality

Render VR-ready content for popular virtual reality headsets with the help of the VR Camera types in Stereo mode.

Interactive lens effect

Instantly add GPU-accelerated glare, bloom and procedurally generated dust and scratches for added photorealism. Fine-tune lens effects interactively while you render.

Automatic Exposure & White Balance

Capture the perfect exposure every time. The new Auto Exposure and Auto White Balance camera controls make rendering as simple as point and shoot.

Shading

Materials

Create great looking materials or select from 500+ readily available ones in the asset library. From multilayered car paint to accurate subsurface scattering, you can create any imaginable material.

Texture Maps

Create realistic and unique shaders using any texture map or one of V-Ray’s many built-in procedural textures – Gradient, Temperature, Tri-Planar, etc.

Metalness

The V-Ray Material provides support for PBR shaders with the Metalness reflection controls.

Randomizer

To create more realistic materials, we’ve added new tools that randomize textures and colors. The VRayUVWRandomizer lets you randomize texture coordinates and includes Stochastic Tiling that automatically fixes repeating textures.

VRscans

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

Atmospheric & volumetric effects

Environment Fog

Quickly add realistic atmospheric depth and haze and use true 3D fog with realistic light scattering.

Aerial Perspective

Simulate natural looking skies with realistic atmospheric depth.

Volumetric Materials

Realistic material light scattering and translucency.

Geometry Management

Proxy Geometry

Bring more detail to your project with memory-efficient proxy models of complex objects like grass, trees, cars. Import and render V-Ray scenes (.vrscene) as references from other applications such as 3ds Max, Rhino, and Revit.

V-Ray Scene Importer

Import any .vrscene file directly as a SketchUp model with correctly sized and positioned objects, proper texture placement, lights and proxy references.

Displacement

Quickly add surface detail without extra modeling with the optimized V-Ray displacement. The 2d Displacement mode is perfect for architectural materials like brick and stone.

Grass

Create realistic grass, fabrics, and carpet with V-Ray Fur.

Section Cuts & Clipper

Easily create quick cutaways and section renders with V-Ray Clipper. Convert any scene object to a clipper.

Render Elements

Render Elements

Choose from many unique beauty, utility and matte passes to give you more control over your rendered images in compositing.

Cryptomatte Render Element

Аutomatically generates and stores object- or material-based masks. It’s perfect when you need to accurately select objects in post-production.


 

Note: for rush delivery please contact sales@toolfarm.com.

Supported platforms: SketchUp 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021

Please make sure that your system fulfills these requirements before installing V-Ray.

Windows

  • Processor – Intel 64, AMD64, or compatible processor with SSE4.2 support
  • RAM – Minimum 8 GB RAM, recommended 16 GB RAM
  • TCP/IP – Only IPv4 is supported. IPv6 is currently not supported
  • Operating System – Windows® 8.1, Windows 10, Windows 11.
  • SketchUp – SketchUp 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022
  • GPU Support -Maxwell-, Pascal-, Volta-, Turing- and Ampere- based NVIDIA card(s) with the latest video driver or at least version 411.31
    For more info, see GPU Rendering. V-Ray Vision requires a Graphics card with DirectX 11 or DirectX 12 and Shader Model 5.0 capabilities.

Mac

  • Processor – Intel 64, AMD64 or compatible processor with SSE4.2 support
  • RAM – Minimum 8 GB RAM, recommended 16 GB RAM
  • Hard Disk Space – Minimum 2GB, recommended 12GB (includes additional downloadable content)
  • TCP/IP – Only IPv4 is supported. IPv6 is currently not supported
  • Operating System – Apple® macOS 10.14.x or higher
  • Sketchup – SketchUp 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

Note: V-Ray GPU works only with C++/CPU devices under macOS. V-Ray GPU can still be used in distributed rendering where a macOS machine runs the CUDA engine on a CPU device together with Windows/Linux machine(s) running CUDA engine on GPU device(s).

V-Ray Licensing Policy

Our new License Server introduces flexible licensing for all Chaos Group products, without the need for any physical devices to be plugged into the machine. The license can be activated or released in a floating license environment.

Customer support is available only for V-Ray 5 and V-Ray Next (V-Ray 4). Earlier versions are no longer supported.

Build 5.20.06

Official release, update 2.5

Date – Apr 14, 2022

Improvements & Bug Fixes

  • V-Ray Swarm is updated to version 1.4.7
  • Adaptive Bucket Splitting is implemented. This is a new method for adapting the render bucket size for optimal utilization. The method is enabled by default for both new and old projects
  • The GPU Light Cache preview is no longer missing when the rendered image is bigger than 4040 pixels squared
  • An issue causing the asset preview to fail in specific situations is resolved

Build 5.20.05

Official release, update 2.4

Date – Mar 16, 2022

Improvements & Bug Fixes

Integration

  • Chaos License Server updated to version 5.5.5
  • macOS: The Intel Open Image denoiser engine is updated to its latest version and now works on Apple M1 devices
  • macOS: V-Ray render processes that run in emulation mode on Apple M1 systems no longer fight over the render license with render processes running in native mode at the same time. This resolves an issue preventing rendering to be started while the asset preview is running
  • macOS: Jumping between SketchUp scenes with different shadow settings during interactive rendering no longer leads to a hang
  • An issue causing a crash upon changing the image size during interactive rendering in SketchUp 2022 is resolved
  • An issue causing a crash when changing the camera type during Interactive GPU rendering is resolved
  • Clipper component definitions are no longer incorrectly created when a SketchUp section plane is added while V-Ray is active. Scenes saved with previous V-Ray versions are not automatically migrated. The redundant clipper components can be manually deleted which will not change the way the scene is rendered
  • An issue causing some of the installer buttons to be incorrectly disabled, preventing V-Ray’s installation in specific situations, is resolved
  • Changing an environment texture now correctly triggers an interactive rendering update
  • Enabling or disabling section planes now correctly triggers an interactive rendering update
  • Adding a Decal mask now correctly triggers an interactive rendering update
  • Creating a Mesh mesh during interactive rendering no longer leads to a crash
  • An issue preventing assets to be populated in the Asset Editor in specific projects is resolved
  • The VFB render progress message no longer gets stuck on ‘Compiling geometry…’ during interactive rendering
  • An issue preventing V-Ray from purging unused materials in specific situations is resolved
  • Failing to load VFB color corrections from legacy scenes is now handled in a better way. Error message is no longer displayed when loading such scenes with the current V-Ray version
  • Fur created in a specific way during interactive rendering no longer causes the fur strands to appear in the world origin instead of on the object’s surface
  • A number of issues related to OSL materials and textures are resolved. Note that such assets are currently unavailable for creation via the Asset Editor
  • The Install button in the installer is no longer renamed to Configure when a specific series of actions is performed
  • Sending Light Mix modifications to the scene now works correctly even when a custom IES light power value is used
  • The Chaos contact address is updated in both the uninstaller and the error message displayed in SketchUp (https://support.chaos.com/hc/en-us/requests/new)

V-Ray GPU

  • The GPU light cache no longer becomes slower when the output image resolution is increased
  • V-Ray GPU no longer crashes with scenes that contain materials with SSS or Volumetric translucency and Wrapper materials with the Matte option enabled
  • An issue preventing soft shadows to be cast from Omni light sources is resolved
  • An issue preventing soft shadows to be cast from Directional light sources is resolved
  • An issue causing incorrect Directional light intensity is resolved
  • The 2D and 3D texture preview swatches no longer render black in GPU mode

UI

  • An issue preventing scrolling with the mouse wheel in the Assets Outliner in specific situations is resolved
  • An issue preventing the minimum subdivisions quality parameter to be set correctly for the progressive rendering mode is resolved
  • The AppSDK bin path is no longer incorrectly set on systems where another V-Ray integration is also installed
  • An incorrect upper value limit of the VRayMtl / Refraction / Depth parameter is removed
  • The Cosmos Browser now appears on the left of the screen by default
  • Disabling the legacy Portal Light option of the rectangular light no longer leads to an error
  • Dropdown menu items are no longer being offset on mouse hover
  • A GUID automatically replaces the name of Scatter guests whose names are deleted in the host application
  • Attempting to update or download a Cosmos asset before logging in the Cosmos browser no longer opens a url with an incorrect port number
  • The asset preview no longer fails due to insufficient rights
  • An issue causing the asset preview to fail in specific situations is resolved

Vision

  • Movement in the Fly navigation mode is no longer horizontally constrained by default. Disable the Free Flight checkbox to back to enable the constraint when needed
  • The Medium shadow quality is selected by default
  • Vsync is enabled by default to avoid tearing when the camera moves quickly
  • An issue causing the Fly navigation mode camera to jump slightly in specific situations is resolved

Build 5.20.04

Official release, update 2.3

Date – Jan 28, 2022

Improvements & Bug Fixes

Integration

  • Added support for SketchUp 2022
  • Added native Apple silicone support
  • SketchUp Ruby errors are now logged in V-Ray’s Log Window
  • The Decal viewport widget is updated to more clearly show the projection’s orientation
  • An issue causing black artifacts to appear in the image during viewport rendering, is resolved
  • An issue leading to incorrect results when one of the Affect Specular or Affect Reflections options of the Dome light is disabled, is resolved
  • Enabling Volumetric Environment or changing any of the fog options now correctly triggers an interactive rendering update
  • An issue preventing vrscene files import through the File/Import menu in SketchUp 2021 and 2022, is resolved
  • A number of issues with region rendering in VFB are resolved

UI

  • Progressive Caustics implemented. The new mode can be enabled in the Calculation Mode/Disk Caching rollout. In Progressive mode the caustic effect is produced during rendering (progressive image sampler has to be used). There is no additional prepass required and no photon map is stored
  • A number of new parameters are exposed for the Curvature texture – Mode, Radius, Ignore Bump, Output Gain, Output Lift, Output Gamma, Output Pivot, Output Clamp
  • Backside Projection Decal option implemented. Enable it to see the Decal effect on a backside of a surface
  • Deleting a large number of materials at once is optimized. Deleting all the V-Ray Library materials (more than 300), for example, now takes less than a minute
  • Some of the default internal GPU engine (CUDA/RTX) parameters are updated to decrease memory usage and improve performance. Scenes saved with previous V-Ray versions are automatically migrated
  • All NeUI errors are now correctly logged in the Log Window
  • In issue causing a SettingsRTEngine.gpu_light_cache warning message to appear in the render log is resolved
  • An issue preventing the link in the new version update popup notification to work, is resolved
  • An issue causing the initial state of the SettingsOptions.ray_bias V-Ray parameter to be incorrectly set by default is resolved. The internal value that V-Ray uses now always corresponds to the UI state
  • An issue causing errors to pop up when the Material Library or Light Gen content download is interrupted is resolved. The message type is changed to a warning
  • The current project name is now automatically suggested in the Export V-Ray Scene window
  • The Scatter’s Seed parameter tooltip is updated
  • An issue causing long Scatter guest names to overlap in the guests list is resolved

Vision

  • An issue preventing Vision from working on macOS 10.14 Mojave is resolved

 

Build 5.20.03

Official release, update 2.2

Date – Dec 21, 2021

Improvements & Bug Fixes

Integration

  • Undoing object deletion now correctly updates the scene during interactive rendering
  • The Decal creation user experience is improved. SketchUp’s snapping no longer interferes with the extrusion of the projector face
  • The Scatter preview generation is optimized leading to faster instances preview generation
  • Changing the texture placement or material size of an object used as a Scatter host during interactive rendering no longer leads to a crash
  • All V-Ray-specific Windows 10 Start Menu shortcuts are now located in a V-Ray for SketchUp Start Menu group

UI

  • Consecutive errors no longer cause the Log Window to pop up and take focus each time. Only the first error brings up the Log
  • Back to Beauty render element implemented. This is a single render element that expands to all beauty elements for the actual rendering. In the VFB, this render element creates a folder named BackToBeauty visible in the Composite output source containing all elements with their appropriate blend modes. The elements used for the beauty rebuild are – Background, Lighting, Global Illumination, Reflection, Specular, Refraction, Self Illumination, Caustics, Subsurface Scattering and Atmosphere
  • Ambient Occlusion render element implemented. Internally, the render element consists of an Extra Texture render element with a Dirt texture connected to it. The only difference is that its background uses the unconcluded (white) color instead of being black
  • An issue causing the Asset Editor to show that Custom quality is used even though all settings match one of the quality presets is resolved
  • Thin Mode option added to the Dirt texture. When enabled, it enhances the look of thin surfaces by casting less dirt on them. The option makes a difference only for the Inner Occlusion Mode of the Dirt
  • Ignore Bump option added to the Dirt texture. When enabled, bump maps are excluded from Dirt computations. The option is useful, when the bump effect is too strong and may produce undesirable effects such as holes
  • Streaks Density parameter added to the Dirt texture. It controls the density of the procedural streaks
  • The name of the Improved Sky model is changed to PRG Clear Sky
  • Switching the render engine from CPU to GPU and vice versa with the Interactive mode enabled no longer changes the GI engines selection
  • Affect Atmospherics option implemented for the Sunlight. It specifies whether the light influences the atmospheric effects in the scene. The value determines the strength of the effect
  • Atmospheric Shadows option implemented for the Sunlight. When disabled, the atmospheric effects in the scene no longer cast shadows from this light source
  • Switching the render engine from CPU to GPU and vice versa with the Interactive mode enabled no longer changes the primary global illumination engine to Brute Force. If another engine (such as Irradiance Map) was initially active it will remain unchanged
  • An issue preventing the automatic adjustment of the Max Subdivs value when switching between the CPU and CUDA or RTX render engines is resolved
  • An issue causing UI elements to be resized and aligned incorrectly when a material layer name is too long is resolved
  • An issue preventing the VRay Mtl’s parameter contribution detection from functioning correctly in specific situations is resolved. The rollout expand arrow in the VRay Mtl’s properties panel will no longer appear highlighted even though all material parameters in the rollout are set to their default values
  • A CUDA or RTX device can no longer be deselected from the Engine Select Device/s menu if it is the only available one

Core

  • An issue causing a crash when changing the rendered image size during interactive rendering is resolved
  • An issue preventing V-Ray from utilizing more than 64 threads in specific situations on Windows 11 is resolved
  • Decal materials no longer render incorrectly with the GPU engine when the On-demand mipmapping Resize option is enabled
  • GPU kernel compilation times are reduced by up to 60%
  • An issue with the GPU Light Cache leading to a memory leak is resolved
  • Increasing the GI Depth during Interactive CUDA or RTX rendering no longer causes a crash when the On-demand mipmapping texture resize option is also active

Build 5.20.02

Official release, update 2.1

Date – Nov 18, 2021

Improvements & Bug Fixes

Integration

  • macOS: V-Ray no longer fails to initialize due to restricted access to its log files’ directory
  • An issue preventing in-app EULA acceptance is resolved. The V-Ray installer no longer fails to create and set access to the required directories
  • An issue preventing rendering in specific projects with faulty Mesh Light components is resolved
  • An issue causing a hang during the quick creation of many assets in the Asset Editor is resolved
  • An issue preventing the Live Link from functioning correctly in specific projects is resolved. Scenes containing a Cryptomatte render elements can now be viewed and interacted with in both Vision and Vantage
  • The Scatter density is now correctly updated when the UV Placement of the density texture is changed
  • Proxy Scenes and other special V-Ray objects can no longer be selected as Scatter guests when using the Scatter Viewer tool. The tool no longer allows the selection of such unsupported objects as well as components containing them
  • The V-Ray Decal projection is now correctly overridden by the global material override. Disabling the ‘Can be Overridden’ option for the Decal material excludes it from the override effect
  • All Windows executable files located in the ..\V-Ray for SketchUp\extension\tools folder now correctly contain .exe in their name. This prevents issues with third party extensions that utilize the tools
  • An issue preventing UNC paths that start with a double backslashes (\\networkLocation\…) from being automatically resolved is fixed

UI

  • The system that establishes a connection between the Asset Editor and the preview render process is improved. This avoids situations in which the preview is not working because of an unstable connection
  • An issue causing the File Path Editor to hang in specific situations when there is a missing file in the list is resolved
  • The Swarm Auto-Discovery option is now disabled by default. This avoids issues causing none of the Swarm tags to be listed, making it impossible to use the Swarm manager
  • An issue causing unnecessary scrolling to be automatically performed in the Assets Outliner is resolved. Selecting an asset in a long list no longer causes incorrect scrolling on systems with custom UI scaling
  • Deleting the Bump attribute of a material no longer deletes child textures instantiated in other material slots
  • The Log Window’s filter source labels are improved

Vision

  • Auto-Exposure is now applied when a Standard image is exported
  • Auto-Exposure is now applied when one of the VR Camera Type output options is selected
  • Output file names that contain Unicode characters no longer cause the Video export to fail

V-Ray Core

  • The render progress is now always displayed correctly in the VFB’s status bar
  • An issue causing a memory leak with GPU Light Cache is resolved
  • An issue causing a misplaced render region to be rendered after loading images directly from the VFB history is resolved
  • An issue leading to a crash in specific situations when a Cryptomatte render element is used in a project is resolved
  • A number of interactive update issues caused by the new SSS and Volumetric translucency modes of the VRay Mtl are resolved
  • An issue preventing Light Mix from working correctly on GPU when the camera Auto Exposure is also enabled is resolved
  • An issue causing material bump maps to appear reversed when viewed in reflections is resolved

Build 5.20.01

Official release, update 2

Date – Nov 04, 2021

Vision

Performance

  • An optimized system for handling a large number of scene objects is implemented. This improves both scene loading and the interactive performance of Vision
  • Vision now completely stops rendering when there is no user interaction to decrease the load on the GPU
  • Loading of scenes with a medium to high number of complex meshes is optimized. This is done by disabling the scene optimizer which was originally combining meshes with shared materials
  • The internal handling of Vision safe frames is improved. This leads to better performance (higher FPS) in most projects

Lights

  • IES Light sources are now supported
  • A new Ambient Light Mode is implemented. The new mode can be enabled in the Settings panel. It replaces the project’s indirect lighting and reflection environments with a gray color. The value of this color can exceed 1 and is controlled by the Ambient Light Intensity slider. The new mode can be useful in closed spaces for removing the blue tint coming from the sky
  • The intensity of the Direct light source now correctly matches the one in V-Ray
  • Soft shadow for the Direct light source is implemented. Make sure that the High Shadows Quality option is selected in the Vision’s Settings panel to see the effect
  • The enabled/disabled state of Direct lights is now supported
  • Added support for the LightIESMax and LightSpotMax V-Ray plugins. This ensures that scenes containing IES or Spot light sources exported from V-Ray for 3ds Max or Revit can be successfully loaded in Vision
  • Sunlight no longer produces artifacts when the model is viewed from specific angles
  • The appearance of the Spotlight’s Penumbra Angle is improved to better match the V-Ray result

Animation

  • Sun animations are now supported and can be played back in real time in Vision
  • Temporal anti-aliasing is automatically disabled during animation playback to prevent ghosting artifacts
  • An issue causing the animation playback to be interrupted when the camera is stationary is resolved

Materials

  • A new temporal screen space reflection method implemented. Blurry reflections will improve in quality after the camera stops moving. Only opaque materials benefit from this new method
  • The Coat layer of the V-Ray Material is now supported. The Coat amount value is the only parameter which impacts Vision. The coat color, glossiness and bump are ignored
  • There is no longer a problem with transparent (and refractive) materials and specific mesh normals
  • The list of strings for the automatic ‘leaf’ material detection is extended. Vision is now better at determining whether a specific material is used for leaves shading and whether its alpha texture has to be treated as a cutout (ignoring grayscale values)

User Interface

  • The Vision toolbar can now be hidden. Use the collapse button that appears when hovering near the toolbar or the F12 keyboard shortcut to toggle the toolbar state
  • Fly mode navigation can now also be controlled with the arrow keys on the keyboard making it much more convenient for left-handed users. PgUp and PgDn keys can be used for moving the camera up and down
  • The Output panel options are rearranged. The Output Mode and the Camera Type parameters are now located at the top since their state controls the remaining parameters availability and behavior
  • The ‘Loading scene’ label is now replaced with just ‘Loading’ to avoid confusion for users unfamiliar with the term ‘scene’
  • A number of tooltips and parameter labels are updated
  • Clicking Cancel in the Save File browser window no longer resets the file type to .png
  • All the parameter panels are now automatically resized to fit in the Vision window. Scroll bar is also implemented to ensure all the parameters are accessible at all times
  • Camera movement is no longer possible while dragging a UI slider

Other improvements & Bug Fixes

  • Videos can now be exported directly from Vision. Select the Video Output Mode to save out a .webm file using the VP8 compression method
  • Standalone / runtime application export implemented. Use the Standalone Application export button on the toolbar to share the project with clients or colleagues via an executable file. Recipients of the file don’t require a V-Ray license and can enjoy the full functionality of Vision – navigation controls, color correction parameters, etc.
  • Preset Grass implemented. Add a V-Ray Fur modifier to any object and make sure that the word ‘grass’ is part of the Fur asset’s name to see grass growing on the object’s surface. The length of the V-Ray Fur determines the length of the grass in Vision (values under a specific lower limit are ignored). Beside the length and material all other Fur parameters are ignored
  • Auto Exposure behavior is improved. The target exposure is now much more balanced in dark scenes
  • Toggling the High-quality Cosmos Assets checkbox now automatically reloads the scene to ensure the option state matches the rendered result
  • V-Ray’s Instancer plugin is now supported in Vision. This ensures that Scatter results can be successfully loaded and previewed
  • The panorama image export is improved. Spherical and cubemap images will show a much higher quality. The camera orientation is also taken into account
  • The error message displayed when Vision fails to initialize is improved. It is now much more precise and can help with debugging various issues
  • The Vision icon is updated. The new icon is visible on the toolbar and is also used for the executable file of the standalone application
  • The default Tonemapping Curve is now set to Disabled. This makes Vision renders more similar to the V-Ray result out of the box
  • An issue causing ghosting artifacts to appear over transparent objects when the camera moves quickly is resolved
  • An issue causing the leaves of merged Cosmos trees to fade in a distance when the Proxy LOD option is disabled is resolved
  • An issue causing bump and normal maps appear flipped in Vision is resolved
  • Zooming in with an ortho camera no longer flips the entire model
  • Vision now correctly loads plugins with non-latin characters in their names
  • Multi Material assignments are no longer incorrect in specific situations
  • An issue preventing the output Size Multiplier from working when exporting animations is resolved
  • An issue causing objects from referenced Proxy Scene files to be misplaced is resolved
  • An issue causing Tri-planar textures to appear darker is resolved
  • Increasing the environment intensity using the multiplier value no longer causes issues in Vision
  • The Save File browser window now correctly lists existing supported files
  • Mipmaps are now generated even for textures embedded in the scene
  • An issue causing choppy camera movement in the fly navigation mode with very slow fly speeds is resolved
  • An issue causing a dark circle to appear on surfaces close and under the camera in specific situations is resolved
  • Cosmos assets are now considered when calculating the camera’s clipping planes. Cosmos assets are no longer cut out when away from regular scene objects
  • macOS: The target sphere of the orbit navigation no longer spawns at an incorrect location

Scatter

  • Scatter implemented. Easily scatter objects from the project (including Cosmos assets) onto the surface of another object. Select an object to be used as a host mesh and click the toolbar Scatter button to begin the process. Objects that will be scattered, known as guests, can then be added using the Scatter UI in the Asset Editor
  • Scatter Viewer tool implemented. Activate the tool to see all scattered instances in the project. Select, drag and drop objects with the tool active onto a Scatter host to add them as guests. The tool is automatically activated after a Scatter modifier is added
  • Detailed information on the usage of the Scatter Viewer is added to the instructor tray. Activate the tool to see it

Materials

  • Thin-walled option added to the VRay Mtl Refraction parameters. Enable it to simulate single-sided refractive surfaces avoiding unwanted refraction distortions. When enabled together with the SSS Translucency mode of the material it simulates thin-walled translucent surfaces such as curtains or leaves
  • Fog Scattering renamed to Translucency to be consistent with the parameter label used in other V-Ray integrations
  • New SSS and Volumetric translucency modes implemented for the VRay Mtl. The previously available Hard and Hybrid models are considered legacy and can no longer be used in new materials. The Volumetric mode can be used for highly transparent materials that scatter light while the SSS one is good for non-transparent materials like skin, wax, marble, etc.
  • The Fog Multiplier parameter is now called Depth (by default). It has an alternative Scale mode when SSS Translucency is used
  • A logic that automatically sets the Color Space (sRGB or Linear) for bitmaps loaded in any of the VRay Mtl layer slots is implemented. Float textures as well as maps used for Bump are assumed to be Linear. The logic is only applied when the map is initially added to a parameter texture slot. Pasting an existing texture in a slots will not use this logic
  • Changes to the Reflection Glossiness of Metallic materials now work even when the Reflection color is not white
  • VRScans loaded with a script now have all of their parameters set correctly

Decal

  • V-Rat Decal implemented. Project any material onto the scene objects with the help of the Decal viewport gismo. Add the Decal object to a group or component to limit its effects. Only objects within the same group will receive the projection
  • Detailed information on the usage of the Decal is added to the instructor tray. Activate the tool to see it

V-Ray Frame Buffer (VFB)

  • Batch Image Processing implemented. Batch-apply layer presets or color corrections to multiple images using a simple UI. The feature is located in the File menu
  • Log tab integrated into the right fly-off panel of the VFB. Only render process information is displayed in it
  • Color corrections can now be applied explicitly to the Background layer. Select the Background and then add a new correction layer to it
  • A confirmation dialogue is now correctly displayed when the ‘Clear image’ action is performed
  • The elapsed time info is now correctly displayed in the VFB stats panel during bucket rendering
  • An issue preventing V-Ray Next VFB color corrections to be loaded in V-Ray 5.1 and later is resolved
  • All the default VFB hotkeys are reintroduced
  • Color corrections can now be applied to all render channels when an image is manually saved. To enable the option go to the ‘Save all image channels to separate files’ configuration
  • The thumbnails in the VFB’s history panel are no longer duplicated when ‘Use project path’ option is enabled
  • An issue preventing the VFB from being restored (after being minimized) in specific situations is resolved
  • The behavior of the Lookup table correction layer is improved
  • An issue causing a crash when an image with Exposure correction is significantly zoomed in is resolved
  • An icon is now used for the visibility button of disabled layers

V-Ray GPU

  • Textured Spot Lights support added
  • Support for the Lighting Analysis render element added
  • An issue leading to artifacts when Adaptive Lights are enabled during Swarm rendering is resolved
  • An issue causing ‘firefly’ artifacts to appear on refractive materials in specific situations is resolved
  • The Compensate EV option of the Emissive material is now supported with VR cameras
  • The results in MultiMatte render elements now always match the CPU result
  • An issue causing visual artifacts in shadows casted by Fur strands is resolved
  • An issue with the On-demand mipmapping mode and .tx texture files is resolved
  • Light Cache is always calculated on the GPU when the CUDA or RTX engine is selected
  • An issue causing a discrepancy between Spot Lights rendered on CPU and the same light rendered by the GPU is resolved
  • An issue causing incorrect results with invisible lights viewed through blurry refractive surfaces is resolved
  • Dirt textures that are set to ignore invisible objects no longer produce occlusion from invisible lights
  • Metallic objects no longer render black when their reflection color is set to black
  • An issue causing the render process to stop midway when specific output resolution ratio is used is resolved

Cosmos

  • A new material library section added to the Cosmos browser. Choose from a selection of more than 200 render ready materials and import them to the project
  • Cosmos materials import implemented. Each material from the library can be imported directly to the project and edited when necessary. Enable the tri-planar option in the Cosmos browser if you prefer all material textures to use a tri-planar projection placement instead of the default UV mapping
  • The default size of the Cosmos browser is updated to better fit the Cosmos narrow UI
  • A drop shadow effect is added for the Cosmos browser’s navigation menu to visually separate it from background elements using the same color
  • Cosmos login is now performed in the default OS browser instead of in the Cosmos window itself
  • An issue causing unused textures to appear after specific Cosmos assets are merged is resolved
  • An issue causing the Update button next to the asset in the outliner to remain visible even after an asset is updated is resolved

UI

  • Scatter UI implemented. A new UI component that allows picking scene objects is included. It is used for picking guests to be scattered
  • Decal UI implemented
  • An issue causing the host application to crash in specific situations when shutting down the Asset Editor is resolved
  • An issue causing a visual glitch when an Attribute is added to a Blend material is resolved.
  • Assets which are automatically selected are now considered for a consecutive range selection. The automatic asset selection is performed when an asset is created, deleted, imported from the library, etc.
  • A default icon is now correctly used when an asset which does not have a pre-rendered preview is saved to a user defined library (in the left hand side panel) with the drag and drop action
  • An issue causing unnecessary scrolling in the asset parameters panel is resolved
  • An issue causing the random color generation for the Proxy Mesh asset to fail is resolved
  • Setting the refraction Depth / Fog Multiplier value with the slider no longer leads to inaccurate rounding of the parameter value
  • A number of issues causing Light Gen generation to fail are resolved
  • Loading a big number of materials as a batch from the material library (or a set of vrmat files) is now optimized taking significantly less time
  • The Light Gen info tooltip now indicates that a .lightset file is loaded
  • An issue causing the asset preview to stop working is resolved
  • V-Ray Log Window is implemented. The window will automatically pop up when an error is logged. Alternatively the window can be shown manually by clicking its shortcut in the Asset Editor. The new Log window allows filtering the log information based on the source or level, searching in the log, clearing the log data as well as a shortcut to the folder where log files are stored
  • Vropt render settings files can no longer contain material and light assets
  • The NVIDIA AI Denoiser option is automatically disabled on macOS to indicate that it is not supported
  • The Bump attribute’s Object and World space normal options are marked as legacy and can no longer be selected. The same goes for the bump mode of the Car Paint material
  • Right-clicking on a saved color swatch in the Color picker window now deletes the entry
  • Assets selected in the outliner now remain in view when switching between categories
  • An error message is displayed in the Cosmos Browser window in case the Cosmos service is down and needs to be restarted
  • Open Image Denoise is now used instead of NVIDIA AI in Light Gen. This ensures optimal denoising performance and quality independent of the available system hardware
  • The max control range of the Texture Placement / UV Channel parameter is set to 10 which is more convenient than 100 in most cases. Parameter values that exceed 10 can still be set in the number value field
  • An issue causing the remove button of the Swarm’s tags to disappear when the tag name exceeds a specific length is resolved
  • A function that establishes a live link between V-Ray for SketchUp and Chaos Vantage is implemented. The live link button is at the Chaos Vantage toolbar and can be used for starting Vantage and establishing a connection with a single click. The connection can be restarted at any time by clicking the same button once to stop it and a second time to reestablish it. By default, this new toolbar is not displayed and needs to be manually enabled
  • V-Ray Live linking menu implemented. It is located in Extensions / V-Ray / Live Linking and contains the standard functions for linking to Vision and Vantage as well as a Custom Live Link option (and the custom live link configuration)
  • Start Custom Live Link function implemented. It establishes a connection between V-Ray for SketchUp and any external application using the V-Ray Server. To use it start the other application (Vantage standalone or V-Ray for Unreal, for example), set the port it is running on in the Configuration panel and click on Start Custom Live

See full release notes here

Build 5.10.06

Official release, update 1.5

Date – July 20, 2021

Installation

  • Chaos License Server updated to version 5.5.4
  • Chaos Cloud client application updated to version 1.12.0
  • Cosmos client application updated to version 2021.7.14

Vision

  • Cubemap image export implemented. Select one of the new Camera Type options to enable it – VR Cubemap 6×1 or VR Cubemap 6 images
  • An issue sometimes causing an incorrectly lit patch (distorted rectangle) to appear in exported VR Spherical Panorama images is resolved

Light Gen

  • A custom set of HDR images can now be used for scenarios generation
  • An option that allows for scene lights to remain active on scenario application is implemented
  • The custom Sunlight orientation is no longer modified when a HDR scenario is selected

Improvements & Bug Fixes

Asset Editor

  • Materials connected to an Attribute extension in another material are now correctly listed as sub-assets in the Outliner
  • Materials saved to a custom Library location before a valid preview image is generated now correctly use the default asset icon
  • Added support for OSL material and textures. Such can be loaded from a manually created vrmat containing TexOSL or MtlOSL plugins

Integration

  • A number of issues preventing V-Ray for SketchUp from installing properly are resolved
  • Proxy previews optimized. Proxy Meshes, Proxy Scenes as well as Cosmos asset previews are now generated significantly faster
  • All files required by the OSL compiler are now included in the V-Ray’s installation folder. TexOSL or MtlOSL plugins loaded from a manually created vrmat can now be rendered

V-Ray Core

  • Proxy Meshes rendering is optimized leading to significantly shorter render times on machines with many cores
  • The VFB’s Display Correction mode now affects the history image thumbnails

Build 5.10.05

Official release, update 1.4

Date – June 22, 2021

Improvements & Bug Fixes

  • An issue prompting errors on SketchUp launch is resolved
  • Section planes in SketchUp 2017 are no longer ignored

Build 5.10.03

Official release, update 1.2

Date – April 8, 2021

Improvements & Bug Fixes

  • Cosmos client application updated to version 2021.3.22
  • Light Mix Environment adjustments can now be transferred ‘To Scene’
  • The Chaos login url opened after installation is updated. The online licensing is automatically activated to prompt login right away
  • Lighting Analysis render element changes are now automatically updated in the VFB
  • Packing a project with an unsaved model no longer fails silently. A message that clearly states – The model must be saved before it can be exported – is now displayed
  • An issue preventing specific geometry and light assets from being purged is resolved
  • Scenes created with V-Ray versions older than 1.4, later loaded and saved with V-Ray 5, update 1 no longer lead to a crash. This also applies to 3D Warehouse models saved with V-Ray 1.4 or earlier

Build 5.10.02

Official release, update 1.1

Date – Mar 24, 2021

V-Ray Vision

  • The Vision window is once again parented to the host application (Windows only). The temporary workaround positioning the window on top of all other windows (always on top) is removed
  • A regression preventing V-Ray Proxy Scene references from being loaded in Vision is fixed
  • Rotating a Proxy Mesh or a Cosmos Asset using a scale different than 1 no longer distorts the object
  • Very small Proxy Mesh scaling factors no longer cause the mesh to appear incorrectly in Vision
  • MacOS: Vision can now be used on macOS 10.14 – Mojave or earlier
  • The Tone-mapping Curve option state now persists between sessions
  • Navigation controls now work as expected when running Vision through remote desktop
  • Scene loading progress bar implemented
  • Deleting an object in a heavy scene no longer takes excessive time
  • Geometry scene data loading is optimized making heavy scenes faster to load and view in Vision
  • The Proxy Mesh LOD system no longer causes issues when a layered material is used. This improves Vision compatibility with some 3rd-party assets
  • The FreeImage library used for loading textures in Vision is replaced with OpenImageIO
  • The texture mip-map level variations creation is optimized making it faster to load scenes with many large textures
  • Textures containing built-in mip-maps are now loaded in a more optimal way. This applies to textures from the built-in material library and Cosmos
  • A number of issues related to .tx texture loading are resolved. Textures will no longer appear vertically flipped or with a black band at the bottom
  • The Orbit Navigation mode is improved in various ways. The Vision window size is taken into account when zooming, orbiting and panning to ensure consistency when resizing the app window
  • A number of issues causing an incorrect spherical panorama output are resolved

Cosmos Integration

  • Asset download progress indication implemented. See the Asset Editor section for details
  • Asset upgrade function implemented. See the Asset Editor section for details
  • A number of Cosmos asset issues in Vision are resolved. See the vision section for details

Other Improvements & Bug Fixes

Installation

  • Chaos License Server updated to version 5.5.3
  • Chaos Cloud client application updated to version 1.10.0
  • Cosmos client application updated to version 2021.03.15

Asset Editor

  • Cosmos assets Upgrade function implemented. An Upgrade icon appears on the right of the asset name in the outliner when a new version is available on the Cosmos servers. Use it to download the new version and replace the outdated one in the scene
  • Cosmos asset status indicator implemented. A small icon appears on the right side of the asset properties header to indicate whether the paths to the textures and other external reference files used by the asset are valid. Hover over the icon for more detailed information
  • Cosmos asset download progress is now displayed in the outliner. The progress percentage appears while an asset is being downloaded or upgraded
  • Custom camera type user interface implemented. When a non-standard camera type is selected with a script the appropriate UI controls (like FOV and Height) are listed in the Camera settings rollout
  • Camera clipping user interface implemented. When the camera clipping is enabled with a script the appropriate UI controls (Clipping Near, Clipping Far) are listed in the Camera settings rollout
  • Renaming an environment Bitmap texture no longer changes its Texture Placement mapping to spherical
  • An issue preventing VRScan material parameters from being set correctly on load is resolved. Properties like the Coat IOR are derived from the built-in VRScan parameter block and set as soon as the material file is loaded
  • Double-clicking on a Light Gen swatch no longer creates two LIGHT_GEN_DOME lights in the project

Integration

  • The Chaos License Server updated to version 5.5.3
  • An issue preventing V-Ray from running in SketchUp 2017 and 2018 is resolved
  • A message is displayed on startup in case the user is not logged in to the Chaos License Server. It also redirects to the license server login page
  • The Cloud Batch rendering feature is re-enabled. Use the toolbar button to submit the Scenes/Pages from the project to the Chaos Cloud. A new web wizard guides through the process of submitting and rendering the batch. All the scenes are analysed in advance and potential issues are reported
  • An issue preventing some legacy materials from being migrated and rendered correctly is resolved. Scenes saved with early V-Ray 2 versions or similar assets downloaded from the 3D Warehouse no longer prevent rendering
  • Progressive rendering is no longer restarted after saving or auto-saving the SketchUp project
  • Face material assignments are now supported during interactive rendering or in a Vision session
  • The ‘Ctrl + [‘ and ‘Ctrl + ]‘ can now be used by default to toggle the side panels of the V-Ray Frame Buffer (VFB). The VFB is now consistent with the Asset Editor in this regard
  • Proxy Meshes using a Custom Preview type can now be correctly loaded from a vrmat file. This also applies to merged Cosmos assets. Saving them as vrmats and loading them in a project no longer causes issues
  • The way Tag visibility is handled during interactive rendering is improved. Toggling the visibility of tag folders and tags within folders is now respected during interactive sessions
  • The V-Ray helper texture no longer overrides the automatically selected viewport bitmap when an attribute is added to the material
  • A number of issues with caustic photons emitted from the Sun Light are resolved. The ‘photon emission disk’ no longer appears cut in half
  • A ‘vfb_history’ folder next to the project file is no longer incorrectly created after rendering
  • Custom camera types (spherical, cylindrical, fish-eye, pinhole, etc.) can now be selected via script. The corresponding camera parameters are automatically displayed in the Asset Editor / Camera rollout
  • Custom camera clipping can be enabled via script. The near and far clipping plane options are automatically displayed in the Asset Editor / Camera rollout
  • A number of issues related to Cosmos assets export and rendering are resolved. This leads to significant speedup of the pre-render (export) stage with specific models
  • Changing a group or component’s material scale in SketchUp during a live Vision session no longer causes objects to get misplaced
  • MacOS: Automatically replacing an object when exporting it as a Proxy Mesh no longer causes an incorrect material assignment
  • MacOS: An issues causing a crash when adding a Light Mix render element is resolved
  • MacOS: An issue causing silent exceptions to be raised on macOS 11 – Big Sur is resolved

V-Ray Core

  • An issue causing a crash when a V-Ray Clipper is cutting specific mesh shapes is resolved
  • The way Sphere Light scale transformations affect the light intensity (in the Luminous and Radiant Power modes) is updated. Scaling up a light makes its dimmer to ensure the combined light emission from the surface remains constant. Note that old scenes with scaled Sphere Lights might render differently

Build 5.10.01

Official release, Update 1

Date – Feb 23, 2021

V-Ray Vision

  • Screen Space Reflections for transparent materials implemented
  • Cosmos assets support added
  • Implemented a Level of Detail (LOD) loading and display system for all Cosmos assets. When available the Medium asset representation is loaded close to the camera. Zooming out fades the model to its Low version. If the Medium representation is not available Vision uses the Low version directly. Enable the High Quality Cosmos Assets option to load their High representation close to the camera. Note that this will increase scene load times and may affect performance
  • Cosmos assets interactive transformations support added
  • The way Automatic Exposure works in Vision is improved. Pitch black areas in the image are now handled more reliably. Image over-exposition is avoided in most cases
  • Temporal image anti-aliasing method implemented. Make sure that the corresponding option in the Settings panel is enabled. This method requires a couple of frames to resolve to final quality but the result is significantly better compared to the old one. Temporal anti-aliasing is automatically disabled during the export of Spherical Panorama images
  • Added support for the Clip Opacity Mode of the VRay Mtl. Make sure that this mode is selected for leaves and other cutouts
  • The Clip opacity mode is automatically enabled for materials whose names contain ‘Leaves_mtl’ and whose opacity is mapped with texture files containing ‘Leaf’ in their name
  • Tri-planar texture support added. Only the One Texture Mode is currently supported. The Randomization parameters are ignored. World is the only Projection Space supported
  • Vision no longer stops responding when picking an output image file location two times in a row
  • Added support for the Stochastic texture randomization parameters of the UVW Placement map. The other randomization modes are not supported yet
  • Super Sampling option removed from the Image Export panel. Use Temporal Anti-aliasing combined with a longer Frame Delay to improve the output image aliasing/quality
  • Frame Delay option added in the Image Export panel. Increase its value to allow accumulative effects to resolve before the image is saved. The Temporal Anti-aliasing for example requires approximately 30-40 frames to resolve to final quality. Note that changing the Frame Delay might increase the image export time significantly depending on your hardware
  • High Quality Cosmos Assets option implemented. Use it if you want to see the High Cosmos representations close to the camera. Vision will fade to the Medium and then Low versions of the model based on the distance between the camera and the object and the area the object occupies on the screen
  • The logic for selecting a UV set for a material is improved. Note that Vision currently supports only one UV set per object
  • A number of issues with Multi Material assignments are resolved. Non-consecutive IDs are now handled correctly
  • The Sun Light Size Multiplier value is now linked to the one in Vision. Changing the sun size in V-Ray will change the Sun disk in Vison’s sky. If the Shadow Quality option in the Settings panel is set to High the Sun size also affects shadows softness
  • Shadows Quality parameter implemented. The Low preset corresponds to enabling the Optimize Shadows parameter available in older versions. It uses a lower resolution shadow map during scene interactions and switches to the full resolution one once the interaction ends. Medium enables high resolution cascading shadow maps with Medium filtering quality. High is similar to Medium but enables High filtering quality for the shadow maps, enabling soft shadows from the Sun Light
  • Soft Sun shadows implemented. Increasing the Sun Light Size Multiplier in V-Ray will now result in softer shadows in Vision as long as the High Shadow Quality option is selected
  • The Vision window is now ordered on top of all other windows (always on top). This is a temporary workaround that prevents a host-app hang caused by the previous window parenting approach

Rebranding

  • Updated installer logos and styling. Installer splash screen implemented
  • Asset Editor and Chaos Cloud toolbar icons updated
  • The About Window is redesigned completely and now matches the UI color theme selected in the Asset Editor Configuration
  • New Chaos Black color theme implemented. It uses the new Chaos brand colors and matches the Cosmos Browser appearance
  • V-Ray icon of the Vision application updated

Cosmos Integration

  • Chaos Cosmos added to the installer. The Cosmos service will be automatically started after the V-Ray installation
  • Downgrade of Cosmos is prevented in the installer. If a newer Cosmos version is already installed the V-Ray installer will simply skip the Cosmos installation step
  • Cosmos Browser window implemented. It presents a web interface for user account management, asset browsing and import
  • The Cosmos Browser window is automatically hidden when an asset is imported to allow for easier placement in the scene
  • Importing Cosmos assets in the scene automatically activates the SketchUp’s Component placement tool. Placing an asset will keep the tool active making it easier to place multiple asset instances around
  • Geometry Cosmos assets support added. Such assets are displayed and managed as blackboxes – the object and its materials are hidden in a single item listed in the Asset Editor. Merging the asset with the scene for editing is also an option
  • Merge function implemented for the geometry Cosmos assets. It converts the blackbox asset to a Proxy Mesh with associated materials that can be edited or changed completely. Note that exploding an asset will also remove the Medium geometry representation used in Vision and might affect scene load time and performance (only in Vision)
  • Cosmos asset scene replacement function implemented. Right-click on a source asset in the Asset Editor and select Use as Replacement. Right-click on the one to replace and choose Replace in Scene
  • Added support for light sources as part of Cosmos assets. The lights are by default part of the blackbox asset until it is merged. After that point the light sources become independent and editable
  • Simple light management implemented for Cosmos assets containing light sources. Intensity and Color multipliers are available for changing the contained lights’ appearance
  • Cosmos lights Light Mix support added. When the Group Instances Light Mix mode is used light changes can be transferred to the scene even for blackbox assets
  • Cosmos environment assets support added. The HDR environments are imported as global textures in the Asset Editor that can later be connected to a Dome light or directly to the scene environment
  • Cosmos asset file references are now resolved to the local Cosmos repository when opening a file. This allows users to share scenes without packing the Cosmos assets as they are available for download on both systems
  • Cosmos file references can now be packed (Pack Project). A prompt message  appears when invoking it. Packing the assets ensures that textures and other external files referenced by Cosmos assets are collected and included in the archive. As a result, the project will be loaded and rendered correctly on other systems even if the same Cosmos assets are not downloaded there. Use this option when submitting projects to a 3rd-party render farm. Cosmos assets will still be available for download on the destination computer even if they are not included in the archive
  • Use Material Override feature implemented for geometry Cosmos assets. It allows them to be individually excluded from the global material override effect

V-Ray Frame Buffer (VFB)

  • Stamp layer implemented. It allows showing the render time information on top of the rendered image similar to the stamp in VFB1
  • The Display Correction, Lens Effects and Denoiser layer icons are updated to be more distinguishable from those of the correction layers
  • Integer, Cryptomatte and MultiMatte layer masks added. Each of the mask types require a specific render element to be present in the rendered image. Masking can be done for both Render Element and Correction layers in the Composite image editing mode. Multiple masks can be applied to a single layer
  • Shortcuts editor added to the VFB Settings panel. The default hotkeys can now be reconfigured to better match a specific user workflow or avoid conflicts with the host application

Material Library

  • The Material Library can now be downloaded by users that don’t have permissions to read from the Windows registry. The default library location is used in this case – `C:\%UserProfile%\Documents\V-Ray Material Library`

Other Improvements & Bug Fixes

Notifications

  • New V-Ray version notification is now displayed in the V-Ray Frame Buffer (VFB)
  • New V-Ray version notification is now available in the About Window

File Path Resolving

  • The file path resolution logic executed when opening a new file is updated. Files with duplicated names located in different folders are now resolved correctly
  • The file path resolver search depth is increased to five (5 subfolders)

Asset Editor

  • New Intel Open Image Denoise engine implemented. It can be selected from both the quick access menu in the Render rollout and the Denoiser rollout in the advanced settings panel. It is a new denoiser engine perfect for interactive rendering. It does not depend on a specific hardware – runs on any CPU (including AMD models). Can be used as an alternative to the NVIDIA AI denoiser. Make sure to set the Update Effects slider to Rapid for best interactive experience
  • Cosmos geometry asset type implemented. A preview image is loaded for each asset and a set of parameters that control the preview, material override and lights are exposed
  • Cosmos assets download implemented. It is detected if a Cosmos asset is missing in the database and a Download button is displayed in the Outliner
  • Scale parameter implemented for Proxy Meshes. Can be used for quick unit conversions in case the mesh was exported from an application or a project using different scene units
  • Normal Map texture implemented. This is a texture utilized by some Cosmos assets for Normal Map assignment. It can not be created from the UI. It may be created only when a Cosmos asset is merged
  • Explicit Normal bump mode implemented for the VRay Mtl material layer. It can not be selected from the UI but will appear if a Normal Map is used in Cosmos assets (after Merge)
  • Normal Map Flip texture implemented. It can not be created from the UI. Added to handle specific Cosmos materials
  • Self-illumination of the VRay Mtl implemented. It can not be controlled from the UI. Added to handle specific Cosmos materials
  • An issue preventing V-Ray from running on Apple machines with the new M1 CPUs is resolved
  • The Submit to Chaos Cloud icon is updated
  • Chaos Cosmos shortcut added to the Asset Editor Toolbar (in the VFB drop-down menu)
  • Adding a Translucency attribute to a material no longer prevents the Raytrace Properties from functioning correctly on GPU
  • Blend, Bump and Contour materials now work correctly with sub-materials which names start with an underscore (e.g. _Name)
  • An issue with the HDR rotation (Bitmap Spherical Rotate H) value of Light Gen textures is resolved
  • The V-Ray logo in the material library is updated
  • The GPU Memory Management option Resize is now set to Full-size textures by default. This is a temporary solution that avoids artifacts caused by the on-demand mip-mapping mode in specific situations
  • Renaming a material no longer causes index numbers (such as 001) from its name to be removed
  • The Camera Vignetting maximum value limit is removed. Higher than the previously allowed values might be useful in scenes with narrower field of view

Integration

  • The way backface texture placement (backface UV placement) is handled in V-Ray is improved. Proxies exported from 3ds Max or any other V-Ray integration will no longer render with their backface textures missing
  • The Hide Widgets option now hides Proxy Meshes only when their preview type is set to Bounding Box or Point (origin). The preview types Whole Mesh, Custom Preview and Proxy Preview are always visible in the SketchUp viewport
  • The Helper Textures is automatically enabled for newly-created Blend, Bump and Toon Override materials
  • The no license message is updated. More detailed information is available to help determine the cause of the issue
  • An issue preventing the import of vrscene (skp to vrscene importer) from functioning correctly in SketchUp 2021 is resolved
  • A number of issue preventing V-Ray from working correctly on Windows 8.1 are resolved

3rd Party Support

  • Proxies exported from 3ds Max or generated by 3rd party plugins will no longer present incorrect backface texture placement
  • A number of issues with Vispark proxies are resolved

V-Ray for Sketchup v5.00.03 (Hotfix 2)

Date – Dec 15, 2020

V-Ray Vision

  • Vision is now supported on macOS
  • macOS: The Vision window is arranged on top of all other apps. Minimize it to temporarily hide it
  • Pen tablets can now be used for navigation in Vision
  • Vision can now be interacted with fully through a remote connection
  • An issue with loading 16-bit .tiff textures is resolved

Material Library

  • Custom location for assets library can now be specified. Set the path in the ‘Asset Editor / Advanced Settings / Configuration / Remote Assets / Download Location’. SketchUp restart is required for the new location to be used. Releasing the V-Ray license can be used as an alternative
  • The initial assets update check can now be disabled using the  ‘Asset Editor / Advanced Settings / Configuration / Remote Assets / Check for Updates’ checkbox. The setting remains disabled even between sessions until manually toggled or until V-Ray is reinstalled. It is recommended that Check for Updates is disabled in case a network location is selected for the assets
  • A correct message now appears in case a lack of permissions is preventing the library from being downloaded or updated
  • A warning icon no longer appears on the left of the ‘Materials’ library entry when the library folder does not exist on disk
  • The default ‘Materials’ library is now automatically expanded to reveal its subfolders on initial load. The user-defined state persists between sessions from then on
  • A number of issues caused by non-Latin characters in the library path are resolved

Light Gen

  • The custom assets library location specified in ‘Asset Editor / Advanced Settings / Configuration / Remote Assets / Download Location’ is also used for Light Gen assets
  • Disabling the ‘Asset Editor / Advanced Settings / Configuration / Remote Assets / Check for Updates’ checkbox also affects Light Gen. It is recommended that Check for Updates is disabled in case a network location is selected for the assets
  • A correct message now appears when a lack of permissions is preventing the HDR environments from being downloaded or updated

Light Mix

  • Light adjustments can now be applied to the lights in the project when the Group Instances Light Gen Mode is used. The ‘To Scene’ function automatically resets the VFB adjustments and a new render is required for the scene modifications to become apparent. Note that Environment and Self Illumination adjustments transfer will be implemented in the future

Other Improvements & Bug Fixes

Notifications

  • V-Ray Version Notifier implemented. It uses the native operating system notification system to give you information when a new V-Ray update is available
  • A way for disabling the update notifications is implemented. To do it disable the  ‘Asset Editor / Advanced Settings / Configuration / Update Notifications’ checkbox

Migrations

  • V-Ray Next scenes saved with CUDA or RTX engine selected or the interactive rendering mode enabled are no longer loaded incorrectly in V-Ray 5

Asset Editor

  • The ‘Select Objects in Scene’ function can now be performed with multiple materials selected
  • ‘Data Window’ dropdown menu added to the exr output Image Options. It determines the way the VFB render region selection is handled when an output image is automatically saved
  • The lower limit of the Temperature slider in the Color Picker is changed to 900 to better reflect the starting point at which solid bodies begin emitting visible light
  • An issue preventing the Volumetric Environment settings to be reverted is resolved
  • The advanced camera Shutter Speed parameter value can no longer go below 0
  • An issue caused by quickly adding slots to the Multi-Sub texture is resolved
  • A speed optimization is done for the Material Preview Swatch in case Contour attributes are not used in the selected material
  • The Asset Editor no longer appears blank or empty when opening specific scenes

Integration

  • An issue preventing images from being saved when the output file path contains non-standard characters is resolved
  • Ruby compaction in SketchUp 2021 is now handled. This improves the overall software stability and reduces the chance for random crashes
  • A number of issues caused by OS user name containing non-Latin characters are resolved
  • Hidden objects are no longer exported in .vrscene files
  • Objects exported as Proxy Mesh (.vrmesh) files now contain back-face texture placement (UV) information. This ensures that the object will appear exactly the same way after being converted to proxies
  • A number of issues with the way multiple mesh and plane clippers are rendered are resolved
  • Opening a scene saved in V-Ray 2 no longer causes two Sun lights to appear in the Asset Editor
  • macOS: Reintroduced some standalone tools that were previously missing

V-Ray Core

  • Custom operating system display scale no longer causes the VFB to appear outside of the monitor bounds in some situations
  • Toggling the global material override during RTX interactive rendering no longer leads to a crash

Build 5.00.02 (Hotfix 1)

Date – Nov. 19, 2020

V-Ray Vision

  • Automatic mipmap generation implemented for all bitmap textures. It optimizes the rendering speed and removes moire effects when viewing detailed textures in a distance
  • Exceeding a specific light count limit no longer causes artifacts to appear on screen
  • All the default V-Ray material parameters are now set correctly in Vision on scene load
  • Resizing the Vision window (making it smaller) no longer restricts the hit area of the toolbar buttons
  • Scenes with spherical cameras are no longer displayed with extremely narrow field of view. Note that the spherical camera settings from V-Ray are ignored in Vision
  • Half-float precision is used when exporting images which reduces the memory consumption. This lowers the chances of Vision crashing when huge resolution images are exported
  • Mesh Lights can now be disabled during a live session
  • A number of issues with the Orbit Mode target are resolved
  • The procedural sky appearance is improved

Other Improvements & Bug Fixes

  • Full support for SketchUp 2021 implemented
  • Big .tx textures loaded in the SketchUp model are now automatically optimized by V-Ray to keep the file size small. The full pixel data is no longer stored as a texture buffer in the model. A lower resolution compressed representation is used instead. The original texture is only loaded during render time
  • An issue with the Individual Lights Light Mix mode is resolved. Instances no longer get grouped together
  • SketchUp no longer crashes when changes to a Tri-Planar texture Projection Space are introduced during Interactive rendering
  • An issue with the Swarm uninstaller is resolved
  • An internal optimization related to the Contour / Toon effect is introduced. It boosts render times when the global contours are disabled and there are no Contour attributes used in the scene materials
  • A default texture transformation and material scaling is used even when the Texture Placement type is set to Mapping Source and the source slot is empty
  • A number of issues related to the UVW Placement Randomization options are resolved. The Render ID, Node Name, Node Handle modes now work as expected
  • Light Gen no longer applies Dome light texture rotation values exceeding 360 degrees
  • Roughness values are no longer treated as Glossiness when there is a texture connected to the slot and the texture is disabled
  • Simple Mix textures not longer disappear when the project is saved and then reopened
  • The interactive render image sampling no longer stops way before it should which in some situations leaves the image noisy
  • Each new slot added to the Multi-Sub texture now presents a unique random color by default
  • The scene synchronization between SketchUp and the V-Ray Asset Editor is optimized. Scenes with many materials now load much faster
  • Non-latin characters in the OS Username no longer prevent the Material Library and the Light Gen assets from being downloaded
  • LightGen’s notification animations are updated

V-Ray for Sketchup v5

V-Ray Vision

General

  • V-Ray Vision real-time viewer implemented. It works like a V-Ray Interactive Rendering session but uses a different engine (rasterizer) to visualize the V-Ray scene. Project changes will be immediately reflected in the Vision viewer. Note that there are still many unsupported V-Ray features and effects
  • Vision toolbar icon and menu entry added. It opens the Vision window and starts an interactive session. If the Vision window is already open the toolbar button just enables the live link

Geometry

  • Standard geometry support added. Only one UV set per object is currently supported
  • Geometry visibility state support added
  • Proxy Mesh geometry support added. Changing the Proxy Mesh file, transformation or material assignments during interactive rendering is also supported
  • Proxy Scenes (.vrscene references) support added
  • Automatic geometry optimization implemented. Small objects sharing a material are automatically merged in Vision to improve performance

Lights and Environment

  • Rectangle, Sphere, Omni, Spot, Sun and Direct lights support added. Note that only the natural Inverse Square light decay is used
  • Dome Light support added. Spherical texture placement is required
  • Multiple Dome lights handling implemented. Vision ignores disabled lights from the scene’s list and picks the first enabled one
  • Support for Dome lights without a texture added. The light color is used in this case
  • Partial Environment Override support added. A maximum of two separate environments can be visualized – one for Background and Refractions and another used for GI and Reflections
  • Partial Mesh Light support added
  • Partial Volumetric Environment support added

Materials and Textures

  • VRay Mtl support added. Note that not all V-Ray parameters have an effect
  • Bump and normal maps support added. The Bump material attribute or the built-in bump parameters can be used to enable the effect
  • Emissive material support added. Mapping the Transparency of the material is also supported
  • Material Translucency support added. This includes the Two Sided material as well as the Translucency material attributes
  • Multi Material support added
  • Basic Layered and Blend materials support added. Note that Multi Materials combined with material layering may produce incorrect results
  • Bitmap texture support added
  • Color Correction texture support added
  • Spline and Bezier Curve correction textures supported
  • Color and Temperature textures supported
  • Mix textures support added
  • Falloff and Fresnel textures supported
  • Global material override support added

Camera and Navigation

  • Standard and Orthographic (Parallel Projection) cameras support added
  • Support for Two-Point Perspective cameras added
  • Two navigation modes implemented in the Vision window. Orbit enables camera movement based on orbit, pan and zoom manipulations. In Fly mode the keyboard W, A, S, D, Q, E buttons are used for moving while mouse left click + drag can be used for looking around. The camera is automatically leveled (roll transformation is removed) once fly or orbit navigation is initiated in the Vision window

User Interface

  • Toolbar UI implemented in the Vision viewer
  • Live Link indicator added to the toolbar. It shows whether a live session is ongoing or not
  • Live Link parameters added. Camera and Sun synchronization can be disabled. Click on Vision’s Live Link button to manipulate the live link options state
  • Open button added to the toolbar. Opens an existing .vrscene file for viewing. The button is disabled while in a live session
  • Resolution Mode toggle added to the toolbar. Different modes change the image framing in the Vision window. When Fit in Window is selected the image matches the Vision window size and aspect. When Match Scene Aspect is selected the image matches the aspect ratio specified in the V-Ray render settings. The size of the image is still determined by the window size
  • Camera Navigation Mode toggle added to the toolbar. It switches between Orbit and Fly mode. The ‘Tab’ keyboard key can be used as well
  • Auto Exposure toggle added to the toolbar. Use it to quickly toggle the effect
  • Save button added to the toolbar. Use it to display the Image/Animation Export panel
  • Settings button added to the toolbar. It opens the Settings Panel where various Vision-specific options can be changed
  • Info button added to the toolbar. It shows the Info Panel where some useful keyboard shortcuts are listed
  • Color Correction button added to the toolbar. It opens a panel with various color correction settings
  • Exposure, Saturation, Contrast, Temperature and Tint color correction controls implemented
  • A way for saving, loading or resetting the color corrections implemented

Settings

  • Geometry level of detail implemented. Activating the Enable Proxy LOD option replaces the full proxy mesh with the proxy preview when the object is in a distance or occupies a small portion of the screen. Note that most proxy preview meshes don’t have material ID assignments and hence the first material in the list will be used for the whole preview
  • Shadow optimization implemented. Enable the Optimize Shadows option to use lower resolution shadows while moving the camera. Once the camera stops moving the high quality shadow will be displayed. This option only applies to Sun and other Direct lights
  • Auto Exposure implemented
  • Auto Exposure Compensation implemented
  • Fly Mode parameter implemented. Enables the fly navigation mode similar to the toolbar Navigation Mode toggle
  • Fly Speed and Mouse Sensitivity options added. Both affect only the Fly Navigation Mode
  • Fly navigation mode motion smoothing implemented. Increase the Smooth Movement Delay to explore or present the model in a more fluent manner
  • Automatic Image Based Lighting Sun option implemented. Automatically adds a directional light based on the brightest spot in an HDR environment image. The option has no effect if the project Sun is enabled. It is also not recommended when there is no single distinct bright spot in the image used for lighting

Animation

  • Camera animations can now be transferred to Vision. The animation can be played in real time or exported as a sequence of images. Set up a scene transition animation in SketchUp, enable the Animation toggle in the render settings and run Vision for a live preview

Image and Animation Export

  • Image and Animation export options panel implemented
  • File path and type controls implemented
  • Spherical panorama image export implemented
  • Image resolution control implemented. Use the Resolution Mode, Resolution slider and the Size Multiplier to change the size of the output images. Adjust the Size Multiplier value to render images bigger or smaller than the one shown on screen
  • Export function implemented. A still image or an animated sequence will be exported based on the Animation checkbox state. The Animation FPS value can be used for animation retiming

Other

  • Quick controls for modifying the Sun position and intensity implemented. Check the keyboard shortcuts in the Info Panel for more information
  • Quick camera exposure controls implemented. Check the keyboard shortcuts in the Info Panel for more information
  • Loading screen implemented. It is displayed when a scene is being transferred to Vision
  • A license error screen implemented. It is displayed when no V-Ray License is available
  • The Vision application is automatically closed after SketchUp closes
  • Multiple instances of SketchUp can now start and manage separate Vision viewers
  • Some of Vision’s preferences are stored between sessions
  • A logic for determining the initial Fly Speed on scene load based on the scene size is implemented
  • Shortcuts for manipulating the Fly Speed implemented. Use ‘Ctrl’ and ‘+’ to increase it and ‘Ctrl’ and ‘-’ to decrease it
  • HDR images bigger than 15K are automatically downscaled when loaded to avoid video memory issues

New V-Ray Frame Buffer (VFB)

  • The entire VFB is redesigned. The style and appearance of all UI elements is improved
  • Layer Compositor implemented. The right fly-off panel of the VFB now presents a full-featured layering system that can be used for image editing – without the need for a separate post-processing app
  • Image Source control implemented. Choose between RGB, Light Mix or Composite depending on your needs. The RGB mode enables color correcting the Beauty (RGB) image. The Light Mix source allows light intensities and colors to be modified after rendering. The Composite mode lets you access, comp and modify the individual render elements for a more advanced post-effects
  • The color correction system is updated. Color corrections can now be added, removed and reordered at will. Multiple instances of the same correction type are allowed
  • Blend Mode as well as Weight controls added to each correction layer
  • Color Channel Curve corrections implemented. Use the new Curves UI to remap the values in the individual R, G and B image channels
  • Filmic tonemap layer implemented. Use the preset curve profiles and their parameters to quickly achieve impressive results
  • Color correction layers can now be applied to individual render elements. For example, changing the saturation of the Diffuse element only is done by selecting it first and then creating a Hue Saturation layer from the menu. The arrow indicates that the correction is applied only to the item below
  • Render element layers can also be grouped and organized in folders
  • Save layer tree preset function implemented. Save layer configurations as part of a preset library. The library can then be referenced by the VFB for easier access
  • Advance VFB configuration implemented. Change visual as well as functional properties of the window and save them between sessions
  • The way the Denoiser and Lens Effects elements are presented is updated
  • Keyboard shortcuts implemented in VFB. Check the VFB Settings / Shortcuts section for more details
  • Four image comparison modes implemented as part of the History panel
  • Render regions can now be moved or resized after they’ve been drawn
  • The render buckets colors can now be changed in the VFB Settings window
  • The pixel info is now located in the footer section
  • The pixel info can sample more than one region and print information about the average value. Use the drop-down menu (1×1) to change the sample size
  • Stats tab added in the right fly-off panel. Useful information about the project complexity and size (memory allocation) from a V-Ray standpoint is interactively displayed there
  • Undo and Redo functions implemented
  • Render Interactive button added to the VFB. It behaves the same way as its toolbar and Asset Editor counterpart

Light Mix

  • Light Mix render element implemented. It extracts lights’ contribution and stores it in a separate element. Lights can also be grouped based on the mode in the element parameters. Use the Light Mix source mode in the VFB to change light intensities after or even during rendering
  • Individual Lights mode implemented – Each light instance is stored on a separate element/layer
  • Group Instances mode implemented – Light instances are grouped together
  • Layers mode implemented – Lights are grouped based on the SketchUp layer/tag they are associated with
  • Light IDs mode implemented – Lights are grouped by their V-Ray Object ID assignment. Right-click on a light in the viewport to assign ID

Light Gen

  • Light Gen (Generator) tool implemented. It automatically generates a big number of lighting variations for the currently active project. It can illuminate exteriors or interiors with natural light using the V-Ray Sun & Sky system or a Dome Light (named LIGHT_GEN_DOME) for an image-based lighting (IBL) setup. The resulting lighting scenarios are presented as thumbnails that can be interactively applied to the project.
  • Exterior Sun & Sky mode implemented – The scene will be lit with the V-Ray physical Sun & Sky system
  • Exterior HDR (IBL) mode implemented – The scene will be lit with a Dome light and one of the high quality HDR images that come prepackaged with the software
  • Interior Sun & Sky mode implemented – This mode is best used for illuminating closed spaces with openings letting some natural light in. A pre-pass stage picks the most notable light angles and then the scenarios are generated
  • Light Gen preset management implemented. Light Gen results can be saved and loaded with no need for re-generation. Use the results screen Save button to save a .lightset file and load it back at a later stage using the Load button in the generate screen. Note that the HDR images used by the tool might change in the future which will deprecate previously saved .lightset files
  • On-demand download for the HDR images implemented. All the images are downloaded the first time Light Gen is started. They are then stored locally (as part of the V-Ray Library) and reused in consecutive sessions. Note that custom V-Ray Material Library location specified in V-Ray for 3ds Max will also be used for storing the HDR images used by Light Gen in V-Ray for SketchUp
  • An HDR content set check is performed for every new session. In case some of the assets are missing or have been updated on the Chaos servers the updated content will become available for download. Each file is validated separately to avoid unnecessary downloads
  • A notification system is implemented. Info and error notifications will pop up in case something goes wrong with loading Light Gen preset files (.lightset). If, for example, the HDR images used in a specific lightset are missing locally but are available on the Chaos servers a notification with a direct link to the download screen will appear
  • Generation can not be initiated while there is an ongoing render process or a Vision live session

V-Ray Sun & Sky

  • Improved Sky Model implemented. Reproduce the subtleties of twilight when the sun is below the horizon with the new Sun and Sky model
  • Custom sun orientation controls added. Use the new widgets to override the host apps sunlight angle. The custom sun orientation is also used by the Light Gen tool
  • Interactive preview for the custom Sun orientation implemented. Change the sun horizontal or vertical angle while receiving visual feedback in the light preview swatch

Contours

  • Global Contours control implemented. Apply contours (V-Ray Toon) to the entire scene with a single click
  • New Toon Material implemented. It exposes new controls and fixes some of the issues of the old V-Ray Next shader
  • New Contour material attribute implemented. Easily add contours to existing scene shaders without the need of material re-assignment
  • Inner Line Control added to the global Contours as well as to the material properties
  • The Compensate EV option of all contours is enabled by default

Materials

  • VRay Mtl Coat layer implemented. Add reflective coating directly in the updated V-Ray Material, saving you both material creation and rendering time vs. using a Blend/Layered material
  • VRay Mtl Sheen layer implemented. Create soft microfiber fabrics like velvet, satin and silk with the new Sheen options
  • VRay Mtl built-in Bump layer implemented. There is no longer need to add Bump attributes to a material – use the built-in parameter section instead
  • Glossy Fresnel is now enabled for all materials and no longer available in the UI
  • The Normal opacity mode option is removed. Stochastic is used for all materials that were using it which ensures faster render times in scenes with many opacity-mapped objects
  • Metalness and Use Roughness options added to the VRay Mtl  parameters. Use them with textures prepared for a Metalness and Roughness workflow
  • PBR material layer removed. The PBR and regular VRay Mtl functionality is combined and the two separate shaders are no longer needed
  • Highlight Glossiness parameter removed. This simplifies the material control and increases realism
  • An indicator highlighting which rollout options affect the final shader is added to the VRay Mtl  layer. Rollout carets become blue in case the parameters inside contribute to the look of the material

Textures

  • Multi-sub texture randomization options implemented. Select one of the Random modes (Get ID from) and change the Hue, Saturation and Gamma values to achieve variation. Note that a single slot and one texture can be used together with the randomization parameters regardless of the number of scene IDs
  • Dirt texture Streaks implemented. Easily achieve weathered streaks and dirt in crevices with the enhanced V-Ray Dirt, which now employs both ambient and inner occlusion
  • External Mapping Source support added for all textures. Use it to easily instance Texture Placement parameters between unique textures
  • UV Randomization implemented. Select a custom Texture Placement source for any texture and connect the new UVW Placement map. There is a randomization section to help you achieve procedural variations
  • Stochastic Texture Tiling implemented as part of the UVW Randomizer. Automatically remove texture tiling artifacts with the new Stochastic tiling option on the UVW Placement
  • Added support for .tx file format for Bitmap textures

Material Library

  • The built-in material library is updated in various ways to take advantage of all new functionality in V-Ray 5
  • All the materials in the library now use GGX brdf type. The Glossiness as well as the GGX Tail Falloff values are adjusted accordingly
  • Materials previously using the Bump attribute now use the built-in Bump
  • Materials previously using Reflection Coat layer now use the built-in Coat
  • Fabric materials previously using Diffuse Coat layer now use the built-in Sheen
  • Textures that require identical texture placement in the scope of the material now use a single instanced UVW Placement map
  • The randomization feature of the UVWPlacement is utilized where appropriate to avoid visible texture repetition patterns
  • The resolution of all library textures is increased up to 4K
  • The library is now downloaded on demand. With the increased texture resolution it is no longer practical to have it as part of the installer
  • The library assets/textures are now shared with V-Ray for 3ds Max. If the maps have been downloaded by 3ds Max already they will be reused by V-Ray for SketchUp and vice versa. If a custom library location has been specified by V-Ray for 3ds max, V-Ray for SketchUp will also use it
  • A library content check is performed for every new session. In case some of the assets are missing or have been updated on the Chaos servers the updated content will become available for download. Each file is validated separately to avoid unnecessary downloads

Asset Preview

  • GPU (CUDA) Asset Preview mode implemented. Select GPU from the menu to activate it. It shows a more accurate preview in case V-Ray GPU is used for the final project rendering
  • The engine selection (CPU / GPU) for the Asset Preview Swatch is now preserved between sessions
  • GPU Preview Devices option added to the Configuration settings. Use either the global GPU Devices configuration or just the CPU in CUDA mode. The second option is preferable when all the GPU computational resources are required for rendering
  • Custom texture preview scene selection implemented. Choose between 2D, 3D, Environment, Falloff and Dirt scenes depending on the situation. If, for example, an environment texture is being color corrected, the Environment scene can be selected for the Color Correction map for a more accurate preview
  • Each asset preview render is temporarily stored for the active session. This temporary preview will be saved out with the asset without the need of re rendering

Updated Displacement Workflow

  • New Displacement object modifier implemented. Select a Group or Component in the scene and apply Displacement using the V-Ray toolbar button. This new workflow is clearer and much closer to the V-Ray Core displacement handling
  • The Displacement material attribute is now deprecated. It will be removed in the future. It is recommended to use the object modifier instead

V-Ray GPU

  • 2D Displacement is now supported
  • Cellular textures are now supported
  • Wrapper material’s ‘Environment Projection’ matte mode is now supported
  • Out of Core memory management implemented in an experimental state. It enables evicting triangle meshes out of the GPU memory when they are no longer needed in order to make room for other resources, once the renderer has run out of memory. This option is available only for CUDA and is not yet supported for RTX
  • Textures slotted in a Tiles texture now render correctly on GPU
  • V-Ray Infinite Plane mapping is no longer rendered incorrectly on GPU. The SketchUp texture size is now respected

New Architecture

  • The way SketchUp scenes are exported to V-Ray is rebuilt from the ground up. This results in faster scene export times and overall reliability
  • A new scene management system is now in place to ensure stability. It also makes finding and solving technical issues much easier and safer

Other Improvements & Bug Fixes

  • Chaos License Server updated to v5.5.1
  • The way materials and material inheritance within the scene hierarchy is handled is improved. Changes to any scene material are now handled faster and in a more reliable way during Interactive Rendering
  • The top level material assignment now determines the size of all child materials. Blend material children, for example assume the size of the Blend itself. This clears confusion when it comes to scaling textures that are part of a complex shading network
  • Back-face material handling is improved
  • Dome lights created in the Asset Editor are now automatically instantiated in the scene
  • Blue Noise sampling implemented. When enabled, reorders the DMC samples in screen space to produce a more pleasing result from low sample counts
  • V-Ray Scene export window implemented. It exposes some useful options when exporting the project. The file reference paths can now be stripped (made relative). HEX compression can be disabled for both transformation and mesh parameters
  • The visual style of the V-Ray installer is updated
  • Contours render element implemented. It stores a mask for both the global and material based contours in a separate render element. Note that the contour color and exposure compensation are ignored
  • Creating a Gradient texture no longer crashes the Asset Editor
  • A number of issues preventing materials with special characters in their names from being loaded (from vrmats) are resolved
  • Applying Fur, Mesh Light or Clipper modifiers to the same object more than once is no longer allowed allowed
  • Closing SketchUp no longer causes Ruby console errors to be printed
  • A number of issues with SketchUp’s texture colorization are resolved
  • Skatter library proxies are no longer deleted after import
  • The Shape and Diameter parameters of IES lights now correctly update during Interactive Rendering
  • A File Path Editor shortcut is added to the Asset Editor’s toolbar
  • The number of interactive rendering updates when dragging the handle of a Curve Correction texture is reduced
  • The animation settings toggle is no longer grayed out while in interactive rendering mode. This allows animations to be viewed in Vision without switching to production rendering mode
  • MacOS: The window ordering of the VFB is improved. The window no longer syncs behind the main SketchUp window and is now correctly parented to the active model
  • MacOS: An issue causing specific scenes to crash on V-Ray activation is resolve
  • MacOS: A number of issues with the Viewport Rendering overlay are resolved
  • MacOS : Uninstalling V-Ray no longer ends with an error (firewall related)
  • MacOS: The V-Ray installer is now notarized

V-Ray Ruby API

  • The V-Ray Ruby API is redesigned and extended. It streamlines 3rd party extensions development and ensures long term support for scripts using it
  • Documentation for the new API added to the installation folder. Find it in the V-Ray for SketchUp extension menu: Extensions / V-Ray / Help / API Documentation

V-Ray Next, Update 2.2

Date – Aug. 04, 2020

Download – 4.20.03

Improvements & Bug Fixes

  • Chaos Group License Server is updated to version 5.5.0
  • V-Ray Swarm is updated to version 1.4.4
  • The Chaos Group License Server web page now automatically opens after successful V-Ray installation
  • The Material Random Color render element now correctly generates unique colors for materials passed through a Two-Sided shader or ones using the Translucency attribute
  • The way materials are stored in a Proxy Mesh Component is updated. This resolves various issues with 3rd party plugins utilizing V-Ray Proxies
  • An issue with the Sunlight caustic photon emission is resolved. The emission cone is no longer cut in half in some situations
  • Adding a Bitmap diffuse texture to the material (or loading one with such texture assigned) no longer activates the SketchUp’s ‘Colorize’ material option
  • Coat layers (Diffuse or Reflection) added to a material that has no other base layer no longer display the full set of VRay Mtl parameters
  • CUDA hybrid rendering in bucket mode no longer leads to an exception in V-Ray Core when NVLink is used

V-Ray Next, Update 2

Date – Apr. 29, 2020

Download – 4.20.02

Installation & Licensing

  • The Chaos Group License Server is updated to version 5.4.0

Workflow Improvements

  • The quality slider presets are updated. The quality of the rendered image is now consistent between all the engines (CPU, CUDA and RTX) and sampler types (Progressive and Bucket)
  • The quality slider presets count is increased to six. The new preset labels are ‘Low’, ‘Low+’, ‘Medium’, ‘Medium+’, ‘High’ and ‘High+’. All provide better quality than their older counterparts.
  • The Maximum Subdivisions image sampler parameter is now visible at all times (for GPU and also in progressive rendering mode). The value used for GPU rendering is always double the CPU one to ensure consistent quality
  • The Embree related optimization parameters are automatically hidden when the GPU engine is selected. They have no effect in this case
  • The Aperture (F-Number) slider limit is removed. Values from 56 up to 985 will result in Defocus slider values between 0.1 and 0.001 to be displayed
  • Introduced a confirmation window when deleting or purging assets. Using the Shift + Delete keyboard keys removes selected assets without confirmation

Other Changes & Bug Fixes

  • V-Ray material modifications no longer flood the SketchUp’s Undo stack
  • Undoing the V-Ray scene activation no longer causes material duplicates to appear in the project
  • Undoing material rename no longer causes material duplicates to appear in the project
  • A number of other issues related to using the Undo in SketchUp are resolved
  • Scene modification during progressive production rendering no longer restarts the process
  • A number of issues with Section Planes and batch rendering are resolved
  • All bitmap textures stored in the SketchUp model now use the Sharp Isotropic filtering type
  • License error messages no longer appear twice
  • The RTX render engine is now correctly listed in exported vrscene files
  • Viewport camera changes introduced during animation rendering will no longer affect the results
  • Animation property changes are no longer possible while the process is ongoing
  • The geometry compilation stage no longer increases gradually in time with every animation frame
  • Copying or importing proxy mesh components with direct material assignment now correctly copies over the materials
  • Resetting render settings of complex scenes no longer take extra time

V-Ray Next, Update 2

Date – Feb. 18, 2020

Download – 4.20.01

Installation & Licensing

  • V-Ray AppSDK updated to version 4.3
  • V-Ray for SketchUp, the Chaos License Server, V-Ray Swarm and the Chaos Cloud client app are now installed in a single step. Configuring each sub-installer individually is still an option
  • Chaos License Server updated to version 5.3.0
  • Chaos Cloud client application installer updated to version 1.6.5

Workflow Improvements

  • RTX support implemented. The engine selector now presents three options – CPU, CUDA and RTX. The image results produced by the new engine are identical to the ones rendered in CUDA mode (previously called GPU). No scene adjustments are required. Going back and forth between the two engines will only modify what devices are used, so there’s minimal effort to compare the two to see which works best for your scene. The new engine takes advantage of the RT Cores (dedicated to ray-tracing calculations) of the new NVIDIA RTX cards which leads to average speedup of 40%
  • The support of native material color corrections in SketchUp is improved. Make sure that the ‘Extensions / V-Ray / Tools / Colorize Textures’ option is enabled for the color corrections to be rendered. The option is no longer considered ‘Experimental’
  • Partial Proxy Scene export implemented. Export only the selected objects as a .vrscene file containing geometry and applied materials. Lights and V-Ray objects, such as Fur, can also be included
  • A set of material slots is automatically generated as part of every Proxy Mesh asset. Use the slots to assign materials to the Proxy without having to rely on a Multi Material
  • Proxy Mesh assets using the new built-in material system (described in the previous point) now automatically store the materials when saved to the library (or exported as .vrmat files)
  • Automatically calculated exposure and white balance values can now be applied to the scene camera. Use the Auto Values controls to get the most recent results and apply them to the camera
  • The Advanced Camera / Bokeh parameters have been updated and made more user friendly. The additional parameters are no longer grayed out when the Blades option is disabled
  • SpotLight Cone and Penumbra angle sliders’ min and max values are now correct
  • The UI of the Configuration settings section is improved
  • Right-clicking on any color or number input field now provides the option to reset them to their default value
  • A new option allowing color space control of all color sliders is available in the Asset Editor’s Configuration settings rollout
  • Implemented material attribute icons for easier recognition
  • Modifications done to the SketchUp model hierarchy are now handled in a better way by the V-Ray Fur, Clipper and Mesh Light components
  • Tri-Planar Projection texture placement mode added to the VRScan material. It works similarly to the Triplanar texture and removes the need for UV mapping of the shaded objects
  • Proxy Scenes are now by default affected by the global Material Override. To disable this behavior uncheck the new ‘Use Mtl Override’ option
  • ‘Use Mtl Override’ option added to the Proxy Mesh asset. It disables the global Material Override effect for all material slots using plain colors
  • Material Random Color render element is implemented. It generates randomly colored selection masks based on the material assignments in the scene. Unlike the Material ID Color element, it does not require adding Material ID attributes to all scene materials
  • VFB window no longer appears upon vrscene export

Theme

  • A new Bright color theme can now change the appearance of the Asset Editor, File Path Editor, Color Picker and the Progress Log windows. The UI Color Theme selector is located in the Configuration settings rollout. The theme selection persists between sessions. Note that it does not affect the V-Ray Frame Buffer (VFB)

Color Assistant

  • Color Assistant extension added to the V-Ray Color Picker. It presents hue, saturation and value variations of the current color to help with picking the exact color that is needed. Adjust the range values for more subtle or more pronounced variation. Right-click on any of the Assistant suggestions to regenerate variations using it as reference

Materials

  • Some common material settings have been redesigned as Attributes. Attributes are sets of options that can now be created or removed for each material. An ‘Add Attribute button is added next to the ‘Add Layer’ one below the material preview. The list of attributes includes – Translucency (Two Sided), Bump, Displacement, Raytrace Properties, Override and Material ID. New materials are created lean with the option for other attributes to be added later. This way the scene shaders are optimal for both management and rendering
  • The new Translucency attribute can be used instead of the Two Sided material keeping the shader structure simple. This also simplifies material/texture size management when dealing with translucency
  • The Generic material layer names are improved. The V-Ray BRDF is renamed to VRay Mtl, Metallic – VRay PBR, Diffuse – Diffuse Coat, Reflection – Reflective Coat, etc. The Refraction layer is removed. Use the VRay Mtl instead
  • There is a unique icon for each material layer. This is useful visual indication for the layer type in case the layer name is changed
  • Newly created scene materials now use an optimized underlying shader structure. Displacement, Material ID and Render Stats attributes are no longer added to every material. If any of the attributes is required it has to be manually added from the ‘Add Attribute’ menu

Other Changes & Bug Fixes

  • Instance face deletion no longer requires multiple Undo commands to get undone
  • Activating V-Ray in a project for the first time no longer prevents undoing prior actions
  • The ‘Camera Vertical Tilt’ option is renamed to ‘Vertical Lens Tilt’
  • Uninstalling V-Ray no longer leaves some files behind
  • Initiating a render multiple times in quick succession no longer makes the V-Ray UI unresponsive
  • A number of issues related to Proxy Meshes are resolved
  • Importing or creating V-Ray-specific geometries now updates correctly during interactive rendering
  • Enabling the global Lights switch now correctly provokes an interactive rendering update
  • Toggling Safe Frame on and off during Viewport rendering (VPR) no longer stretches the output image
  • Toggling Safe Frame during interactive rendering after an aspect ratio change no longer distorts the image
  • Batch renderer now behaves correctly even when the Scene Transition time is set to 0
  • A number of texture colorization issues are resolved. Using the option (Colorize Textures) on Mac OS in GPU mode no longer leads to a crash
  • The ‘Export’ button of the Export Proxy window is no longer disabled if the window is brought up for the first time during the session
  • Exploding Components containing a Section Plane no longer generates a phantom asset
  • Creating multiple materials in rapid succession no longer causes issues
  • Trying to rename material layers using illegal characters now correctly cancels the operation, keeping the original layer name
  • A number of issues related to 2D Texture Placement are resolved. Uneven U and V Repeat values combined with texture Rotation no longer skewes the texture
  • Embree is now used for hair and motion blur rendering
  • Proxy Meshes created during interactive rendering now appear correctly in the scene
  • Modifying assets during Interactive no longer hangs SketchUp on macOS
  • Fixed an issue with the Scene Importer failing to import specific vrscene files
  • VFB window no longer appears when Viewport rendering (VPR) is initiated
  • Fixed an issue with SketchUp 2020 VPR only refreshing when focused
  • Proxy Export toolbar button is no longer grayed out if the selection does not contain regular geometry
  • Using the VFB’s ‘Render Last’ button for animations (if no prior rendering has been done) no longer causes an error
  • Fixed a crash when deleting a blend material together with its sub-materials

V-Ray Next, Update 1.2

Date – January 30, 2020

Download – 4.10.03

Compatibility

  • Full support for SketchUp 2020

V-Ray Next, Update 1.1

Date – Nov. 19, 2019

Download – 4.10.02

Improvements & Bug Fixes

  • Chaos Cloud client application installer updated to version 1.6.0
  • Consistent render elements are automatically enabled for old and new scenes. This new method for distributing and storing light contribution in the render elements resolves artifacts caused by the adaptive Dome light
  • An issue preventing the Batch Rendering process to be started after being interrupted once is resolved
  • Colorized textures no longer cause issues when connected to a bump material slot
  • Clippers applied to components or groups containing no faces or only grouped geometry are automatically removed
  • The Cap CPU Utilization Swarm option can now be utilized for batch rendering
  • An issue causing interactive rendering crash on Normal Displacement parameter change is resolved
  • Saving or auto-saving a SketchUp project no longer restarts ongoing progressive production or interactive rendering process
  • Imported image objects are now rendered using the correct Screen (sRGB) color space
  • A number of issues caused by a Parallel Projection viewport combined with the Match Viewport Output option are resolved
  • Educational (Edu) builds no longer render VRScan materials with watermark even when a VRScan license is present
  • Fixed an issue with preventing the output images from being saved to the Desktop on macOS
  • Environment variables can now be set specifically for V-Ray for SketchUp on macOS by editing a config file located at /Applications/ChaosGroup/V-Ray/V-Ray\ for\ SketchUp/extensions/config.json. If multiple variables are added they need to be separated by commas.
  • V-Ray toolbars on macOS no longer have some of their buttons persistently grayed out until a random action is taken

V-Ray Scene Importer

  • A number of issues affecting imported object’s UV coordinates (texture placement) are resolved.
  • The importer now correctly handles 3ds Max primitives as well as Editable Mesh objects
  • A number of issues related to imported Proxy Mesh object scaling are resolved
  • Logic for auto-resolving file paths for the imported vrscene is implemented. Proxy references with invalid paths will be automatically relinked if their source file is found (in the same location as the vrscene file)
  • The overall stability and reliability of the scene importer is improved

Version 4.1

Update 1 includes deeper SketchUp integration, performance optimizations and more streamlined workflows.

  • SketchUp Colorization support — Make color corrections on standard SketchUp materials and see the effect right away in the V-Ray Frame Buffer.
  • Improved user experience — It’s easier and smoother to use your favorite V-Ray tools, including Light Creation, Infinite Plane and Scene Interaction.
  • Optimized interactive CPU rendering — Interactive editing of scene cameras, lights and materials is more responsive.
  • Cryptomatte element — The Cryptomatte render element automatically generates and stores object- or material-based masks — perfect for accurately selecting objects in post-production.
  • Quick denoiser engine switch — Switch from V-Ray to NVIDIA AI denoising with a toggle in the main renderer rollout.
  • Updated VFB lens effects — Simulate real-world camera lens effects with new procedurally generated dust and scratches.
  • Color picker temperature — The V-Ray color picker introduces a Kelvin temperature slider so you can save and modify a temperature value for every color slot.

Deep SketchUp integration

The latest V-Ray update features even tighter integration with SketchUp. Enjoy an improved user experience for some of your favourite tools, as well as detailed instructions on how to use them. What’s more, you can make material color corrections and see the effect straight away in the V-Ray Frame Buffer.

Optimized performance

V-Ray Next for SketchUp comes with a handful of speed boosts across the board. The latest update features more responsive CPU interactive rendering when editing scene camera, lighting and materials, as well as a new Light Cache algorithm for improved animation behavior.

Streamlined workflows

V-Ray Next, update 1 adds support for the Cryptomatte render element, which makes it easier to select objects for post-production. The V-Ray color picker also introduces a Kelvin temperature slider, which automatically provides a corresponding RGB color.

Version 4.00.02

Installation & Licensing

The Chaos Group License Server is updated to version 5.2.2
The installer now properly sets and displays a primary remote server IP address and port number – 127.0.0.1:30304

Workflow Improvements

  • The entire asset management system is optimized and made more reliable. This affects asset creation, renaming, deletion, referencing, etc. The optimizations are most obvious in heavy scenes with a big number of assets and complex shading networks
  • Render element assets are no longer deleted when the category is active and the Purge function is used. Use the multi-selection functionality to quickly delete a batch of elements
  • The Z Depth render element ‘Depth from Camera’ parameter is removed

Other Changes & Bug Fixes

  • Saving and loading projects no longer reset the Color Space of all textures to the default sRGB option. Using the File Path Editor no longer changes the color space either
  • The asset preview render process can now be restarted if it stops responding. Make sure to stop and restart the interactive preview (using its toolbar stop/start button) in the unlikely event this happens
  • The fresnel opacity of newly created Reflection material layers is now correctly displayed in the asset preview swatch
  • Invalid material or texture references can now be successfully cleared from the slot’s context menu
  • Creating a proxy from a big number of SketchUp components or component instances now shows accurate progress in the Export Proxy window
  • An issue with Water textures used in a bump slot is resolved. Negative texture values are now properly handled
  • All V-Ray taskbar processes are grouped and displayed under the SketchUp Windows taskbar icon. This applies to the Asset Editor and the V-Ray Frame Buffer window
  • VRscan materials are now correctly sized and properly affected by the SketchUp material scale. A helper texture is displayed in the viewport to ensure this. Texture Placement parameters are now listed for every VRscan in it’s Asset Editor properties panel
  • The way VFB Color Corrections are saved within SketchUp projects is updated and made more reliable
  • A number of issues related to V-Ray 3 scenes loading and upgrading are resolved
  • A number of issues related to .vropt (render settings) files loading are resolved
  • The Purge Unused Assets function no longer causes issues on MacOS
  • Materials incorrectly saved with older V-Ray versions no longer cause issues when loaded in Next
  • A number of issues related to complex texture hierarchy manipulation and deletion are resolved
  • The Batch Cloud rendering functionality is temporarily disabled. Once a Chaos Cloud platform-side update is implemented, the feature will be re-enabled. Our main goal is to provide a system that warns users for possible issues with their batch cloud jobs(like missing external file assets, for example), letting them resolve the problem before the rendering starts
  • Images imported through the SketchUp native Import no longer produce problematic V-Ray materials. Scenes containing such images saved with previous V-Ray version no longer cause issues when rendered in Next
  • A number of issues with badly serialized V-Ray component data are resolved. A more detailed error message is displayed and a better log file is created, letting us easily identify any further problems
  • Deleting Fur, Clipper or Mesh Light widgets from a group is now reliably handled during Interactive Rendering
  • A number of issues preventing the V-Ray Asset Editor from being populated with assets on specific scene load are resolved
  • The V-Ray Scene Importer now reliably imports models using multi materials exported from 3ds Max. The material ID assignment in 3ds Max results in a single object group in SketchUp with different materials applied to the corresponding faces
  • The Scene Interaction Tool now works reliably with obstructed light widgets
  • Deleting multiple materials at once no longer produces Ruby errors and warnings
  • Using the Scene Interaction Tool before the previous action is completed no longer prints Ruby errors
  • Skatter Proxy geometry materials render correctly when using the ‘Render only’ mode. Regeneration no longer causes Ruby errors
  • A geometry instancing optimization is implemented for Skatter objects with the ‘Render only’ mode enabled. This ensures that rendering a big number of instances is done in the most memory-efficient way
  • The way the SketchUp default material is handled by V-Ray is improved preventing incorrect lighting in specific situations
  • Activating Material Override during Interactive rendering now reliably affects all scene materials that have their ‘Can Be Overridden’ option enabled
  • Changing the SketchUp material Opacity value automatically disables the synchronization with the V-Ray material refraction. This allows for custom opacity manipulations in the viewport without affecting the rendered result
  • V-Ray material refraction no longer resets in specific situations when the SketchUp scene is saved and reloaded
  • The Z Depth render element tooltips are fixed
  • All Smoke texture parameters are now properly named
  • Repathing files with a Windows path on MacOS no longer causes issues
  • The migration (gamma management) of render elements from scenes saved with V-Ray 3 is improved
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