v2020.0.2 NewTek LightWave 3D

Minimum System Specifications

Windows™

Hardware

• 64-bit Intel® Core™ 2 or better or AMD64 with SSE4 instruction set (Bulldozer onwards)
• System RAM: 4GB minimum
• Available USB Port (for users with existing hardware dongles)

Operating System

• 64-bit: Windows 7 64-bit through Windows 10 64-bit

Mac OS®

Hardware

• 64-bit Intel® Processor
• System RAM: 4GB minimum
• Available USB Port (for users with existing hardware dongles)

Operating System

• Sierra 10.12 or better

Display

• Minimum Graphics Card: NVIDIA® GeForce® 9 series or ATI Radeon™ HD 4000 series
• Minimum Screen Resolution: 1280 x 1024 pixels
• Recommended Graphics Card: GeForce® 10 series or newer at 1920 x 1080 or better

Installation Requirements

• Storage: All systems require 750MB available hard drive space (excluding content).

LightWave 3D® 2020.0.2 Changes

Bumped product version to 2020.0.2.
Bumped the build number to 3226.

• Return of the Ambient Light
• Too many clones of certain light types crash Layout
• Importing scene with FiberFX elements crashes Layout
• OpenVDB not finding files stored outside of content folder.
• Collapse Obj tool From Directory issue return
• OpenVDB file-paths do not work outside content directory.
• Environment Light doesn’t render properly over LWSN
• … and so many more fixes and notes. I suggest checking out the change log.

What’s new in Lightwave 2020.0.1?

Bumped product version to 2020.0.1.
Bumped the build number to 3221.

• Updated Unreal Bridge Binary for Unreal 4.24
• Added support for Unreal Engine 4.25 to the Unreal Bridge
• Updated Optix to 6.5.0.
• Fixed OpenGL HDR issues.
• SSS optimizations.
• Devised a new light MIS sampling method.
• Fixed an exit memory leak.
• … and so many more fixes and notes. I suggest checking out the change log.

What’s new in Lightwave 2020?

• Layout
  • Scene Editor Improvements
  • Rotation Order
  • Environment Lights
  • Node Editor Workflow Improvement
  • FBX interchange
  • OpenVDB
  • Instancing
  • OpenGL
• Modeler
  • Local AC
• Surfacing
  • New Hair materials for FiberFX
  • Improved SSS
• Rendering
  • New Global Illumination methodology
  • Mobile NRC Monitoring
  • Tone Mapping
• Engineering Updates

2019 – LightWave 2019.1.5

Released 15 January 2020

• 3 bugfixes and feature requests implemented

What’s new in Lightwave 2019.1.4?

This update introduces support for Unreal Engine 4.23. In addition, several issues in Unreal support have been addressed. The Windows installer is fixed to account for a change in Windows 10 on how the version is reported to queries – this caused a variety of issues including that runtime packages required were not being installed.

Added Unreal Bridge support for Unreal 4.23
Fixed UVs being flipped in Unreal Skeletal Meshes

• LB-5705 – Unreal Materials not importing correctly
• LB-5861 Python requires VS2012 runtime (problem with installer under new builds of Win 10)
• LWB-5006 Previews not working consistently (NRC)
• LWB-5515 – Unreal bridge: Skeletal meshes don’t get materials
• LWB-5525 – Can’t send second animation to Unreal

What’s new in Lightwave 2019.1.3?

LightWave 3D® 2019.1.3 is available now in the Registration system as a free update for registered LightWave™ 2019 users. The fix that will affect the largest number of users is a change required for Layout/Modeler/Hub proper linking by OS changes introduced in recent Windows 10 updates that impacted the launch timing of the applications. Fixes in Layers Panel, Network Render Controller, Modeler LScript and for copying the License Key during Mac installs round out this maintenance release.

• Crash in Layers Panel on quit fixed
• LB-5817 Layers Panel – Crash when using the all to ‘F’ layer button
• LB-5842 Lost Node is not removed from Scene queue
• LWB-5381 Internal Modeler Error 2902 (LScript)
• LWB-5394 Layout and Modeler not communicating
• LWB-5412 Does not copy License key file on Mac version Installer
• LWB-5426 Network Render Controller (Mac OS) doesn’t start next scene in queue
• LWB-5474 Very slow Layers Panel

What’s new in Lightwave 2019.1.2?

Update: LightWave 3D® 2019.1.2 is available now in the Registration system. This update covers just two issues that affect a limited number of users:

• The new automatic license mover would fail for users who have a space in their login username for their system
• The LightWave Bridge to Unreal Engine folder for UE 4.22 was not being placed on Mac OS installs

The LightWave 2019.1.2 update is a free download for registered users of LightWave 2019.

What’s new in Lightwave 2019.1?

Workflow “Quality-of-Life” Enhancements:

Modeler Enhancements:

• Layers Panel
  • Rename window is resizable
  • Right-click to freeze/unfreeze a layer as selected
  • Easy insert/exchange layers option in List mode
  • Clicking on the Eye icon on the Object row will select all Layout visible layers.
• Vertex Maps Panel
  • Added Name Filter field at top of panel
  • New Right-Click function: Select By Map, for all points, edges or polygons in a map
  • Delete now allows deletion of multiple VMaps of the same type at a time

New Navigation Options in Layout and Modeler:

• New game-style navigation mode combining hotkeys, mouse and scroll wheel to move within the viewport, adjust the view and move the scene playhead.
• Alternate control subjects and styles can be engaged from the Navigation Panel:
  • View
    • Grab
    • Orbit
    • Helicopter
    • Walk
  • Current Item
    • Grab
    • Helicopter
  • Timeline
    • Activate Twist on Space Explorer or horizontal mouse movement, etc., as jog/shuttle for timeline

Layout Panel List Pane Improvements:

• A variety of new functions have been added to “tree-style” list panes in many panels to allow more customization of the view and easier drag and drop re-ordering and hierarchy adjustments (Scene Editors, Graph Editor, Configure Keys, etc.)

Enhanced Configuration Control:

• Layout and Modeler both now have separate Key and Menu configuration files
• When the app asks for configs to be cleared, only LW2019.1.cfg, LWM2019.1.cfg, Extension Cache-64, and LWHUB2019.1.cfg need to be deleted and rebuilt. Customized hot keys and menus can now be preserved
• Reset Configs command plugin clears the files mentioned in the previous item, preserving customized hot keys and menus

VPR:

• An optional progress bar added on the bottom bar of the Layout window; if multiple viewports are set to VPR, the progress bar will split into multiple bars, to show a bar for each viewport set to VPR

New OpenGL Viewport Option:

• Hide all non-renderable elements – grid, motion paths, camera, light, bone and null icons, etc.

LightWave Network Render Controller:

• Scene files can now be dropped on the lower window in the NRC
• Node Pick-up allows you to enter an IP address (v4 or v6) to access a machine anywhere on the Internet

Feature Enhancements

LightWave™ Bridge to Unreal Engine:

• Added support for the new Red, Green and Blue channels for the Unreal Bridge.
• Improved performance for sending of meshes for scenes with many smaller objects

FBX Interchange Enhancements:

• The Interchange panel now has two options for the Transfer Mode. You can either Append Assets or Replace Animation. Append Assets was the default functionality from before, but Replace Animation is new, and is used to transfer animation over items that are already animated.
• You can now drag and drop complete scenes or individual elements from one side to the other.
• You now have the option to import materials as Principled BSDF using the FBX Interchange.

Node Editor:

• Image and Image Sampler Nodes now offer Red/Green/Blue/Alpha/Luma as Scalar outputs

OpenVDB Enhancements:

• Mesh To Volume node can create a particle system from the vertices of the input mesh.
• Solver and Gas Solver now accept velocity grids for dynamic collisions in addition to level set grids for static collisions.

Physical Sky Enhancements:

• Physical Sky background shader now uses a softened horizon line
• Physical Sky now includes a ground; the ground is an alpha channel that can be colored by any items placed above Physical Sky in the Environment list.

Cel Shader Enhancements:

• The new Cel Integrator now supports light color, but differently from LightWave 2015. The gradient is evaluated separately for each light. This allows for per light buffers for cel shading.

Python Enhancements:

• LightWave’s installed Python is now v2.7.16
• PCore Console has been upgraded to Mark II
  • Save and copy buttons no longer needed
  • Log output is now text; not multiple, separate list entries
  • The window is split in two, with log output and command input sections. The division between the two can be moved as needed and can be maximized in one direction or the other
  • The command input area is deigned to emulate the python CLI, including syntax highlighting, and command recall that is retained between sessions up to the maximum prompt recalls
  • Recall search using Shift-Space
  • Command matching
  • Fully customizable
  • Primary and secondary prompts, even Bash-style
  • The Prompt area has two modes:
    • Command Prompt: default, immediately evaluates each command when entered
    • Editor mode: enter as many commands as you wish; evaluates on return to Command mode
  • Custom key bindings can be set, retrieved and inline documentation is provided

We have a playlist showing some of the new workflows in LightWave 2019.1:  LightWave 3D 2019.1 Playlist

What’s new in LightWave™ 2019.0.3 (Build 3117)

LightWave Bridge to Unreal Engine: Batching sending of meshes for potentially higher performance in scenes with many smaller objects

• LB-4747 How to confuse the Hub/Layout
• LB-5478 cloned image gets lost on reload
• LB-5650 geometry is hidden behind the grid or the origin
• LWB-4481 Selecting objects in Layout doesn’t always work
• LWB-4597 Frame Slider on Timeline is frozen when a viewport has been added
• LWB-4641 OpenVDB saver not working with one input only (save frame).
• LWB-4711 Relativity Rotation in Degrees button partially functional
• LWB-4750 Preview messing up with ui_screen_scale_factors of non whole numbers
• LWB-4820 Bones in LW2018 scenes and earlier with Use Morphed Positions enabled loaded into LW2019 as “Faster Bones” instead of “Full Bones (Morphed Positions)”.
• LWB-4894 This OpenVDB scene works well in 2019.0.1 but not in 0.2. Clamp particles radius to > 0.
• LWB-4899 Instant crash in layout – OpenVDB causing instability. make meshes not available in primitivetovdb node.
• LWB-4903 Connecting nodes in OpenVDB causes hard crash. Fix velocity return.
• LWB-4905 Creating preview skips through frames without resolving
• LWB-4909 Activate Legacy HV crash
• LWB-4911 Motion blur and OpenVDB freakout. Fix MB refresh when the source mesh is animated.
• LWB-4913 Spin Edge Crash
• LWB-4914 LightWave Bridge to Unreal Engine flips the green channel
• LWB-4916 ReplaceObjectLayer command not updating OpenGL with single layers
• LWB-4919 Physical Sky in the popup appears as SunSky in the applied plugin list
• LWB-4920 BandGlue error
• LWB-4921 Background image not rendering in proper color space…
• LWB-4924 Crashing when selecting items in Layout

What’s new in LightWave 3D® 2018.0.6 (Build 3069)

• Bumped product version to 2018.0.6.
• Set the build number to 3069
• LB-4740 Loading From Preset Shelf to Many Surfaces Is Very Slow
• LB-4744 Command Port only functions when the mouse moves (investigated other main loop delays)
• LWB-4122 Keyboard entry to any numeric field = Crash, consistent
• LWB-4131 Crash ModelerTools option mini-slider.
• LWB-4189 NevronMotion 1.0 Kinect rig fails to work in LW2018.0.x
• LWB-4206 Save All Buffers In Image Viewer Not Being Saved

What’s new in Lightwave 2018.0.5?

Mac users: Please download again if you got the update prior to 4:30 PM USCT 3-July-2018. A crash when using numeric entries has been fixed.

LightWave 2018.0.5 will install into its own directory. 2018.0.5 uses the same license as your 2018.0, 2018.0.1, 2018.0.2, 2018.0.3, and 2018.0.4 license – just drag-and-drop the license into the interface of 2018.0.5 when first launching 2018.0.5.

• Bumped product version to 2018.0.5.
• Set the build number to 3068
• Fixed the picking issues in Modeler not working at all with grid scales larger than 5km or so.
• LB-4697 Crash using scene editor plug-in to toggle camera stereo Anaglyph filter on.
• LWB-3641 SyncMesh gizmo picking was weird because picking and drawing were using different scales.
• LWB-3657 morphing (morph target) has weird behavior
• LWB-3715 ClothFX crash
• LWB-3796 LW2018.0.3 crashes on my Mac 10.13.4 when performing certain tasks
• LWB-3883 IKBooster menu no draw on Dope track.
• LWB-3907 OpenGL Update RefreshNow/RedrawNow not working with instances
• LWB-3914 Tree control move func not working (crash)
• LWB-3974 Rendering results in “out of application memory”
• LWB-3987 layout crashes when an instancer is deleted
• LWB-3998 “Not enough memory” error cutting mesh with two-point polygons
• LWB-4007 Memory leak in animation render
• LWB-4033 Shadow Buffer shows errors with Limited region On and the bucket size
• LWB-4065 Object crashes Layout when sending to Modeler
• LWB-4081 Crash when tweaking light samples on Scene editor
• LWB-4083 Deleting a camera could cause a crash because camera evaluators of other cameras in the scene became confused about which cameras they belonged to.
• LWB-4095 The MULTILIST controls require a different kind of value lists than other trees. Added the set_addr_int() function to address this.
• LWB-4101 Layout crashes when you try to access a surface’s node editor
• LWB-4102 Opening the graph editor for an Advanced Camera could crash if no prior evaluation of the camera was done.
• LWB-4103 Modeler crashes when loading object with metalink node

Lightwave 2018.0.1 Changelog