[NEW] Automatically retrieve real world terrain data as heightmap or procedural terrains. Video preview:
[NEW] New Cloud Morphing technology. Video Preview:
[NEW] Animated clouds and cloud layers can now be exported to animated VDBs (one VDB file for each frame)
[NEW] Bake and export all material PBR channels as texture maps
[NEW] New color bleed blending (smudge + mean average color filler) for exported texture maps
[NEW] Added occlusion treatment option, allowing user to select between ambient occlusion compute, ambient occlusion texture or a mix of both
[NEW] Added some maps (Ambient Occlusion, Blurred Reflections, Luminous, Glow) to write at export
[NEW] Added baking to 16 bits Grayscale textures
[NEW] When baking textures, use the alpha of input textures even if it is not exported, we do not want a different result whereas we activate the alpha export or not.
[NEW] Modified the "generic UV" export algorithm to avoid making thousands of mesh parts in some cases. Made it make more compact parts for better packing.
[NEW] Use a better packing for the "generic UV"
[NEW] Ensure baked normal maps are normalized
[NEW] Reworked and optimized FBX import
[NEW] [Import/DEM] Importing a DEM file now offers the choice between creating a Procedural Terrain or a Heightfield (Note: previously it was Procedural Terrain only)
Limit max size of adaptative maps.
Better placement of fragments in baked texture maps.
Fixed missing materials when importing some Collada files
Added a new option ("Invert transparency maps") at the bottom of the Import Options dialog for Collada files, to force VUE to use the contrary of the transparency rule defined in the file (some exporters don't follow the Collada specifications, like VUE before the other fix below...).
Fixed export of Collada files: transparency maps were always inverted, so never following the transparency mode defined in the file (RGB_ZERO).
Fixed import of Collada files: transparency maps were always inverted (ignoring the transparency mode read in the file), which could lead to fully transparent materials if their mode was A_ONE.
Fixed resizing and center options that were not applied to imported objects
Fixed synchronization of imported objects: saved scenes now store the original import options for each object, so that they can be reapplied when objects are synchronized (=automatically reloaded after a change of the file on the disk). Also, if smoothing options are modified in the Mesh Options, they will now be reapplied in future synchronization of the mesh.
Fixed a bug preventing to export the map of some objects (like alpha planes, imported LW models...), because a wrong extension was used to write images.
Fixed wrongly exported Collada files (not readable by VUE or other apps) when material names use non-ASCII characters.
Fixed export of CSG objects to Collada (materials could be wrong)
Ignore empty grids when importing VDB clouds instead of making an error.
Fixed potential crash when loading a scene with multiple MetaClouds
Upgraded Open VDB SDK version to 6.2.1
[LWO] Fixed crashes with some LWO files
Fixed normal map export on PlantFactory plants
Improved displacement export
Fixed truncated camera animation path when importing FBX file as synchronization data.
[Convert Tools for Maya] Fixed errors when converting more than one VUE object.
[Plugin] Remove Synchro plugin for Cinema4D R15
[Plugin] Upgrade V-Ray SDK to 3.6 and remove support for V-Ray 2
[Plugin] Fixed the automatic loading of the VUE plugin for V-Ray Next update 2 and greater.
[NEW] Gather parameters in dedicated tab in material editor rather than publish them all
[NEW] Added support for multigraph .sbsar
[NEW] Integrated version 7 SDK
[NEW] Added support for additional .sbsar inputs
[NEW] Added support for animated .sbsar
[NEW] Path tracer now supports camera orthographic projection and film offset.
[NEW] Added Multi-Pass render outputs for the path tracer.
Properly switch off main view last render display when editing scene, while interactive path tracer is enabled.
Fixed traversed volume handling when objects intersect.
Fixed full CPU (non OpenCL) implementation for path tracer intersection units (wrong lighting).
Fixed a potential crash when rendering Boolean operations containing displaced objects.
Fixed crash on processors that do not support SSE4.X for the non AVX version.
Added SSE2 compatibility check to the OpenCL check to ensure that the path tracer can run properly on the running system.
Fixed huge path tracer performance issue when rendering plants with billboard primitives.
Fixed very slow preparation of EcoSystems with plants with lots of primitives
Reduced memory footprint for procedural terrains part of a group and sped up their initializations when rendering several times.
In the export of "generic UV", converted O(N^2) code to O(N)
Optimize undo/redo memory footprint in some specific scenario
Fixed potential random crashes when there are EcoSystems in the scene (after undo/redo operations and grouping of objects with EcoSystems materials)
Fixed potential crashes related to animated objects in the timeline.
[TerrainEditor/Intel] Improved terrain editor stability with Intel chipsets on Windows
[Mac/Drag&Drop] Robustness fixes following the report of a crash after a few hours sitting idle
Fixed a crash (stack overflow) when relaying mouse events in the context of a scrollable group nested inside another group (or scrollable group)
Fixed a crash when opening the format options panel twice
Fixed a crash in Texture Manipulation Editor
[MaterialEditor] Fixed a crash when switching material layer and the function graph is opened
Fixed a possible crash on Mac when closing a dialog opened from a pop-up menu from inside a modal dialog opened from a menu (e.g. color map editor opened from any modal dialog)
Fixed a potential crash when dropping a group (e.g. a Boolean operation) containing a PlantFactory vegetation to the ground.
Prevent a crash when reading a .fsvue file referencing modified .tpf files, and improve feedback in this case.
Fixed a potential crash (or render aborted at once) related to EcoSystem phasing.
[Windows] Work around crashes in third-party library with some specific fonts (CrashSender will show but VUE will no longer crash)
Fixed a potential crash in the render stack when the NPR or depth channels are selected but their data weren't loaded.
Fixed potential crash when loading a scene with atmosphere editor open
Fixed potential crash on Help (F1)
Fixed prevent potential crash with native browser
Fixed potential crashes with multi-selection browser.
Fixed potential crash using enter key in browser
Fixed crash when editing functions from material editor with multiple materials edited
Fixed crash when clicking on convert to MetaCloud when no object in scene
Fixed a possible crash when loading a DAE files bigger than 2 GB. A proper warning message is now displayed.
Fixed python initialization mistakes (macOS)
Fixed a crash related to texture edition
Fixed a potential crash in 3D Views refresh, after importing a FBX file as synchronization data.
Fixed a potential crash in the Material Editor when loading an image with embedded alpha in the alpha channel itself.
Fixed a potential crash when reading TIF files using color palette mode.
Fixed a potential crash when adding a new keyframe to a rigged mesh whose previous animation was deleted.
Fixed blades breeze animation length on PlantFactory plants
Fixed the loading in a 2nd VUE run of scenes with missing TPF file that were in a preview VUE run, if the updated scene was not saved.
Fixed potential initialization issue with animated plants.
Fixed inconsistent results when populating a material containing several EcoSystem layers and used by several objects.
Fixed instance count sometimes reset to zero for no reason when starting eco-painting.
Fixed the 'Clear' button doing nothing in some cases (in EcoSystem materials using stacking).
Fixed missing animation in vegetation specimens configured as animated mesh, when used in a global EcoSystem.
Fixed wrong offset of shaded billboards, along Z axis.
Fixed potential inconsistencies in the scale of instances, when the scene was reloaded from auto-save or fast-save format.
Improved feedback when the creation of a population fails due to licensing (PlantCatalog).
Fixed rare crashes when editing the graph leads to conflicting concurrent access with function nodes' small previews calculation
Fixed a rare crash when changing a node parameter's color value using the "fast color selection" dialog.
[Spline Proximity] Maximize/Minimize spline edition window by double-clicking on the caption bar
Fixed Node Output Observer not refreshing when changing node parameters
Improved edition of noise parameter in fractal nodes
Fixed regression on Function Node Preview
Added second argument to AddStone and AddVolumeCloud Python function to specify seed.
Fixed AddAlphaPlane by using Alpha channel instead of Transparency and setting projection mode to parametric.
Allow Python function AddAlphaPlane to load Animation.
Make sure python function 'GetBoundingBox' is consistent for a vegetation object just created.
GetProductVersion now takes the current quarterly release into account (ie. returns "1 R4" (display version) or "15.4" (internal version) for R4).
Added the Python function setTimer which allow to run a Python command after at least a specified delay (example: setTimer(42.42, 'print("Done!")') will print "Done!" in the Python console after 42.42 secondes).
Added the ability to load a MetaNode from its file path inside a graph node parameter (via Graph.SetNodeParameter(NodeIndex, ParamterIndex, FilePath))
Added the ReplaceFunction function to load a function from disk and put it instead of already in place Function. Example: ReplaceFunction(obj.Material().ColorFunction(), file).
[NEW] Allow cube map and octahedron map to be selected as panoramic modes. (also add new layout for cube map)
[NEW] [RenderNode] Introduced a new 'tile_rect' option [-tile_rect x_min y_min x_max y_max], with (1,1) as top-left pixel.
Fixed the inability to enable Stereoscopic rendering in the Render Options dialog.
Fixed badly interpolated materials over MetaBlobs when activating relighting.
Fixed missing underwater physical caustics after their activation if water material caustics flag was initially disabled.
Fixed non sticking physical water absorption & scattering mode when changed in the material editor.
Fixed inconsistent physical water foam behavior along coasts.
Fixed Multi-Pass outputs for PBR materials using alpha mapping.
Optimized fully transparent impacts (avoid lighting calculations when possible).
[Render Options] Fixed alpha & depth paths not updated properly when changing the render output path
Fixed invisible heightfield terrain when used inside a group or Boolean operation (for high resolutions and displacement mapping).
Fixed invisible heightfield terrain when a displacement of depth zero is applied to it (only with high resolutions).
Fixed wrong multi-pass/G-buffer output path upon scene reading, to avoid getting an error when saving render to disk.
Improved shadows for terrains using high amplitude displacement mapping.
Fixed potential alpha mapping issues (white leaves) when using GPU anti-aliasing with PlantFactory EcoSystems.
Improved lighting on displaced meshes using Normal Mapping.
Avoid losing 16-bit precision (if any) on imported bump maps.
[Network Rendering] Fixed rendering cube maps with RenderCows
[Network Rendering] Fixed rendering VDB clouds with RenderCows
Optimized splines where both Ecosystem and Material effects are enabled (Terrain effect no longer recomputed when the Ecosystem is populated)
Improved reactivity when editing terrain effect parameters.
Fixed the dropdown feature for spline control points and tangents
Fixed the dropdown feature when dropping splines with a geometry effect enabled, or when dropping onto such splines
Fixed the Drop-on-Top feature for spline control points and tangents
[NEW] In the render stack, renders can now be cloned from existing clones, not only from the original render (to make post process/exposure tests easier).
[NEW] Hiding a scene layer from render now hides its cloud layers (like other objects)
[NEW] Added the ability to open render options from the sky export options
[NEW] Allow drag & drop from atmosphere browser
[NEW] [RenderArea] Support scaling an existing render area from its center (pressing Alt) & preserving its aspect ratio (pressing Shift)
[NEW] Added the possibility to modify gamma in the camera backdrop editor
[NEW] Drag & drop of atmosphere files (.atm) in the main frame is now possible.
[NEW] Added refresh of "Parent level" and "Cascade" in filter editor (for PlantFactory published parameters)
[NEW] Added min/max edition of "Custom variance" in random range parameters (for PlantFactory published parameters)
[NEW] Added modulation of PBR channel when using map
[Erosion] Fixed division by zero in algorithm (could lead to artifacts)
Allow sending a crash report even when we try to go on executing the program after a crash.
Support loading images (for materials, environment maps, etc.) requiring more than 2GB of uncompressed pixel data
Fixed gizmo size when switching to orthographic camera
Fixed TPF plant preview issue when plant OGL qualities are equal
Added a message asking confirmation before deleting a render from the stack
Fixed incorrect graph connection after choosing "Mapped Picture" mode in the transparency tab of the material editor (the image was connected to the alpha output)
In VUE Creator, it is now easier to set the resolution in the Render Options (the Digital 4K limitation is applied when closing the dialog or before starting the render).
Enabled the edition of the output filename from the Render Options (without having to click on "Browse")
Prevented the addition of objects into EcoSystems when they are not supported (procedural terrains, fans, global EcoSystems...)
Fixed interface update after copy/pasting a material inside the material editor (the current tab wasn't correctly updated).
Fixed the display of the EcoPainter brush on HiDPI screens (radius was wrong)
Fixed several problems when painting EcoSystems without "airbrush style": this mode now works in all views. The number of Added instances only depends on the stroke's curve/path, not on the speed of the cursor (like with the "airbrush style"). There is no overlap or empty areas between sub-segment of strokes anymore. Also, the falloff filter is now applied by taking the path into account.
Fixed the application of the falloff filter when painting EcoSystems in perspective views (only a subpart of the filter was applied, which depended on the current size of the perspective view).
Fixed another problem with the distribution of instances in orthogonal views (there was an hidden "square root" falloff filter)
EcoSystem instances are now Added in the whole circle of the brush on screen which seems more intuitive than the previous behavior which was a "mix" of screen and world projections.
Fixed the slider controlling the roughness of PBR materials (in constant mode). The value used for rendering was not correctly applied and setting a value above 17% was like setting 100%.
Fixed the import of materials for some 3D files, like DAE files created in MakeHuman: wrongly defined transparency maps are now ignored (= using an image with embedded alpha already used by the Color and Alpha channels).
Fixed favorites not saved when closing the browser without loading an item (browser)
Fixed Material Editor keeping the size of the function Editor when we close the function editor
Fixed gizmo issues on 4K screen
Fixed glitch on filter editor when switching monitor (with different DPI)
Fixed post render options status bar not flashing sometimes
Fixed animated MetaCloud OpenGL incorrect refresh
Fixed black previews of plant specimens in plant browser
When you reset a cloud material, you got a new cloud material.
Fixed wrong preview in browser when loading species of plants
Localization of hardcoded English strings in MetaNode pop-up menu (Function Editor nodes list)
[Render area] Fixed disappearing render area when editing it would for example move the right border to the left of the left border (same with top/bottom & corners)
[TerrainEditor] Altitudes color bar below the 3D preview was improperly drawn when the "Adapt to clipping" button was toggled down.
[ColorMapEditor] Display real units (e.g. altitude in meters in the Terrain Editor) for key color positions
[Gizmo icons] Inadvertent drag of the mouse of even a single pixel over a gizmo icon (P/L/G and M/R/S icons in the 3D viewports) would deselect the current object.
[ColorMapEditor] Fixed manual edition of the key color position field pushing around other keys
[SplineProximity/Edition] Fixed conflicts between Edit/Insert fast-switch keys and regular triggers + support deletion of a control point with Backspace (useful on Mac keyboards)
[TerrainEditor] Fixed 'adapt to clipping' button status not remembered
[Menu] Fixed varying shortcut displayed as menu item hints before and after opening the Options panel (for shortcuts with an editable and a non-editable version like Undo, Copy and Paste)
Avoid displaying the vegetation variation browser if the file cannot be loaded due to licensing (PlantCatalog).
Remember the last folder from which a Python script was loaded by user for next session.
Fixed a crash in camera backdrop when selecting a picture rotated by 90 or -90 degrees
Improved image mapping on primitives
Avoid bad interaction between sliders and scroll bars.
Better error handling of image/animation loading
Report each parameter loading error
Avoid exiting when accelerator file cannot be read, pop a message but go on.
Fixed erratic random range slider behavior for integer values.
Fixed tabbed dialog not correctly resized when maximizing/minimizing main window
Fixed on preview for 4GB images in browser
Improved error management while reading/writing files
Fixed issues when trying to load a list of images.
Fixed a possible crash when clicking on convert to MetaCloud when no object in scene
Fixed MetaCloud interpolation of amount parameter (used in cloud animations)
Fixed edition of colors in MetaNodes.
[NEW] Allow sending a crash report even when we try to go on executing the program after a crash.
[NEW] Added support for MacOS Catalina (10.15)
PlantFactory
[NEW] PlantFactory Importer plugins for 3ds Max and Maya (2019+). Video preview:
[NEW] Automatically convert materials to VRay native materials
[NEW] Bake and export all material PBR channels as texture maps
[NEW] Added some maps (Ambient Occlusion, Blurred Reflections, Luminous, Glow) to write at export
[NEW] Added baking to 16 bits Grayscale textures
[NEW] New color bleed blending (smudge + mean average color filler) for exported texture maps
[NEW] When baking textures, use the alpha of input textures even if it is not exported, we do not want a different result whereas we activate the alpha export or not.
[NEW] Modified the "generic UV" export algorithm to avoid making thousands of mesh parts in some cases. Made it make more compact parts for better packing.
[NEW] Use a better packing for the "generic UV"
[NEW] Ensure baked normal maps are normalized
[NEW] Added occlusion treatment option, allowing user to select between ambient occlusion compute, ambient occlusion texture or a mix of both
[NEW] Added the import of FBX models.
Re-center baked UVs to improve filtering
Fixed normal map export on TPF plants
Improved displacement export
Limit max size of adaptative maps.
Better placement of fragments in baked texture maps.
Avoid losing 16-bit precision (if any) on imported bump maps.
[NEW] Gather parameters in dedicated tab in material editor rather than publish them all
[NEW] Added support for multigraph .sbsar
[NEW] Integrated version 7 SDK
[NEW] Added support for missing .sbsar inputs
[NEW] Added support for animated .sbsar
Fixed meshing of "closed" segments (when the radius at top or bottom is zero)
Ensure age ratio parameter is in [0,1]
Fixed export and displacement of detailed leaves
[NEW] Added minimal meshing subdivision parameter on several primitives
[NEW] Added a new LOD Selection method based on a referenced length (instead of the plant bounding sphere)
[NEW] Added filter handling on flower primitives’ angular subdivisions
[NEW] Added a meshing symmetry factor for flower primitives
Do not apply "whorl" parameters when the parameter group is disabled.
Use integer quantization for min subdivision numbers
Improved edition of noise parameter in fractal nodes
Fixed regression on Function Node Preview
In the export of "generic UV", converted O(N^2) code to O(N)
Optimize undo/redo memory footprint in some specific scenario
Fixed crash with hooking point editor with paraboloid
Fixed a possible crash when loading a DAE files bigger than 2 GB. A proper warning message is now displayed.
Fixed crash related to texture edition
Fixed a potential crash when reading TIF files using color palette mode.
[NEW] Allow displaying small value ranges in parameter sliders, added specific angle mode.
[NEW] Enable HIDPI interface and preview (single-screen and multi-screen)
[NEW] Added a ... tab with menu when several tabs are superposed (when the tab size is too small)
[NEW] Added refresh of "Parent level" and "Cascade" in filter editor
[NEW] Added min/max edition of "Custom variance" in random range parameters.
More visible force indicators in preview
Better error reporting of DirectX initialization error
Avoid displaying the vegetation variation browser if the file cannot be loaded due to licensing (PlantCatalog).
Reorganized flower primitives meshing parameters into a new tab
Improved image mapping on primitives
Avoid bad interaction between sliders and scroll bars.
Better error handling of image/animation loading
Report each parameter loading error
Avoid exiting when accelerator file cannot be read, pop a message but go on.
Fixed erratic random range slider behavior for integer values.
Fixed tabbed dialog not correctly resized when maximizing/minimizing main window
Fixed on preview for 4GB images in browser
Improved error management while reading/writing files
Fixed issues when trying to load a list of images.
