3DS Max 2018 mental ray removed

[stephen.d.green]

Not entirely unexpected after it was removed from Maya, but confirmed on nvidia's page that Autodesk have decided to no longer bundle mental ray with Max 2018.

http://images.nvidia.com/content/technologies/advanced-rendering/pdf/354915-MentalRay-FAQ-Sheet-FNL-...

If you want it, you have to rent it from nvidia.

[stephan_reischer]

So reading it looks like i could like it. I am loosing networkrendering, thats all (okay, that can be huge, but not for me now).

Feels a bit like Arnold in Maya: rendering on Workstation is untouched, if you need more productivity you pay. But most interesting: it reads like nvidia gives away the plugin for free and is now all alone responsible for the integration. That makes it better in my eyes. So lets see how this will develope.

Have a nice Weekend!

Stephan

[stephen.d.green · Accepted solution]

You have to pay nvidia if you want anything other than single frame rendering, it's animation not just network rendering.

$295 for a single machine, $995 for a 5 machine render licence.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/nvidia-mental-ray-products.html


It also opens up the question of physX - Autodesk already threw out reactor to replace it with PhysX - if they're now removing nvidia tech, who's to say that MassFX, mparticles etc. isn't next?

On top of 38% price rises over the next 3 years for maintenance subscribers and being kept in the dark with who's actually product manager these days, it's not looking great.

[Isaac_Zuniga]

I'm hoping that Autodesk will give those with educational versions of their software an educational code/key to use with Nvidia, that way us cash-strapped students don't have to pay 5 grand for Mental Ray...

That is, assuming if this is true to begin with...

Had what is posted turn out to be true, then that could spell a nasty issue with 3ds Max and Nvidia with Mental Ray...

[Isaac_Zuniga]

While I haven't been a "long-term" Autodesk user since 2000, I have seen enough over the past 7 years; enough to the point that I'm actually not looking forward to this next update if this is going to require me to shell out 5 grand, of which I do not have...

Looks like 3ds Max may hit a rough patch now, because not only, like you said, is it becoming more expensive, but Nvidia is starting to charge everyone just to use Mental Ray...

I hope Autodesk has a new render engine coming out this year to replace the old Mental Ray, if not, I may just skip this year's release altogether, as I won't be able to render anything...

(Kind of raises the question, if Mental Ray and IRay are both gone, whats... going to be the primary render engine then?)

[spacefrog_]

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@stephen.d.green wrote:

You have to pay nvidia if you want anything other than single frame rendering, it's animation not just network rendering.

$295 for a single machine, $995 for a 5 machine render licence.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/nvidia-mental-ray-products.html

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AFAIK that's not correct, Max's animation sequence rendering will work as usual without additional license (AFAIK). But i think all the final facts are'nt really disclosed so it's hard to talk about it. Even the PDF that was downloadable from NVIDIA ( don't know if the link still works) seem to have been an accidental leak. So lets wait for the final, official announcement ...

[companioncube]

i'm guessing Arnold will be the primary renderer. they've done pretty well getting MtoA working over the last year. seems obvious that 2018 will include it.

[Isaac_Zuniga]

That sounds interesting;

How about the possibility of Vray, or maybe autodesk making a new render engine for 3ds Max? (Something similar to the ART renderer but non-physically based?)

[companioncube]

autodesk own Arnold since last year so it seems like the only logical answer. 

[Isaac_Zuniga]

Please excuse my lack of knowledge with the render engine (this is the first time I've heard of it), but what would you say in terms of comparing Arnold with Mental Ray?

Would you say that we're getting something better than Mental Ray or something that's on the "same level" as Mental Ray?

[companioncube]

arnold is far superior to mental ray. As autodesk own it, they never owned mental ray, so expect tight integration and active development.

https://www.solidangle.com/gallery/

[Isaac_Zuniga]

Really? Autodesk owns Arnold?

This sounds promising for the future of 3ds Max, and maybe other Autodesk products as well. Like you said, I hope to see some great things from Autodesk, since they are not bound to Mental Ray's confines.

[Anonymous]

wow, this is an interesting development to say the least. The next year or two will reveal a lot.

[Alfred.DeFlaminis]

I just wanted to pop in and mention that we have a new Arnold support person, @faline.custodio.da.silva and she's already getting into the swing of things.  Welcome aboard, Faline!

Best Regards,

[Isaac_Zuniga]

Sounds awesome Alfred, I'm glad to see 3ds Max will be moving forward from Mental Ray, onto something more brighter and newer.

I'm sure Dominique would be happy to hear that my issue with Mental Ray will be no more this release! 😄

[Anonymous]

Where does this leave 3dsmax users who own their own render farms? Will the licensing for Arnold be similar to how MR was or will it charge per node? There is no way I can afford to license my render farm on a per node basis. I am about to invest in new machines so the timing of this news couldn't be worse.

[jcdeblok]

Yeah basically free network rendering has been removed (as well as ability to render to texture since that was a MR feature).  You get 1 Arnold lic but you can only render from Max's UI with it and not though back burner for example.  

So everyone who is running a MR farm will need to buy render lics from a 3th party. May I suggest to not spend your render budget on Autodesk solutions but support companies that do care about their customers. 

[Isaac_Zuniga]

Whoa, what, really? I won't be able to use Arnold with my render farm?

I'm a student, I can't afford $700 to pay for render nodes for my machines... I didn't know that this is what Autodesk was doing, I thought that they were going to supply Max users with a license/key that allows them to use Arnold, or get Mental Ray back to use on their machines...

I hope Autodesk, at least, creates their own render engine for next release, because:

1. Scanline is pretty weak on it's own; that cannot be Mental Ray's replacement.

2. The Quicksilver renderer, (to my knowledge), has not been touched much and doesn't support most of the things Mental Ray did.

3. The new ART render engine is nice, except for one thing, it's physically accurate, which severely restricts the creativity that Mental Ray offered users.

Maya has 4 different render engines, natively, why can't 3ds Max? (Not Arnold, I mean one that's built in).

[dgorsman]

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@jcdeblok wrote:

Yeah basically free network rendering has been removed (as well as ability to render to texture since that was a MR feature).  You get 1 Arnold lic but you can only render from Max's UI with it and not though back burner for example.  

So everyone who is running a MR farm will need to buy render lics from a 3th party. May I suggest to not spend your render budget on Autodesk solutions but support companies that do care about their customers. 

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Source please?

[dgorsman]

Mental Ray is providing free EDU licenses to students.  I have little doubt that they would provide render-node licenses free to institutions, but whether that's appropriate for a student-run render farm is a question you should pose to them.  That would be a lot of free support requirements for a small segment of the user-base (most would be single-computer) so it may not be their intention to support it.

Either way, I'd get your answers from Mental Ray directly rather than third or fourth hand information.