3ds Max release history
was officially announced at Siggraph 1995 and shipped to users in April 1996. At the same time, the Autodesk Multimedia Division was rebranded as Kinetix, a division of Autodesk. Thus the full name of the official product was Kinetix 3D Studio MAX. The product contained about the same feature set as 3D Studio DOS R4 but implemented all tools using a completely new object-oriented, procedural modeling paradigm featuring the Modifier Stack, an easier to use linear version of the Prisms/Houdini procedural pipeline. Some elements like the Material Editor and the animation controller system were largely enhanced compared to the DOS version, and the render subsystem allowed for volumetric effects and 3rd party plug-in renderers (which started appearing shortly after the first release - RayStudio and RayMax being the first two available). Release 1.0 required Windows NT 3.51 and supported the first 3D Labs GLiNT hardware accelerator cards available for the PC via custom Heidi drivers.
There were two point updates - 1.1 and 1.2. The SDK shipped with 1.1. 1.2 was an update to support WinNT 4 which featured the Windows95-style UI.
3D Studio MAX R2 Windows Athena September 1997
was officially announced as Siggraph 1997 and included over thousand new features and workflow improvements. The most notable additions were:
Ray-tracing in the Scanline renderer via Raytrace materials and maps developed by Blur Studio's Steven Blackmon and Scott Kirvan (who later split to form Splutterfish and develop another popular renderer - the Brazil r/s).
Lens Effects Post Effects licensed from Digimation
NURBS modeling tools
MAXScript built-in programming language
OpenGL support.
There was one point release - 2.5. It was the first and only non-free point release in the history of 3D Studio and included among other enhancements NURBS additions (support for Trims) and VRML import support.
3D Studio MAX R3 Windows Shiva June 1999
was announced at the Game Developers Conference 1999 and was released in June 1999. It was the last version to be published under the Kinetix logo, although the division was already merged with Discreet Logic but had no Corporate Identity design yet. The core of the program was largely rewritten to allow better integration of MAXScript and the Scanline Renderer was enhanced with support for pluggable Anti-Alias filters and Supersamplers. The User Interface was redesigned to support larger true-color icons on customizable tabbed toolbars where custom MacroScripts could be placed by the user.
The point update to 3.1 is considered by many the most stable version of the software in its history.
Discreet 3dsmax 4 Windows Magma July 2000
was initially announced at Siggraph 2000 in New Orleans in an early technology demo. It featured among many other things:
a new IK system
QuadMenus context menus and a unified ActionItems UI customization system
ActiveShade render preview mode
a redesigned Modifier Stack (Stack View) with support for Drag And Drop
new Editable Poly modeling toolset
DirectX Shader support in viewports
ActiveX support in scripted rollouts
MultiRes mesh optimization based on Intel technology
There were two point releases to individual customers - 4.1 and 4.2, and a special 4.3 update which was for Educational users (schools, universities) only.
Discreet 3dsmax 5 Windows Luna July 2002
was the first release ever to support the plug-in format of the previous version. Plug-ins developed for 3dsmax 4 could be used in 5 without a recompile, while both 2 and 3 required completely new versions. The biggest addition to 3dsmax 5 was the Advanced Lighting sub-system of the Scanline Renderer where two new plug-ins were introduced - a brute-force Global Illumination module called Light Tracer and a Radiosity module based on further research by the developers of Lightscape. (Historical note: Lightscape was acquired by Discreet Logic a couple of years before the Autodesk acquisition.) This also incl. Photometric and Day lights support. Further additions were:
the inclusion of Reactor (previously a separate plug-in published by Discreet based on the HAVOK dynamics engine)
Set Key animation mode
a refactored Track View with Curve Editor and Dope Sheet modes
an enhanced UVW Unwrap editor
Render To Texture feature
New Named Selection Sets editor
New Transform gizmos
Character Assembly and Bone Tools
Spline IK
Gimbal rotation mode
Auto-Tangent interpolation
Improved Skin Modifier with Weight Table
Improved HSDS modifier UI
Support for Layers (taken from 3ds VIZ)
Ink'n'Paint Material
Translucent shader
On the human resources side, it is interesting to note that the product was developed under Chris Ford, previously senior Maya product manager who moved to Discreet when Alias dropped Wavefront. (He is now PRman business director at Pixar). Other related 3D Trivia: Bob Bennett, previously product manager for 3d Studio DOS, was Maya Development Manager for many years until the Alias acquisition by Autodesk - he is now with Luxology.
There were three point updates - 5.1, 5.1SP1 and 5.5 (the latter was the extended version with the Particle Flow extensions).
Discreet 3dsmax 6 Windows July 2003
once again required recompiled plug-ins (which later would be usable in 7 and 8). The main new features were:
mental ray renderer incorporated into the base package
Particle Flow (previously shipped as an Extension to 5 for users on subscription),
a refactored Schematic View
Shell modifier
new Vertex Paint
Reactor 2 dynamics
network support for Render To Texture
Discreet 3dsmax 7 Windows Catalyst August 2004
was an evolutionary update on top of the 3dsmax 6 core. Main new features were:
new Editable Poly tools incl. Bridge, Deform and Relax painting, Soft Selections Painting, Preserve UVs option etc.
new Edit Poly modifier which was supposed to ship as Extension to 6 but made it into 7.
Support for Normal mapping generation and rendering
mental ray 3.3, incl. Sub-Surface Scattering and Ambient Occlusion shaders and Render To Texture support
Per-Pixel camera mapping
Flat shaded view
Character Studio 4.3 included in the base package
SkinMorph and SkinWrap modifiers
TurboSmooth modifier
Parameter Collector
Refactored Reaction controller (formerly known as Reactor controller)
Walk-Thru mode for First Person navigation in the viewports.
Autodesk 3ds Max 8 Windows Vesper September 2005
was published in the Fall of 2005 and was the first release in the history of the product not to break the SDK compatibility in a 3rd major update - in other words, plug-ins from 6 and 7 could be used in 8 without the need for a recompile. Main new features were:
Asset Tracking with support for 3rd party solutions and Autodesk Vault shipping with the package.
Enhanced XRefs
MAXScript Debugger
Support for Scene States
Hair and Fur (shipped as Extension to 7 earlier that year, based on Joe Alter's Shave & Haircut)
Cloth (also available as Extension to 7, based on Size8's ClothFX, formerly known as Stitch)
Editable Poly enhancements - Shift Ring and Loop, better Bridge and Edge Connect, Open Chamfers option, clean removal of edges.
Enhanced Skin tools incl. Grow and Shrink, Loop and Ring, Weight Tool
Enhanced Unwrap UVW with Pelt Mapping support, better Relax options and Render Template tool
Sweep modifier and enhanced spline options incl. rectangular cross-sections
Brush Presets
Real-world map scale
Motion Mixer support for non-biped objects
Autodesk 3ds Max 9 Windows Makalu October 2006
was the first release to include both 32 bit and 64 bit builds of the software. It shipped to customers in October 2006 and required once again recompiled plug-ins due to the switch to a newer Visual Studio compiler and because the MaxSDK6 was getting old and was in need for an update to fix long-standing bugs. Major new features:
Project Path support incl. support for relative paths
Proxy Textures Manager
.NET support in MAXScript incl. classes, objects and UI controls.
ProBoolean and ProCutter (shipped as Extension to 8, based on PowerBooleans 3rd party plug-in), enhanced in this version with MAXScript exposure of ProCutter.
HAVOK 3 engine support in addition to the existing 2
better mental ray 3.5 integration with support for Physical sky and sun, Arch.&Design shaders and more.
Faster screen redraws in Direct3D mode incl. incremental D3D Mesh cache updates, faster spline redraws and more
Viewport Stats option for all viewports.
New Hidden Line viewport shading mode
Support for CG shaders
Animation Layers
Hair styling in the viewport, support for reflections
Updated PointCache incl. interoperability with Maya 8 (which uses the same cache format)
Better interoperability via FBX
Autodesk 3ds Max 2008 Windows Gouda October 2007
The first release to fully support the Windows Vista operating system.
Major new features:
Core Performance Optimizations with large number of objects
New Adaprive Degradation system with view-dependent per-object culling
Scene Explorer Scene Management
Working Pivot mode and Keyboard Shortcut Overrides
Selection Preview in EPoly mode
Review: Shadows and Per-Pixel Lighting in the Viewports
Review: mental ray Arch&Design Shader preview in the Viewports
Review: mental ray Sun and Sky Shader preview in the Viewports
mental ray: Sky Portals and Photographic Exposure Control
MAXScript ProEditor - based on the open source Scintilla control and SciTE editor
MAXScript Extension - integrating the complete Avguard Extensions feature set
Support for file-per-frame Point Cache format common with Autodesk Maya
Autodesk 3ds Max 2009 Windows Johnson April 2008
This was a special "short release cycle" with only 6 months of development time, changing the 3ds Max release cycle from autumn to spring. Major new features:
Spline UVW Mapping tool
Reveal™ Iterative Rendering
ProMaterials™: A set of new flexible mental ray materials
Photometric Lights
ViewCube™ and the SteeringWheels™ viewport navigation tools
ForeFeet option for quadrupedal skeletons
Rearranged UI
mental ray: mr Proxies, for fast render time geometry loading
mental ray: New render elements
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