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3ds Max Support

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3ds Max Geometry Support

3ds Max supports various methods for generating objects, but currently only meshes are supported for conversion.

Supported Input Geometry

All surfaces and primitives that are convertible to Editable Meshes, even if not listed here, are supported by RapidPipeline DCC Importer.

  • ✅ Geometry Surfaces: Editable Meshes, Polys, Patches, Shapes.
  • ✅ Standard Primitives
  • ✅ Extended Primitives
  • ✅ Patch Grid Primitives
  • ✅ Door Primitivies
  • ✅ NURBS Surfaces
  • ✅ Windows Primitives
  • ✅ Dynamics Objects Primitives
  • ✅ Stairs Primitives

Unsupported Input Geometry

Unsupported Geometry objects are removed during scene preprocessing within 3ds Max.

  • ⛔ Particle System Primitives
  • ⛔ AEC Extended Primitives
  • ⛔ PointCloud Primitives
  • ⛔ Compound Objects
  • ⛔ Body Objects
  • ⛔ Fluid Primitives
  • ⛔ All Chaos Scatter-specific geometry is unsupported.
  • ⛔ V-Ray-specific geometry, such as VRayFur, VRayPlane, VRayClipper, VRayProxy.
  • ⛔ Corona-specific geometry.
  • ⛔ Arnold-specific geometry.

3ds Max Modifier Support

Supported Modifiers

Any modifiers not listed here can be considered to be supported. Some modifiers have partial support, they are listed here:

  • ✅ Displace modifier
    • Displacement is automatically converted into geometry.
  • ✅ Hair and Fur (WSM) modifier
    • Each hair modifier will have only one Material ID.
    • Only the Diffuse color is converted from a VRayHairNextMtl material applied to the model; all material settings are ignored from within the Hair and Fur modifier.
  • ✅ VRayDisplacementModifier
    • Displacement is baked into normal maps by default.
    • If "3D Mapping" mode is used, displacement can be converted into geometry using the option --bakeDisplacement. See bakeDisplacement for more information.


Displacement conversion methods

Unsupported Modifiers

These modifiers cannot properly apply their changes when the model is collapsed, therefore these are unsupported. These are ignored during processing and will not have any effect in the result.

  • ⛔ Particles or Animation (e.g., skin, deform) related modifiers.
  • ⛔ Camera Map Modifier, Camera Map Modifier (WSM)
  • ⛔ PathDeform, PatchDeform, PathDeform (WSM), PatchDeform (WSM)
  • ⛔ Point Cache, Point Cache (WSM)
  • ⛔ Physique
  • ⛔ Skin, Skin Wrap, Skin Morph, Skin Morph Patch
  • ⛔ Particle Skinner, PFlow Collision, Particle Face Creator, PFlow Collision (WSM)
  • ⛔ VRayHairFarmMod
  • ⛔ Arnold-specific Modifiers
  • ⛔ Corona-specific Modifiers

3ds Max Material Support

Fully Supported Materials

  • V-Ray Materials:
    • ✅ VRayMtl
    • ✅ VRayLightMtl
    • ✅ VRayBumpMtl
    • ✅ VRayMtlWrapper
    • ✅ VRayOverrideMtl
  • Standard 3ds Max Materials:
    • ✅ MultiMaterial
    • ✅ Shell Material

Work-in-Progress/Partially Supported Materials

  • *️⃣ V-Ray Materials:
    • *️⃣ VRayHairNextMtl
    • *️⃣ VRayHairMtl
    • *️⃣ VRayFastSSS2
    • *️⃣ VRayALSurfaceMtl
    • *️⃣ VRaySkinMtl
    • *️⃣ VRayBlendMtl
    • *️⃣ VRay2SidedMtl: Replaced by front Material.
    • *️⃣ VRaySwitchMtl: Replaced by first material.
    • *️⃣ VRayCarPaintMtl
    • *️⃣ VRayCarPaintMtl2
    • *️⃣ VRayStochasticFlakesMtl: Only supported as a coat material of VRayBlendMtl at this time.
    • *️⃣ VRayFlakesMtl: Only supported as a coat material of VRayBlendMtl at this time.
    • *️⃣ VRayFlakesMtl2: Only supported as a coat material of VRayBlendMtl at this time.
  • *️⃣ Standard 3ds Max Materials:
    • *️⃣ Blend
    • *️⃣ PhysicalMaterial
    • *️⃣ Standardmaterial
    • *️⃣ RaytraceMaterial
    • *️⃣ Architectural
    • *️⃣ Shellac
    • *️⃣ CompositeMaterial
    • *️⃣ TopBottom
    • *️⃣ DoubleSided: Replaced by first material.
    • *️⃣ PBR Material (Metal/Rough)
    • *️⃣ PBR Material (Spec/Gloss)
    • *️⃣ GLTF Material
    • *️⃣ USD Preview Surface

Unsupported Materials

  • V-Ray Materials:
    • ⛔ VRayToonMtl
    • ⛔ VRayScatterVolumeMtl
    • ⛔ VRayVectorDisplBake
    • ⛔ VRayGLSLMtl, VRayMDLMtl, VRayOSLMtl
    • ⛔ VRayPointParticleMtl
    • ⛔ VRayPluginNodeMtl
    • ⛔ VRayVRMatMtl
    • ⛔ VRayScannedMtl
  • ⛔ Corona Materials
    • All Corona-specific materials, such as CoronaPhysicalMtl, are currently unsupported.
  • ⛔ Arnold Materials
    • All Arnold-specific materials, such as Standard Surface, are currently unsupported.
info

Corona materials can be converted into V-Ray materials, through a tool provided by Chaos which converts most settings reliably. It can be found in the V-Ray menu, under Converters, V-Ray scene converter. Currently, you must convert your Corona materials before processing such a scene with the DCC Importer.

3ds Max Texture Node Support

If any 3ds Max texture node is not mentioned here, it should be considered "unverified" and will force the material to be atlas baked. If any texture of a material is considered to be "procedural" the material will also be atlas baked.

Supported Input Texture Nodes

Non-procedural Texture Nodes

  • Standard 3ds Max Nodes:
    • ✅ ColorMap
    • ✅ BitmapTexture
    • ✅ Color_Correction
    • ✅ Normal_Bump
    • ✅ Mix
    • ✅ Output
    • ✅ Mask
    • ✅ CompositeTexturemap
    • ✅ RGB_Multiply
    • ✅ RGB_Tint
    • ✅ Missing_TextureMap
    • ✅ Gradient
    • ✅ Gradient_Ramp
    • ✅ TextMap
    • ✅ Checker
    • ✅ ShapeMap
    • ✅ Swirl
    • ✅ Bricks
    • ✅ MultiOutputChannelTexmapToTexmap
  • V-Ray Nodes:
    • ✅ VRayColor
    • ✅ VRayBump2Normal
    • ✅ VRayColor2Bump
    • ✅ VRayNormalMap
    • ✅ VRayBitmap
    • ✅ VRayCompTex
    • ✅ VRayUserColor
    • ✅ VRayUserScalar

Procedural Texture Nodes

  • Standard 3ds Max Nodes:
    • ✅ AdvancedWood
    • ✅ Smoke
    • ✅ Noise
    • ✅ Cellular
    • ✅ Dent
    • ✅ Marble
    • ✅ Perlin_Marble
    • ✅ Splat
    • ✅ Speckle
    • ✅ Stucco
    • ✅ Water
    • ✅ BlendedBoxMap
    • ✅ Camera_Map_Per_Pixel
    • ✅ Vertex_Color
    • ✅ MultiTile
    • ✅ Particle_Age
    • ✅ Particle_MBlur
    • ✅ TextureObjMask
    • ✅ Vector_Displacement
  • V-Ray Nodes:
    • ✅ VRayCurvature
    • ✅ VRayDirt
    • ✅ VRayDistanceTex
    • ✅ VRayEdgesTex
    • ✅ VRayMultiSubTex
    • ✅ VRayPluginNodeTex
    • ✅ VRayTriplanarTex
    • ✅ VRayUVWRandomizer
    • ✅ VRayParticleTex

Unverified Input Texture Nodes

If an unverified texture node is found, it forces the material to be atlas baked as a fallback. Some examples include:

  • All OSL 3ds Max texture nodes, including OSL Map
  • Standard 3ds Max Nodes:
    • ❔ BlendedBoxMap
    • ❔ Camera Map Per Pixel
    • ❔ Particle Age
    • ❔ Raytrace
    • ❔ ShapeMap
    • ❔ Substance
    • ❔ TextureObjectMask
    • ❔ VectorDisplacement
    • ❔ Vector Map
  • V-Ray Nodes:
    • ❔ VRayLut
    • ❔ VRayGLSLTex
    • ❔ VRayOCIO
    • ❔ VRayOSLTex
    • ❔ VRayOSLOutputSelector
    • ❔ VRayPtex
    • ❔ VRaySky
    • ❔ VRaySamplerInfoTex
    • ❔ VRayPointCloudColor
    • ❔ VRaySoftBox

Unsupported Input Texture Nodes

Unsupported texture nodes are removed, skipped or converted during scene preprocessing. Errors and Warnings logged during conversion can be reviewed using RapidPipeline QC Tools.

  • ⚠️ Falloff:
    • Falloff cannot be supported directly in standardized real-time materials because Falloff is view-dependent.
    • Falloff nodes are converted by DCC Importer into an 80:20 mix between the two nodes/colors in use, and Falloff Curves are ignored.
    • As an alternative, we suggest using the Sheen parameters in VRayMtl; DCC Importer can convert this directly into the glTF extension KHR_materials_sheen.
  • ⚠️ VRayHairInfoTex:
    • Basic colors are converted to a color map, or a mix of colors, to roughly preserve the general appearance of fur geometry.
    • VRayFur is not currently supported, but we do support VRayHairInfoTex when used on explicit geometry.
  • SigerNoise and other third-party plugins:
    • We do not have support for third-party plugins at this time.
    • If unsupported third-party nodes are detected, they are removed during scene preprocessing, and an Error is logged.
  • All Arnold 3ds Max texture nodes
  • All Corona 3ds Max texture nodes

3ds Max Additional Support

  • Cameras are preserved for rendering by RapidPipeline QC Tools.
  • Animation is currently not supported: generally meshes will be converted using their appearance at frame 0.
  • Negative transforms should be avoided if possible, however the converter will attempt to preserve mesh appearance as it appears when rendered in V-Ray.
  • For information about scene organization for optimal conversion please see 3ds Max Guidelines.