Rendering in the background.

[dangiles]

Probably on many wish lists and probably unfeasible as well but: I'd like to continue working on my scene while Max is rendering. So much workflow strategy is dedicated to limiting time wasted while the render engine blocks out the rest of the interface. I'd be willing to sacrifice any percentage of my hardware resources to reduce downtime while (non-network) rendering.

[Tommy L]

You can open backburner on your own machine, submit render to network and render locally that way. You can set how many threads for the operation in the task manager or I think backburner submission may have an option for that? Cant remember. Best solution is to buy a node or two, but I understand thats not the question youre asking.

[dangiles]

There are a number of workarounds - I've also simply opened the file in another instance of Max and saved incrementally while the original rendered. What I'd like is being able to simply hit render, move the rendered frame window aside and keep working. If the program was managing it, I'm sure that would be the most efficient use of computer resources and time.

[Francisco Penaloza]

Well the "best option" is get a render node, if budget is low you can get and older PC for cheap. It will take longer to render, yes but at least it does not stop your modeling time. Now rendering in the same machine that you are modeling has serious RAM limitations, this will affect more than dividing a mutl-core processor, Backburner option is better than opening other instance of 3DsMax, because it load only the necessary to render, no UI, scripts and so on.

[Nic H]

just put to below normal priority

[Chris MacDonald]

I use the "set affinity" in the task manager to turn off a single core on the render, giving me just enough juice to continue working on other things.

[dangiles]

We don't start up an external program to edit materials, particle flows, etc. Having Max take care of those functions internally has to be the most efficient use of hardware resources, and the convenience of accessing these functions through modal interfaces that don't lock out all other functions is appreciated. Rendering lacks that convenience.

Of course rendering drains resources, but when additional RAM and cores are not required (or, as in my case, unavailable), I'd like to be able to continue developing my scene without having to set up a network, buy a node and run Backburner. But even if I had twenty top-end nodes at my disposal, I'd still like the option to simply go back to editing after clicking the little teapot icon - without the need to redirect the render process elsewhere.

[Zdravko Barisic]

Well the "best option" is get a render node, if budget is low you can get and older PC for cheap. It will take longer to render, yes but at least it does not stop your modeling time. Now rendering in the same machine that you are modeling has serious RAM limitations, this will affect more than dividing a mutl-core processor, Backburner option is better than opening other instance of 3DsMax, because it load only the necessary to render, no UI, scripts and so on.

 

Well, you're so right, for last 6 months I am using X79 mobo/2011 with 64GB of RAM, yeas, you read it correctly, I am on 64GB of RAM.

And, I must say, that is like driving Titanic 150M/h!

....

You can open multiple files, open them and use COPY/PASTE script, etc....in one word, like I am reborn!

http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/copy-and-paste-objects

[Guest dialog]

Check "Low Priority"

[Crazy Homeless Guy]

If you are only doing simple rendering then you can try VrayRT with ActiveShade. It will update as you are working on your scene... but it isn't for complex scenes or finish work.

[ankurrajput]

I do this... and it works friends...

set affinity to low from task manager than its easy .

you can render and work on model too in other file.

Edited March 19, 2014 by ankurrajput
to add more

[branskyj]

I completely agree with the OP.

 

Yes there are workarounds but that's not really what he/me/we want- Max should let us work on the scene/ change parameters while rendering.

I believe Cinema4D allows for some changes to be made while rendering but Max completely blocks everything else while rendering.

I 'd love to be able to at least perform more basic things- like edit materials, change render settings, etc...

I guess it's the way the software is written and it will be too cumbersome implementing these wishes though.

I also don't think Autodesk can sell new releases of 3DS Max very efficiently by improving too many features, they also have to introduce new features, fix bugs, etc...and there just isn't enough time for all that.

Oh well...

[Rich O]

This is possibly the biggest weak point of Max that I can think of.

 

Whenever I switch back to Max from Maya this drives me insane, not being able to change things in the scene as I see them happening in the render. Opening another instance of Max as a workaround is a big waste of system resources.

 

Is there a genuine, Max-is-too-old-and-creaky, technical reason this is not a thing? eg even V-ray doesn't implement it in Max

(Note I'm not talking about realtime renderers here)

[Chris MacDonald]

Could you not send the render through backburner to render on your local machine, thus freeing up the max file to continue work on?

 

I realise it's not ideal, but I don't see any reason that it shouldn't work.

[Rich O]

Quite hard to do quick look development that way, as you don't have access to the VFB

[Chris MacDonald]

No, but it should open up the max default frame buffer all the same, no?

[RyderSK]

[Regarding 3dsMax being un-locked while rendering]

I believe at some point Vray either had it, or Vlado contemplated having that option but decided against due to stability, while Corona still has it, but at some point almost decided against it as well because of 3dsMax reasons.

 

Interactive modes in any engines enable you to continue working (even very fluently if you dedicate only certain fraction of cores to 3dsMax) if you're after look development.

If you want to render final images though, I don't see Backburner being any inconvenient, it's literally 2 clicks of button. Also, BB does spawn minimized and locked 3dsMax session, so you do have access to framebuffer (of your choice, so if you had VFB enabled, it will spawn preview in VFB). I use it like that with no issue. But again, core affinity in task manager should be tweaked to allow for optimal multi-tasking. Keeping 2 threads is enough.

[ryannelson]

Vray 2.0 (and i think 1.5+) for Rhino 5 lets you do this. It works well if you're using DR too, untick "use local machine" and away you go. Using Rhino has its own drawbacks though, less 3rd party support such as Forest Pack Pro...