Maxwell V1.0 Features List

[Devin Johnston]

This is a list I've compiled of the known features that Maxwell V1.0 will have, I will update it as other features are revealed. This list is unofficial and therefore is subject to change:

 

Last Updated: 4/18/06

 

Maxwell V1.0 Final Release will include:

-Maxwell V1.0 (as stable as RC5 if not more) 32 & (maybe) 64 bit version

-Maxwell Studio

-Compensation for RC problems (stated by Victor)1 Free License if you purchased Maxwell during Alpha, Beta, or RC Stage

Features

-3D Motion Blur

-Alpha Channel rendering

-Anisotropy

-Attenuation Model (improved)

-Bump mapping

-Clip Maps with Transmittance

-Complex IOR/SSS/Dispersion

-Cooperative/Network Rendering

-Caustics (improved)

-Dispersion (improved)

-Emixer

-Falloff Curves

-Gradiance in the transmittance

-HD option

-HDR/MXI Emitters

-HDR/MXI Lighting

-Light editor

-Lighting presets

-Material Wizard

-Material Editor Preview

-Multi Light Illumination Control (can change sun intensity not position)

-Multi sub object materials (Tom says this will come in V1.0)

-MXED (Standalone material editor)

-Normal Mapping

-Objects hidden to camera (can hide shadows as well)

-Reflected caustics

-Render output 32 bits per channel

-Resume rendering

-Sun behind glass (Tom says it's improved)

-Tone mapping

-Transmittance mapping (also known as alpha mask)

-Undo

-Weight mapping with Transparency

-Supported Plugins-

-3D Max

-Maya

-Lightwave

-Rhino

-Cinema 4D

-SolidWorks

-Form Z

-Sketch Up

-ArchiCAD

Supported OS

Windows

Mac OSX

Linux

[buffos]

Maxer. Do you feel satisfied reading that list?

 

Please check older lists.

 

Many important features are missing.

Many have been removed

 

SSS? Displacement maps? Programmable materials? Volumetrics?.... the list is big.

 

And dont listen to tom. Sun problem is either solved or not solved. There is nothing like improved.

 

Since March Alpha, More features have been removed than added.

The quality and rendering time have not been improved, and as you see

what is missing is

 

WILL WE HAVE TO PAY FOR THE FEATURES WE WERE PROMISED?

 

MY answer is yes.

[Devin Johnston]

This is exactly why I wanted to create this list so that people could see what they were really getting. I think it's absurd that NL has refused for almost a year to provide this list; I can see no logical reason for a company not to provide a features list for a piece of software they have already sold. Others will say that NL is simply to busy to waste time on such an endeavor, that completely dumbfounds me since it took me all of 10 minutes to come up with it my self. My original posting of this list on the Maxwell site was moved from the main Maxwell forum to the Off Topic forum because it was deemed as irrelevant. I'm not sure why a company making a new piece of software thinks that it's features are irrelevant and not worth public scrutiny.

[buffos]

Its easy Maxer.

 

They have promised alot. And they cannot deliver. So they just shut up, and try to pursuade idiots (yes they are alot out there) they found gold.

 

Actually, this would be the less featured renderer out their, in the market.

[quizzy]

[i cleaned up the thread]

[Sawyer]

What is weight mapping?

[Devin Johnston]

What is weight mapping?

It's a way of blending materials together to create a more physically accurate material.

[olbo]

What is weight mapping?

 

As far as I know, it works like a blend material ... you can use a numerical

input or a texture to blend materials. And if I'm not wrong this is not limited

to a number of materials. ;o)

 

edit: ... grrrr Devin you beat me to it.

 

 

take care

Oleg

[Devin Johnston]

I was just told by Tom that some of the features on my features list won't be included in the V1.0 release. He wouldn’t say which ones they are but he did say that a full feature list would be out sometime this week. When I told him that all of these features were specifically stated to be in V1.0 by A-team members, he had no response.

[AdamT]

Wow, they've really opened up over there--offering a feature list less than a week before the final release.

[Ernest Burden III]

I had heard that Victor and others were showing remorse and contrition over their behaviour this last year. However, I would like to see some public signs of that, not just whispers from insiders. When you feel sorry, you're supposed to SAY so. Otherwise, no one knows!

 

I'm still waiting for a response on my recent idea to pull those fools out of their own filth, but recent event make me question why I'm even bothering.

[Adehus]

I'm still waiting for a response on my recent idea to pull those fools out of their own filth, but recent event make me question why I'm even bothering.

 

Are they going to be receptive to ideas from someone they just banned?

[Ernest Burden III]

Are they going to be receptive to ideas from someone they just banned?

 

They wouldn't know it was my idea.

[bricklyne]

I was just told by Tom that some of the features on my features list won't be included in the V1.0 release. He wouldn’t say which ones they are but he did say that a full feature list would be out sometime this week. When I told him that all of these features were specifically stated to be in V1.0 by A-team members, he had no response.

 

 

If I were a betting man, and were to take a stab, my guess for least likely features to be reasonably expected in v1.0 would be:

 

 

-Sun behind glass (Tom says it's improved)

-64 bit version (available ASAP may not be ready for V1.0)

-Lighting presets

-Resume rendering

-Multi sub object materials (Tom says this will come in V1.0)

-HD option

-Alpha Channel rendering

-3D Motion Blur

-Light editor

-Tone mapping

-Clip Maps

 

 

In fact I doubt most of the above features will even be available before v2.0 in any mid-stream release. Obviously all this is a just a guess, and based on nothing more than their well-documented history of release fiascos and perpetual back-tracking on originally promised features and functions. WE already know it's not going to be any faster than the RC5 engine, which is only marginally improved over the Alpha engine with some renders and actually slower than the Beta version in most others.

 

Personally, I don't think anyone will be able to judge Maxwell on the same basis, criteria and standards as proven Industry and production-ready renderers ( or even seriously consider it as one) until some time after v2.0 when they integrate the much talked about RS2 engine ( assuming, of course, that, it's everything they promise it will be; and we all know NL and promises).

 

As for the actual release itself, haven't we all seen this movie before; a couple of days before the release, probably Monday, they'll release some flashy promo video-montage on their website - Flash-authored, of course - which will still show absolutely nothing about the new engine and focus mainly on images rendered with the alpha and beta engines. And then the night before ( depending on your time zone), word will leak out that they have to delay it a couple of days to get all the nuts and bolts on tight, and when they actually do release it, their server will probably go down for a couple of hours from too many download requests, which will shortly be followed by the entire website, leaving customers in the dark regarding installation and stability issues.

 

A fix-patch for stability will follow shortly, a few days later.............

(aslo to get rid of that nasty blur, red-dots, white-dots, insert-quirky-bug-here, that the new release has)

 

 

 

Right now, even barely a week before the release of v1.0, all this still has all the same feel and familiarity of a software development still at the Beta or Alpha stages, especially considering that they effectively skipped right through the RC stage.

[Devin Johnston]

I really hope your wrong about all of that but you do have history on your side to back you up. I also don't like the idea that so many features would be missing from V1 especially considering that every single one of these features were spoken of by people who should know what is and isn't in the final product.

[Bongo51]

One of the reasons I bought Maxwell as an Alpha was the promised plugin "vue infinite". Nobody wants to talk about it. It's simply vanished. They think I guess that now it's been removed from their website, thus it never existed. Not to mention fog and a few other key features which were PROMISED in the V1 release. Now it's called a 'light simulator' and a lot of the features which prompted people to lay down the cash are missing or delayed.

 

What good is an extra license when you can't even sell it to pay for a V2 upgrade to get the features you originally expected.

 

 

[Sawyer]

I can't help but scratch my head about the 2 license thing. In theory you would have to pay 4 times what you paid for v1/beta whatever to keep your 2 licenses only to end up with the final product that was promised for v1.