Autodesk® 3ds Max® 2015 software software delivers efficient new tools, accelerated performance, and streamlined workflows to help increase overall productivity for artists and designers working with the complex, high-resolution assets required by today's demanding entertainment and design visualization projects.
With the ability to import, visualize, and render massive point cloud datasets; enhanced viewport performance; and new scene management workflows, 3ds Max 2015 helps artists and designers handle greater complexity without slowing down. In addition, a more responsive ActiveShade interactive rendering workflow that now supports the NVIDIA® mental ray® renderer, and a new artist-friendly node-based visual shader editor for creating and previewing complex real-time shaders help increase efficiency for lighting, shading, and rendering tasks. Meanwhile, with new support for Python® scripting, 3ds Max 2015 offers a robust core toolset that is more easily extended and customizable to meet each studio's unique requirements.
This section lists all significant new features, but does not include every change in 3ds Max. As you proceed through the documentation, keep an eye out for the 
icon, which indicates a new feature, and the 
icon, which indicates a change to an existing feature.
You can also search for information about new or changed features. For topics that describe new program features, search for "new feature". For changes in existing features, search for "changed feature".