What is New in MAXScript in 3ds Max 2017
This topic will give you a quick overview of the MAXScript language changes and improvements in 3ds Max 2017. For details on each feature, please follow the links to the respective documentation pages.
Boolean Objects And Related Interfaces
The new
Boolean3 : GeometryClass implements a boolean object with a modern and easier to use interface.
The new
Interface:BooleanExplorerManager Core Interface provides MAXScript access to the Boolean Explorer dialog.
The new
Interface:BooleanObjectManager Core Interface exposes new Boolean3-related management methods.
Animation Presets / Offset Animation
The new
Preset_Maker : modifier is used by the new Animation Presets functionality.
The new
offset: floatController allows the shifting of selected animation tracks in time.
The new
Interface:OffsetManager exposes methods for creating and applying Animation Presets and Offset Animations
to scene objects.
Animation Controllers And Animation System Access
The new
Bezier_Point2 : Point2Controller is used to store Point2 animation keys. It derives from a new Point2Controller superclass.
The
following new functions can be used to set, restore, and commit value changes in animation controllers:
- SetControllerValue()
- RestoreControllerValue()
- CommitControllerValue()
The
following new functions can be used to construct a new controller using the default class customized by the
user via the Assign Controller dialog:
- NewDefaultBoolController()
- NewDefaultColorController()
- NewDefaultFloatController()
- NewDefaultFRGBAController()
- NewDefaultMasterPointController()
- NewDefaultMatrix3Controller()
- NewDefaultPoint2Controller()
- NewDefaultPoint3Controller()
- NewDefaultPoint4Controller()
- NewDefaultPositionController()
- NewDefaultRotationController()
- NewDefaultScaleController()
The
following new properties can be used to enable/disable the default key creation when animating a previously
not animated property, as well as set the default keyframe time, which is not limited
to frames 0 or 1 anymore:
- preferences.autoKeyDefaultKeyOn
- preferences.autoKeyDefaultKeyTime
The
new
animateMode System Global variable can be used to enable animation without changing the Auto
Key button state in the UI.
ART Renderer
The new
ART_Renderer : RendererClass exposes the new advanced renderer to MAXScript.
The new
ART_Renderer_Noise_Filter : RenderElement allows the noise removal from ART_Render output images via a post process.
Physical Sun And Sky
The new
Sun_Positioner : light implements the light and control gizmo of the new Physical Sun and Sky system that
integrates with the ART_Renderer.
The new
Physical_Sun___Sky_Environment : textureMap implements the environment map which renders the Physical Sun and Sky system based
on the Sun_Positioner's settings.
Materials
The new
PhysicalMaterial : Material was designed for use with the new ART_Renderer raytracer.
Texture Maps
The new
colorMap : textureMap offers a simple way to pass a solid color into any map slot, allowing for example
the instancing of a color value among independent Materials and Maps.
The new
textMap : textureMap allows the procedural creation of texture maps from one or more TextPlus geometry
objects.
The new
shapeMap : textureMap allows the procedural creation of texture maps from one or more Spline objects, including
the legacy Text shape.
The new
MultiTile : textureMap implements support for UDIM, custom, Z-Brush and Mudbox-compatible multi-tile textures.
The new
TextureObjMask : textureMap implements a texture for controlling inside/outside or above/below masking based
on basic geometry primitives.
mental ray Shaders And Interfaces
The new
Interface:NVIDIARenderersHelper Core Interface exposes a function to check for the existence of the mental ray and
iRay DLLs which are now an installer option.
The new
max_Shapemap : textureMap implements the shapeMap texture map as a mental ray shader.
The new
TextureObjMasktextureMap : textureMap implements the textureObjMask texture map as a mental ray shader.
HDPI Support
The
Interface: colorMan has new functions:
getColorTheme() and
setColorTheme(). The
getColorSchemeType() and
setColorSchemeType() functions are removed.
Button UI Control,
Checkbox UI Control,
Mapbutton UI Control, and
Materialbutton UI Control – all now support a simpler syntax for displaying images:
iconName and
iconSize creation parameters.
Several functions in the
windows structure and
systemTools structure now take a new
applyUIScaling parameter to deal with HDPI displays.
There are new "unscaled" versions of these System Globals:
New function to get the scale factor for High DPI displays:
GetUIScaleFactor monitorID:<int>.
New arguments have been added to the existing function to get the size of a string
in pixels if it was displayed on a command panel:
<point2> getTextExtent <string> removeUiScaling:<true> useQtTextWidth:<true>.
The
getProperty() and
setProperty() functions now have optional
removeUIScaling:<bool>/applyUIScaling:<bool> parameters.
The
Bitmap and
imgTag classes have new
iconName:<filename> and
iconSize:<point2> parameters.
The new
getIconAsBitmap() function in
imgTag gets a bitmap from a loaded icon.
The
dotNet Struct has a new
dotNet.loadIcon() function to load icons.
The
getColorSchemeType() and
setColorSchemeType() functions are removed from the
Interface: colorMan.
Core Interfaces
The new
Interface:MaxThumbnailMgr Core Interface exposes the saving of viewport thumbnails with the saved .MAX file.
The new Interface:IAutoCamMax Core Interface exposes the new viewport navigation Pivot Ball to MAXScript.
The new
Interface:SceneConverter Core Interface exposes properties and methods for setting up the scene converter
system and its rules.
Import/Export Dialogs Access
The
following new functions can be used to control the FBX settings dialog:
- OpenFbxSetting()
- GetEnableEditFbxSetting()
The following new functions can be used to control the display of the Game Exporter
dialog represented by the
GameExporter: UtilityPlugin:
- GameExporterOpenDialog()
- GameExporterShown()
Debugging Support
The following new functions have been added to the
systemTools struct:
- getSystemMetrics() - calls the win32 function of the same name.
- enumDisplayDevices() - returns an array corresponding to displays.
- isAeroEnabled() - returns true if Windows Aero mode is enabled.
The following functions have been removed from the
systemTools struct since the respective platforms are not supported by 3ds Max anymore:
- systemTools.isWindows98or2000()
- systemTools.isWindows9x()
New
MXSCallstackCaptureEnabled context allows you to better control how the MAXScript callstack is captured.
New function
<array>getLastMergedNodes() - returns an array of merged nodes after a merge operation.
The
Stack() function has a new
exlcudeOwner:<bool> parameter.
The
globalVars.gather function in
globalVars Structure now has an optional filter function parameter.
Several new
Miscellaneous Functions to support advanced debugging:
- hasCurrentExceptionStackTrace()
- hasCurrentExceptionCallStack()
- getCurrentExceptionCallStack()
- CaptureCallStack()
The new
getMaxExtensionVersion() function returns the version number of the current Extension, or 0 if no Extension
is installed.
The new
isValidValue() function returns False if a value has been deleted, True if it is still valid.
The new
refs.getAddr() method can be used to acquire the memory address of any MaxObject as a Pointer value.
The following new
System Globals and functions are used internally to control the dependency notification optimizations,
and collect related statistics:
- preferences.EnableOptimizeDependentNotifications
- GetOptimizeDependentNotificationsStatistics()
- ResetOptimizeDependentNotificationsStatistics()
Miscellaneous Changes
OpenEXR : BitmapIO has new functions:
<maxObject>fopenxr.getRenderElementByLayer <integer>layer
<bool>fopenxr.getLayerEnabled <integer>layer
The
Interface: AssetManager has a new function:
<IObject>GetAssetById <&TSTR>assetid
It returns the AssetUser object of the asset with the given asset ID.
The following FFD functions now support FFD Spacewarp objects:
- conformToShape()
- getDimensions()
- setDimensions()
- animateAll()
- resetLattice()
Tooltips are now supported for
MultiListBox,
Listbox,
Colorpicker,
EditText,
ComboBox and
Label UI Controls.
The
Slider UI Control has a new height creation parameter.
The filename being imported/exported is now returned in
callbacks.notificationParam() for
callbacskaddScript #postImport and
#postExport.
Miscellaneous Functions
The new
convertKelvinToRGB() function returns the RGB color corresponding to black body radiation at the specified
temperature in Kelvin.
The new
mesh_weld_overlapping_vertices() function welds overlapping vertices in the TriMesh of an Editable_Mesh base object.
New in 3dx Max 2016 Extension 1
New Scripted Animation Controller Plug-ins
The new
Scripted Animation Controller Plug-ins allow you to write scripted plug-ins in MAXScript for several controller types.
New TextPlus Tool
The new
TextPlus GeometryClass class, and related
TextObject2 Mixin interface provide MAXScript exposure for the new TextPlus tool.
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