Supported SAS Shader Semantics

The following is a list of 3ds Max supported semantics for DirectX 9 hardware rendered materials through the SAS based parsers. The Microsoft SAS 0.8 specification with and without scene effect source identified by the paramId strings "0x0003" and "0x0001" respectively, and the Cg parser identified by the paramId string "0x0002".

Render Semantics

The following are supported render semantics:

DIFFUSEMAP
OPACITYMAP
SPECULARMAP
BUMPMAP or NORMALMAP
LIGHTMAP
DISPLACEMENTMAP
REFLECTIONMAP
RENDERCOLORTARGET
RENDERDEPTHSTENCILTARGET

Basic Transformations

The following are supported basic transformations (note that unlike HLSL parser the names are longer and use INVERSE instead of I and TRANSPOSE instead of T).

WORLD
WORLDINVERSE
WORLDINVERSETRANSPOSE
VIEW
VIEWINVERSE
VIEWINVERSETRANSPOSE
PROJECTION
PROJECTIONINVERSE
PROJECTIONINVERSETRANSPOSE
WORLDVIEW
WORLDVIEWINVERSE
WORLDVIEWINVERSETRANSPOSE
WORLDVIEWPROJ
WORLDVIEWPROJINVERSE
WORLDVIEWPROJINVERSETRANSPOSE
WORLDTRANSPOSE
VIEWTRANSPOSE
PROJECTIONTRANSPOSE
VIEWPORTPIXELSIZE

Geometry Semantics

The following are supported geometry based semantics. Note that unlike HLSL parsers cameras are not supported:

LOCAL_BBOX_MIN or LOCALBBOXMIN
LOCAL_BBOX_MAX or LOCALBBOXMAX
LOCAL_BBOX_SIZE or LOCALBBOXSIZE
RECIP_LOCAL_BBOX_SIZE or RECIPLOCALBBOXSIZE

Lighting Semantics

The following lighting based semantics are used to populate the light drop downs with the correct style of light.

POSITION
DIRECTION
LIGHTCOLOR
LIGHTHOTSPOT <float value>
LIGHTFALLOFF <float value>
LIGHTATTENUATION <vector4> - X = near attenuation start, Y = near attenuation stop, Z = far attenuation start, A = far attenuation end

3ds Max has its own lighting semantic that differ from the SAS 0.8 specification. You can use the 3ds Max semantics by identifying Max specific sections in the shader file using #ifdef / #else / #endif blocks, as in the following example.

/// Point Lamp 0
float3 Lamp0Pos : POSITION
<
    string Object = "PointLight0";
    string UIName =  "Light Position";
    string Space = "World";
    int refID = 0;
>
= {-0.5f,2.0f,1.25f};
 
#ifdef _MAX_
float3 Lamp0Color : LIGHTCOLOR
<
    int LightRef = 0;
    string UIWidget = "None";
>
= float3(1.0f, 1.0f, 1.0f);
#else
float3 Lamp0Color : Specular <
    string UIName =  "Lamp 0";
    string Object = "Pointlight0";
    string UIWidget = "Color";
>
= {1.0f,1.0f,1.0f};
#endif

Mapping Channel Semantics

3ds Max has the concept of mapping channels. The TEXCOORD semantic allows the developer to define which channel is provided on which texture coordinate input for the vertex shader.

The following is an example of its usage

int texcoord0 : TEXCOORD
<
  int Texcoord = 0;
  int MapChannel = 0;
> = 0;

This will provide mapping channel 0 (the vertex color channel) to texcoord0. Currently the actual value of the parameter, in this case texcoord0, is ignored, and the parser only reads the annotation.

Miscellaneous Semantics

The following are non-categorized semantics:

BKRGCOLOR – The current background color of the max viewport
TIME – The current time in the animation sequence.
BITMAPOVERRIDE (deprecated) – Defines the bitmap used for the bitmap render option of the DirectX 9 Shader (deprecated)
COLOROVERRIDE (deprecated) – Defines the shaded render color of the DirectX 9 Shader

Unsupported Semantics

The following semantics defined for SAS 0.8 are not supported by 3ds Max

DIFFUSE
NORMAL
SPECULAR
SPECULARMAP
ENVMAP
ENVIRONMENTNORMAL
ENVIRONMENT