All things considered, Chip Render Farm is an easy-to-use and effective Twinmotion Render Farm for 3D artists. We not only offer the most control and freedom but also have powerful configurations for even the trickiest jobs.

Experience the next level of cloud rendering right now with the GPU Workstation for Twinmotion with Chip Render.

Chip Render Farm supports Lumion and Twinmotion with integration and other rendering tools such as SketchUp, Revit, and ArchiCAD, etc. Join Chip Render now and cut your rendering time multiple times with just a small investment from 2.9 USD. With Chip Render, you have your own Cloud Workstation and leverage 1/2/4 x RTX 3090 GPU servers to render 3D projects.

Discover 3ds Max vs Maya, which is the right tool for your project.

Autodesk’s 3ds Max and Maya are two leading 3D modeling and animation software solutions with distinct strengths and applications.

Choosing the right software tool is crucial for ensuring the success and efficiency of any project. While both 3ds Max and Maya offer powerful features and capabilities, each excels in certain areas and caters to different workflows and industries.

In this post, Chip Render will compare 3ds Max vs Maya and help you choose the right tool for your project.

3ds Max is a professional 3D modeling, animation, and rendering application for gaming and design visualization.

Image via Autodesk 3ds Max

Robust modeling toolset

3ds Max’s modeling toolset allows you to shape and sculpt whatever you can imagine, from complex details on humans and things to jaw-dropping sceneries and worlds.

You may easily create complicated models by using 3ds Max’s strong polygon modeling capabilities. Tools like Smart Extrude provide a simple and versatile approach to shape faces on an object while automatically rebuilding or stitching adjacent faces together. The powerful retopology tools in 3ds Max allow you to design clean 3D topology and produce professional results.

A distinct modifier stack technique enables you to sculpt and modify. Use the Chamfer modifier to create edges, the Relax modifier to modify surface tension, and the Symmetry modifier to do typical modeling work.

Intuitive texturing and shading

With 3ds Max’s sophisticated texture, material, and viewport tools, you now can improve your look development. Support for Substance Maps and Open Shading Language (OSL) enables you to build and apply complex materials that elevate your ideas. At the same time, the Material Editor allows you to add material finishes, modify textures, and use vivid colors to create photorealistic designs.

Bake-to-texture in 3ds Max also offers an optimized, intuitive, and fully scriptable texture baking experience that includes support for Physically Based Rendering (PBR), material input overrides, and OSL workflows.

High-quality rendering

3ds Max allows you to see render previews fast and effectively. This means you can spend more time being creative rather than waiting for time-consuming overnight renders. The 3ds Max viewport also provides render-quality previews, which show physically based rendering (PBR) materials and camera effects directly.

With Arnold as the default renderer, you can see changes to the scene in real time, including lighting, materials, and cameras. Furthermore, with support for Open Shading Language (OSL), you can modify OSL shader text directly in the material editor and view live modifications in the Viewport and ActiveShade, significantly increasing productivity.

Maya is an industry-standard 3D animation and visual effects software for movies, television, and video games.

Image credit: Natalie Jerabek, concept art by Wenjuinn Png​, via Autodesk

Powerful character creation

Polygon modeling in Maya lets you create 3D models with geometry based on vertices, edges, and faces, whereas NURBS modeling allows you to build characters from geometric primitives and drawn curves. The sculpting toolset of Maya offers an intuitive clay-like process for shaping and molding characters while maintaining complete artistic control.

Maya’s interactive grooming features enable you to make realistic hair and fur for your favorite characters and animals. There is a comprehensive set of tools, including sculpting brushes, modifiers, and sculpting layers, for you to discover and produce all types of hair and fur.

Lifelike animation

Maya has powerful capabilities for speeding up animation and editing. The Time Editor offers a straightforward, clip-based approach for non-linear animation editing. This means you can effortlessly switch between clips and alter timing operations such as speed, length, and start/stop times. Cached Playback allows you to test iterations of your animation in the viewport rather than creating additional playblasts.

Maya allows you to add realistic movement to any scene or character you are working on, with the help of various tools and features. For example, tools for creating high-quality, production-ready characters, an intuitive graph editor for manipulating animation curves and keys, and shape authoring tools for adding fine details like facial expressions.

Incredibly detailed simulations

Bifrost, which focuses on delivering rich, procedural workflows to many parts of your pipeline, contains robust scattering, instancing, volumetric, and FX features.

It allows you to generate rich procedural effects such as smoke, fire, explosions, sand, and snow. Then you simply share them with other artists for usage in various shots, scenarios, and shows. Effects can be seen in the viewport and rendered using Arnold, Maya’s built-in renderer.

When it comes to creating complex characters and dazzling effects, Maya takes the spotlight. With its robust toolset for modeling, shaping, grooming, rigging, and animating, Maya is the go-to choice for bringing intricate characters and dynamic visual effects to life.

On the other hand, if you are looking to build expansive worlds and detailed props, 3ds Max steps up to the plate. Offering an easy-to-use and flexible toolset for modeling, texturing, shading, lighting, and rendering, 3ds Max empowers you to craft immersive environments and intricate props with precision and ease.

Architecture

When it comes to architecture, 3ds Max is a preferred choice over Maya. With 3ds Max, you can seamlessly visualize high-quality architectural renderings and meticulously model detailed props and objects for your projects in a fraction of the time. Its rich and flexible toolset empowers architects and designers to craft premium designs with unparalleled artistic control.

Game Development

Both Maya and 3ds Max stand as pillars in the game development industry, providing a rich array of proven 3D tools tailored to every stage of the process. Maya provides a powerful animation toolset and unparalleled rigging capabilities, allowing artists to infuse 3D characters and creatures with lifelike movements and personalities. Meanwhile, 3ds Max offers strong modeling tools and physically-based rendering, empowering game developers to craft vast and intricate game worlds for players to explore.

Animation

When it comes to animation, Maya stands as a cornerstone with its Academy Award-winning toolset, renowned across the industry for crafting believable characters and their immersive worlds. You will dive into an intuitive and robust toolkit that transforms animation into a seamless creative journey, where every movement becomes an expression of artistic vision rather than a series of button presses.

In summary, 3ds Max is renowned for its robust modeling capabilities and flexible workflow, making it a preferred choice for industries like architecture, interior design, and entertainment. On the other hand, Maya excels at character rigging, animation, and dynamics, making it a must-have tool for animation studios and visual effects artists.

Understanding the software’s strengths can help you optimize your workflow and achieve desired outcomes efficiently.

So, tell us. 3ds Max vs Maya – Which software are you using?

Chip Render Farm supports 3ds Max and Maya Rendering with its integrated Arnold Renderer and other render engines such as V-Ray, Redshift, OctaneRender, Corona Renderer, and more. Join Chip Render now and cut your render times several times with just a small investment from $2.9. With Chip Render, you have your own Cloud Workstation and leverage 1/2/4 x GPU RTX 3090 servers for rendering 3ds Max projects.

Discover what’s new in Octane 2024.1.

In November 2023, Otoy presented a sneak peek into Octane 2024 across all platforms. This early release showcased exciting features such as per-light denoising, custom OSL AOV post and comp shaders, network rendering between Metal and CUDA devices, and hardware acceleration ray tracing tailored for M3 GPUs. The preview hinted at a dozen of significant features for the 2024 release cycle, including meshlets, neural rendering, temporal real-time denoising, light field baking, and Material X support.

In this post, Chip Render takes a closer look at What’s new in Octane 2024.1, and what you can expect from Octane 2024.x version this year.

In November 2023, Otoy released the first public preview of Octane 2024.1, with a lot of new features, including:

• New Post FX Shader Graphs: The AOV compositor fully supports Texture Nodes and OSLshader nodes.
• Powerful Denoiser AOV Nodes and filter graphs (GPU and CPU).
• New Geometry Pipeline: Less memory, more performance.
• Significant hardware ray-tracing improvements on both CUDA and Metal.
• A smaller geometry memory footprint.
• The mixed platform network rendering between CUDA and Metal GPUs.

Powerful Denoiser AOV Nodes and filter graphs (GPU and CPU)

Octane introduces powerful Denoise AOV Nodes and filter graphs that seamlessly operate on both GPU and CPU. Adapted from the Open Image Denoise framework, these new nodes are equipped to denoise any Render AOV pass, providing you with the flexibility to craft robust and detailed denoising filters within any composition AOV output graph. This functionality extends to various applications, including per light, per beauty pass denoising, and OSL-driven denoising effects.

Whether you’re utilizing the PMC and Info kernels or working with different AOV outputs, Octane’s Denoise AOV Nodes offer comprehensive support.

New Post FX Shader Graphs

Octane 2024.1 introduces an exciting feature “Post FX Shader Graphs”. This update brings full support for Textures and OSL shader nodes in the AOV compositor.

Now, you can seamlessly integrate any texture into your output AOVs using the innovative “Texture” output AOV layer node. This feature supports a spectrum of options, from individual image files to intricately designed node trees, allowing for unparalleled flexibility. Embrace the power of OSL textures to create custom effect layers and leverage image generators for dynamic compositing. The addition of the “Output AOV parameter” texture node further enriches your toolkit, enabling the construction of effect layers.

Hardware Accelerated Ray Tracing for Apple M3 GPUs

Experience a significant boost in rendering performance with Octane X 2024.1’s optimized support for ray tracing hardware acceleration on Apple M3 GPUs. This enhancement translates to remarkable speedups, with performance gains ranging from 2x to an impressive 12x in heavily instanced scenes.

New Geometry Pipeline

Explore an enhanced rendering experience with Octane 2024’s new and improved Geometry Pipeline. This overhaul brings a host of benefits, including boosted rendering speeds, reduced memory usage, and the unification of geometry data across CUDA and Metal platforms. Witness a seamless integration of RT ray tracing with ‘RT core-only’ rendering, ensuring optimal utilization of resources for improved performance.

Mixed Platform Network Rendering

Step into network rendering with Octane 2024.1’s revolutionary Mixed Platform Network Rendering feature. This update introduces a unified memory layout, enabling network rendering across both Metal (macOS) and CUDA. For the first time, studios leveraging Octane X for Metal can seamlessly harness the power of near-limitless Windows GPUs as render nodes.

Full Utilization of Ray-Tracing hardware

Octane 2024.1 brings you full usage of ray-tracing hardware. This latest update ensures that all mesh primitives and geometry, from hair to spheres and displacement triangles, fully capitalize on modern hardware’s potential for maximum acceleration. ‘RT core-only’ rendering takes center stage, enhancing speed, stability, and efficiency by minimizing dependencies on system memory and out-of-core geometry. This maximizes the utilization of RT core hardware, streamlining the rendering process and navigating the intricacies of various ray-tracing types with finesse.

Smaller Memory Footprint for Geometry

Experience the efficiency boost in Octane 2024.1 with a smaller memory footprint for geometry. The introduction of ‘RT core-only’ rendering results in remarkable memory reductions across Windows and Linux platforms. It enhances efficiency and stability not only in Octane Standalone but also in DCC plugin integrations, relieving memory pressure on the host DCC applications.

In addition, there is an exciting array of features in development for Octane 2024.1.

• Light Field Baking.
• Brigade Temporal Denoiser.
• Meshlet Texture Streaming.
• Native MaterialX support.
• OctaneGPT: A groundbreaking Language Model service that provides comprehensive assistance within Octane – documentation, tutorials, and even code. For example, OctaneGPT can generate nodes, scripts, and shaders and create interactive scenes and assets from text, voice, and even screen sharing.
• Localized Language support.
• Unreal Engine style decal support in core.
• Rest Position Nodes.

The upcoming Octane 2024.x release is packed with cutting-edge features that elevate your rendering experience. Here is a sneak peek at what you can expect:

• Headless rendering live linking across multiple renderers and engines (Blender, Unreal Engine, Cinema 4D, and standalone).
• Neural Rendering including NeRF, Splats, and generative AI scene nodes.
• Meshlet Geometry Streaming.
• New Render Network Manager for both live and offline GPU workloads.
• Volumetric Live Compositor for Virtual Production and Mixed Reality and Light Field displays.
• Improved BRDF and shader support allows for faster single-sample quality output.
• Improved LensFX system, based on the 2023 framework and 2024 shader graph system for post-processing.

In summary, Chip Render has explored all new features of Octane 2024.1 and other features in development for upcoming versions throughout the year. These updates continue to push boundaries and redefine the landscape of rendering technology. Stay tuned for these upcoming features that promise to enhance your creative journey.