Yesterday, 01:10 PM
(This post was last modified: Yesterday, 01:11 PM by Kresimir Tkalcec.)
Today we released FumeFX 7.6 for Autodesk 3ds Max, together with a substantial update to NodeWorks, our node-based particle and ocean toolset.
Two ideas run through it: reaching a simulation result faster, and being able to change that result afterwards without simulating it again.
At the core is a new Multigrid PCG solver on both CPU and GPU. Pressure projection is the most expensive stage of a gas simulation, and multigrid changes how its cost grows — in a 100-frame explosion benchmark it held a flat 13–17 iterations per frame across grids from 1.7 to 177 million voxels, where the previous PCG solver averaged 98. That works out to up to twice the GPU simulation speed, and roughly ten times faster than CPU simulation in FumeFX 5, with the largest gains on the largest grids.
The bigger workflow change is the new Post Load pipeline, which modifies a cached simulation as it's read from disk and leaves the cache untouched. Fast Up-Res adds detail on load without re-simulating, and the Retimer changes playback speed on load without re-caching — now interactive in the Playback rollout rather than baked and reviewed.
A new Memory Cache keeps frames in RAM so up-res, retiming and sharpening stay responsive while you scrub, and once the look is settled, Post Processing bakes all three to disk using exactly the settings you previewed. Alongside that, a new multiple scattering algorithm arrives for Scanline and is now properly supported in the GPU viewport, which is itself 10–20% faster, while VDB export meets Unreal Engine 5's requirements.
The NodeWorks Ocean has been largely rebuilt. Ocean Dynamics replaces its old wake and ripple solver with a GPU-accelerated one that resolves Kelvin wakes — the V-shaped pattern a moving hull leaves behind — and boats gain engine force and direction control plus more stable floating dynamics.
A new 2D Flow Solver drives surface motion from FumeFX and native 3ds Max forces, and Ocean Float can advect any particle group through it, while the new Dyna Whitewater node creates foam and bubbles from wakes and flow, drivable by any source and by NodeWorks forces — with Submerged Decay letting bubbles fade out of the surface's forces with depth and re-couple as they rise.
New Ocean Spectrum and Ocean Spectra Mix textures displace geometry through VRayDisplacementMod or drive a bump map, so ocean detail no longer needs an ocean object, and both spectra and Ocean Dynamics data export to file and read back so a look travels between shots. Ocean GPU performance is up 2–10× across whitewater, spectra tiling and displacement.
Release video:
https://youtu.be/qq8Jl6ayXaI
Complete list of changes:
https://docs.afterworks.com/FumeFX6max/R...istory.htm
Two ideas run through it: reaching a simulation result faster, and being able to change that result afterwards without simulating it again.
At the core is a new Multigrid PCG solver on both CPU and GPU. Pressure projection is the most expensive stage of a gas simulation, and multigrid changes how its cost grows — in a 100-frame explosion benchmark it held a flat 13–17 iterations per frame across grids from 1.7 to 177 million voxels, where the previous PCG solver averaged 98. That works out to up to twice the GPU simulation speed, and roughly ten times faster than CPU simulation in FumeFX 5, with the largest gains on the largest grids.
The bigger workflow change is the new Post Load pipeline, which modifies a cached simulation as it's read from disk and leaves the cache untouched. Fast Up-Res adds detail on load without re-simulating, and the Retimer changes playback speed on load without re-caching — now interactive in the Playback rollout rather than baked and reviewed.
A new Memory Cache keeps frames in RAM so up-res, retiming and sharpening stay responsive while you scrub, and once the look is settled, Post Processing bakes all three to disk using exactly the settings you previewed. Alongside that, a new multiple scattering algorithm arrives for Scanline and is now properly supported in the GPU viewport, which is itself 10–20% faster, while VDB export meets Unreal Engine 5's requirements.
The NodeWorks Ocean has been largely rebuilt. Ocean Dynamics replaces its old wake and ripple solver with a GPU-accelerated one that resolves Kelvin wakes — the V-shaped pattern a moving hull leaves behind — and boats gain engine force and direction control plus more stable floating dynamics.
A new 2D Flow Solver drives surface motion from FumeFX and native 3ds Max forces, and Ocean Float can advect any particle group through it, while the new Dyna Whitewater node creates foam and bubbles from wakes and flow, drivable by any source and by NodeWorks forces — with Submerged Decay letting bubbles fade out of the surface's forces with depth and re-couple as they rise.
New Ocean Spectrum and Ocean Spectra Mix textures displace geometry through VRayDisplacementMod or drive a bump map, so ocean detail no longer needs an ocean object, and both spectra and Ocean Dynamics data export to file and read back so a look travels between shots. Ocean GPU performance is up 2–10× across whitewater, spectra tiling and displacement.
Release video:
https://youtu.be/qq8Jl6ayXaI
Complete list of changes:
https://docs.afterworks.com/FumeFX6max/R...istory.htm
Best regards,
Kresimir Tkalcec
Kresimir Tkalcec