Tuesday, October 27th, 2015 Posted by Jim Thacker

Sitni Sati releases FumeFX 4.0 for 3ds Max

Sitni Sati has released FumeFX 4.0 for 3ds Max, the first major update to the popular gaseous fluid simulation system in over three years, boosting performance and adding new tools for art directing simulations.

New, faster solver, and new tools for art-directing simulations
Top of the features list this time around is the new QCG solver, which Sitni Sati describes as “up to twice as fast” as FumeFX 3.0’s CG solver.

There are also a couple of new features designed to help art direct simulations, such as the Spline Follow force field (shown above), which forces all of FumeFX’s fields to flow along a user-defined spline curve.

In addition, a new vorticity type provides “additional control over vortices [to help] fine-tune the final result”.

New black body radiation shader and burning model for fire simulations
Other new features include a built-in black body radiation shader, which mimics the thermal radiation emitted by real-world objects, and is designed to help improve the realism of fire simulations.

There is also a new burning model, taking oxygen supply into account, to further improve realism.

Improved simulation nesting, volumetrics and cache handling
Of the existing tools, the N-Sim feature introduced in FumeFX 3.0, which enables smaller sub-simulations to be linked to form a larger system, now enables N-Sim grids to be nested infinitely.

Handling of volumetrics has been improved, with support for OpenVDB, and a Field3D and OpenVDB importer that allows for channel assignment.

Renders now support motion blur and V-Ray 3.x’s deep data; and fire and smoke can now be sharpened at render time as a post process.

Handling of simulation caches has also been improved, with a list of recently used caches, the option to drag and drop caches, and a read-only mode that won’t overwrite existing caches by accident.

You can see a full list of new features in the release at the foot of the story.

Pricing and availability
FumeFX 4.0 for 3ds Max is available now for 64-bit 3ds Max 2012 and above. A full licence costs $845, including two accompanying simulation licences; additional new simulation licences cost $195 each.

Read more about FumeFX 4.0 for 3ds Max on Sitni Sati’s website

NEW FEATURES IN FUMEFX 4.0 (Taken from Sitni Sati’s website)

  • New, faster solver.
  • New vorticity type.
  • Sharpening of various channels during the simulation.
  • New burning model with oxygen.
  • Wavelet or Post simulation to be able to wait for caches (DC-deferred caches option).
  • Infinite nesting of N-Sim grids.
  • Email notifications.
  • Spline Follow force.
  • Faster application of objects and sources.
  • Defector objects voxelization resolution and minimal voxelization.
  • OpenVDB support.
  • Effector has an option to use a 3D Texmap for input.
  • Field3D and OpenVDB importer allows for channels assignment.
  • PRT|PDC particle system.
  • Direct picking of ParticleFlow events.
  • ParticleFlow float and vector channel access.
  • Motion blur rendering support.
  • Black-body shader.
  • Support for VRay’s deep data.
  • Sharpening of fire and smoke at render time.
  • Recently used caches list.
  • Caches drag and drop.
  • Quick path/filename versioning.
  • Cache files delete.
  • FumeFX.ini location can be defined with the environment variable FUMEFX_INI.
  • Read-only mode so that user can’t overwrite caches by an accident.
  • CPU Preview Window can have shadows as well.
  • Shadows inside the 3ds max viewport.
  • Preview Window exact window size.
  • MXS: CancelSimulation(), StopSimulation(),DeleteCaches(),ResizePreview(width, height).
  • Support for 64-bit Windows only.