nPower Software have updated their site with lots of news about their upcoming plugin Power NURBS. The plugin is currently in alpha release, and nPower anticipates a beta release in April or May 2005. If you are interested in taking part in beta-testing, you can find more information on the Power NURBS page.

There is also a load of information on two other upcoming plugins, Power SolidWorksToMax and Power UGSToMax, both of which allow Max to import native SolidWorks / UGS parts and assemblies.

Changes for v1.1.30 are:
- Improved tone mapping
- A new physical sky is being implemented, causing problems with the current one

Maxwell is currently in alpha-testing. Alpha version 1.1.30 is available to those who have pre-ordered the final version.

This is a set of tools to help with matching viewport objects against an image plate. It allows you to zoom into a bitmap in the 3d viewport without changing the original camera's perspective.

The source code for Zoom Camera is also available here.

Changes for v7.06 are:
- Adds pathIsNetworkPath, globalVars.remove, ik structure methods
- Adds useSoftSel keyword parameter to meshop.moveVert and polyop.moveVert
- meshop.setVert, meshop.moveVert, polyop.setVert, polyop.moveVert now maintain order between verts and pos/offset if verts are specified as array

I'm away for most of the week, so I won't be able to update the site until Friday or Saturday. Dave.

Changes for v2.0 are:
- Support for raytrace shadows
- Horizontal shadows
- Adds random tinting
- Adds random mirroring
- New creation tools to build group of planes automatically
- Rotation of the distribution map
- Auto facing camera only before rendering option to speed up redrawing
- Adds configuration presets
- Freeze of all Forest objects with one click
- About 50 new tree textures included
- New random algorithm to avoid tiling and repetition of trees
- Trees are built much more efficiently
- New creation system
- Various bug-fixes

Forest Pack Pro is available for Max 3 to 7 and costs €250. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v1.1 are:
- Raise Mode added
- Fixed bug with textures which have non power of 2 width or height
- Manual updated
- Minor bug fixes

Landscape Tools is available for Max 5 to 7 and costs $24. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v0.63.02 are:
- Turbulence now affects fire
- Various minor bug-fixes

AURA is currently in open beta-testing, this version will expire in a month or so.

Object Planter is a helper that lets you distribute/erase copies of objects across the surface of other objects using only the mouse.

Key features are:
- Single object planting - plants an object selected from the palette
- Random object planting - plants random objects from the palette
- Erase - erases previously planted objects with a single mouse click
- Rotation/Scale variations
- Instance/Copy/Reference clone modes

Object Planter is available for Max 5 to 7 and costs $5. A demo version is available here.

P SOFTHOUSE Co., LTD. have released versions of their plugins Pencil+ and Liquid+ for Max 7. Users of the plugins can download the new versions from the User page. There are also demo vesions of both plugins available for download.

Character Animation Technologies Ltd. have posted a load of new information on their upcoming plugin CATMuscle, a tool for producing smooth organic skin deformation. There is also a fully functional, unrestricted beta version of the plugin to try out (Max 7 only).

Discreet have released Service Pack 1 for Max 7.

The Service Pack fixes a number of issues, all of which can be found in the ReadMe file. This is only for the English-language version of Max 7, other languages are planned for release later this year.

P SOFTHOUSE Co., LTD. have just announced that their plugins Liquid+ and Pencil+ will be officially updated for Max 7 in the next few days.

Changes for v2.54 are:
- I don't know at the moment, but I will post them when I find out.

Changes for v2.20 are:
- Quality antialiased masks (scanline renderer / latest versions of V-Ray)
- New export dialog parameter 'Expand mask borders'
- Better compatibility with Render Effects
- Export now based on Render Node ID channel
- The original Object ID channel is now kept
- Fixes wrong material area calculation
- Fixes Max VFB window name

AF Export Channels is available for Max 3 to 7 and costs $99.99. A demo version is available here.

This is a fix for the small, yet incredibly irritating, bug in Visual Maxscript Plugin where when you've finished editing a rollout in VMS it would remove one line directly below the rollout block which, if not manually fixed could lead to the rollout 'eating' your code away.

This is a modification from the original plugin from Discreet so all credit goes to them.

Changes for v1.0 are:
- Bitmap and texture coordinates bugs corrected
- Material names are their real names and not the mesh name

Changes for v1.01 are:
- Adds motion blending

Changes for v1.46.15 are:
- A new mode, Progressive path tracing has been added to the light cache
- Fixes crashes with dynamic geometry (VRayProxy, VRayFur, displacement etc)
- Fixed splotches using Glass with Affect shadows option
- Skylight portals no longer hang with the light cache
- Mapped IORs in the VRayMtl greater than 1.0 now work
- VRay VFB now overwrites files if the file resolution differs from the VFB resolution
- Small memory leak for each rendered image (4-16Kb) removed
- Meshes with 0 faces / 0 vertices are no longer a problem in Dynamic geometry mode
- Photon or light cache subdivs above 1100 now work
- Fixes a crash if the Max resolution differs from VRay and a file-save is required
- Irradiance map was very slow with motion blur and subdiv surfaces

V-Ray is available for Max 3 to 7 and costs $299 for the Basic version, and $799 for the Advanced version. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v1.3 are:
- A number of bug-fixes
- Adds optional retriangulation after slicing
- Adds mapping channel support for UV correction and face mapping
- Several small improvements

For a complete list of all changes in this version, look here.

Changes for v1.1.23 are:
- Motion blur issue fixed
- SDK is under revision, it will be uploaded next week

Maxwell is currently in alpha-testing. Alpha version 1.1.23 is available to those who have pre-ordered the final version.

Mir is a Max integration for real-time rigid body dynamics in viewports. Real-time means that you can have it going and work at the same time with Max.

Usage is quite simple: all your current scene objects are automatically added and simulated once you make mir active. You can choose to exclude certain objects by making them not live, or make them immovable (ie. unaffected by collisions and forces but still participating).

This is just a proof of concept, so don't expect updates or support. You can download some sample scenes here.

Changes for v1.1.22 are:
- Adds camera motion blur
- Adds object motion blur
- Adds clipmap support
- Region bitmap render
- Fog (volumetric render)
- New camera parameters: ISO
- Z-layer, alpha-layer, cosAngle-layer now have DOF and motion blur
- 4 processors per license
- Less noise with the same render time
- Lower memory requirements for voxelization
- New MXS format with size optimization
- Major and minor bug-fixes

Maxwell is currently in alpha-testing. Alpha version 1.1.22 is available to those who have pre-ordered the final version.

Changes for v3.0 include:
- Pen style outlines
- Render speeds up to 50 times faster
- Per-object rendering styles
- Shadow density and color controls
- Save and load user-defined render styles
- Enhancements to vector transparency rendering
- Level 3 support for EPS files
- Outlines at intersections
- Two pass curve fitting
- Enhanced SVG output

Swift 3D MAX is available for Max 3 to 7 and costs $295. A demo version is available here. A demo version is available here.

RT/shader:Ginza takes real-time shader editing to the extreme. Leveraging the cutting-edge technology of RT/shader 1.0, Ginza incorporates some of the most-requested features to make it the most full-featured shader creation and editing tool available.

The new plugins for Max 6 and 7 now add dynamic parameters imported in real-time from a live connection to RT/shader or via a .FX file import. Now, a few artists can create shaders in Ginza that the rest of the team can use and tweak in Max 6 or 7.

RT/shader: Ginza is available for Max 5 to 7 and costs $995. The Max plugins are also available separately for $295. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v1.3 are:
- Many improvements and bug fixes in general workflow, rendering, and animation
- Adds a special mesh type for seamless integration with cloth dynamics
- Adds propagation tools to spawn hierarchies of hairs on top of each other on the fly
- Adds an additional dynamics engine with improved stability and collision detection
- Improved support for mental ray hair primitive including UVW mapping and motion blur
- Many major and subtle bug fixes

Ornatrix is available for Max 6 and 7, and costs $149.99. A demo version is available here.

MAX2AE is a full featured plugin for Max that bridges the gap between Max and After Effects. Every property of a Max camera, object or light can be translated into AE.

Far more than just camera matching; MAX2AE offers object to layer animation matching, Max light to AE light animation matching and handles all resolutions, pixel aspects and frame rates.

MAX2AE incorporates the ability to create 'helper planes' in Max which represent your AE layer or comp. These 'helpers' provide a highly accurate way to envision the AE layer relevant to your MAX scene. The 'helpers' can be animated just like any other Max object, then used to output keyframe data to AE layers for a perfect match, or even allowing them to be rendered from Max for the purpose of generating track mattes for object/AE layer occlusion!

MAX2AE is available for Max 4 to 7 and costs $99. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v0.63.01 are:
- New smoke shader options
- Cache params moved to separate tab
- New default cache folder operation
- Object selection improvements
- When the Flame/Smoke preview is moved you can render it at its new position
- Object UVW map channel parameter
- Fixed: Flame fractal shader properties could be simulated wrongly
- Fixed: Gravity pointer did not save, had no effect on the simulation

AURA is currently in open beta-testing, this version will expire in a month or so.

Changes for v1.5 are:
- Unknown, if I can find out I will post it here

Hypercosm Teleporter is available for Max 5 to 7 and costs $299.99. A demo version is available here.

This is a DirectX realtime viewer for skin animation, needing DirectX 9 to work. At the moment, only skinning is shown animated, particles and mesh animation are ignored.

Landscape Tools is a landscape oriented editor and texture-painting plugin which consists of a modifier which allows you to edit landscape geometry in an editor window, and a multi-layer texture map for blending different textures together for your landscape.

Landscape Tools is available for Max 5 to 7 and costs $24. A demo version is available here.

pCharacter Import allows you to import rigged and weighted Daz3D models into Max. It supports morphs, textures, and material zones. The imported model can then be posed and animated in Max using standard Max bones.

pCharacter Import is available for Max 4 to 7 and costs $149.

This is an improved version of the standard Max particle systems SuperSpray, Blizzard and PArray. The main differences are that the extended versions fix problems with sub-frame particle generation and sampling, and add the ability to inversely rotate facing particles.