Faustics is a commercial MAXScript for creating fast-rendering procedural water caustics effects easily and quickly in Max.

Features include:
- Create water caustics with a single click
- Extremely fast renders
- Still and animated previews
- Multiple caustic sources, each with its own settings
- Three built-in effects: turbulence, waves and rain
- Enables blending of these three effects
- Supports custom animated image sequences as caustic maps
- Source properties can be customized
- Turbulence, wave and rain properties can be customized
- Supports include/exclude of objects receiving caustics
- Exports the animated caustics map for use in game engines

Faustics is available for Max 2011 to 2015 and costs $25. A demo version is available here.

The new feature in v1.64 is the Voronoi modifier, which allows you to interactively fragment objects to voronoi fragments.

Features include
- 20 times faster fragmentation speed
- Correct fragmentation of shelled geometry and geometry with holes
- Support for custom vertex normals (no smoothing artifacts at sliced edges)
- Box, spherical and cylindrical point cloud distribution with falloff
- Radial point cloud distribution
- Point cloud distribution by geometry, particle systems and shapes
- Custom point cloud distribution
- Outside Object, Outside Clipping Gizmo, Noise and Texture Map point cloud filtering
- Fragment gluing by Clipping Gizmo, Texture Map, Noise generator and By Volume
- Wire color preview for fragments
- Stretching for creating wood splinter fragments
- Gap and scale properties for fragments
- Material ID and mapping size properties for inner faces
- Explode to Objects functionality

RayFire is available for Max 2009 to 2014 and costs $365. (Max 2015 version will be available mid-July) A demo version is available here.

DomeLight Pro is a powerful V-Ray dome light that acts like a traditional photography light box with full controls over front, back, left, right, top, and bottom. Each side can be mapped with any of the shipping 15 HDRI maps. DomeLight Pro can be manipulated to achieve infinite combinations.

It also ships with a library of 10 presets to help you get your lighting on point. You can save and share your own presets, and you also get a look development material library and example scenes to help get you started.

DomeLight Pro is available for Max 2014 to 2015 and costs &69.95.

Changes for v2.0 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- 'Manage Textures' lists all textures used and allows you to add and remove files
- New probability setting gives textures priority over other textures
- New rotation field rotates all texture by a certain amount
- A solid color can now be used instead of textures

Changes for v3.4.129 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015

Changes for v2.3.2 beta are:
- New 'Conform to Surfaces' conforms geometry to surface using the RailClone Z axis
- Adds new Surface object for assigning the surface object
- Adds a Surface slot to Linear and Array generators
- New segment parameter: 'Deform->Align Y with Surface'
- Adds a checkbox to enable 'Fixed Size' in Transform operator
- Adds Corner->'Fillet Radius' and 'Align to Path' properties to A2S Generator
- Fixes 'Fillet Radius' modifying material ID's on closed splines

RailClone Pro is available for Max 9 to 2015 and costs €190. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v2014.0.3 are:
- Fixes some minor bugs

The RealFlow 3ds Max plugins come with RealFlow, which is available for Max 2008 to 2015 and costs €1700. A demo version is available here.

The HairWorks modifier allows you to export hair guides for use with the HairWorks hair simulation and rendering technology. The modifier works on top of the Hair and Fur solution built into Max, and sets up the guides and growth mesh for export.

HairWorks features include:
- Supports off-the shelf grooming tools
- Shape and style control
- Self shadowing
- Body to hair shadow casting
- Wind interaction
- Level of Detail
- Scalability
- Real time editing in viewer

Changes for v1.00.07 are:
- Fixes a bug when applying to or selecting CAT Gizmos

Track Editor is available for Max 2012 to 2015 and costs $19.95.

Changes for v4.7.1.3264 are:
- Fixes subdivision (works with polygons instead of triangles now)
- Fixes hair UV's in raytracing
- Fixes alpha with SSS diffuse radius
- Fixes alpha on edges with transparency on solid background
- Fixes anisotropy specular with Hybrid environment map method
- Adds support for Nvidia Maxwell graphics cards

FurryBall is available for Max 2013 to 2015 and costs €599. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v2.3.2.0 are:
- Fixes an error when dragging out a cluster node view's internal input
- Composite view external port names now update when a composite node port is renamed
- Adds special icons for Ornatrix modifiers
- You can now see connections to Paramblock 2 parameters in schematic view
- Fixes an error when clicking on a wire of a single modifier connected to a modifier stack
- Fixes an error when dropping some cluster templates into schematic view
- Fixes an error resetting scene after dropping 'Spring Thing' and other cluster templates
- Fixes custom attribute parameter renaming not working
- Restoring synoptic view no longer produces wrong nodes sizes
- Nodes can no longer be collapsed and edited when fully transparent in synoptic view
- Node display state now restores collapsed states correctly with 10+ nodes per tree level
- Schematic node display state now correctly (re)stores node height
- Schematic control nodes now have a 'Refresh' right click option
- Fixes errors when undocking/redocking external ports inside a cluster node view

Zookeeper is available for Max 2009 to 2015 and costs $249. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v1.03 are:
- Adds an intermediate spine bone
- Fixes the parenting of bones to export correctly with LH|FbxExport
- Reduction and optimization of the tool window
- Adds corrected stretch on FK chain
- Fixes a bug with auto-clavicle
- Fixes a bug when there is only one bone on the arms
- Rig performance optimization
- Fixes compatibility with Max 2012 without service pack
- IK bones renamed as helper to facilitate skin bones selection
- Adds an error message for symmetry helpers when no helper is selected
- Adds compatibility with the next update of CharacterTool and SaveAnimTool
- Fixes a bug with the installer and Browse... option
- Adds StretchBend system (Cartoon-Rig only)
- Fixes bugs when adding cartoon options to a character not in skin pose (Cartoon-Rig only)
- Fixes a bug when adding cartoon options with quadruped (Cartoon-Rig only)
- Fixes a scale bug with the curves option (Cartoon-Rig only)

LH | Auto-Rig is available for Max 2011 to 2015 and costs €59.

Changes for v1.6.5 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Adds support for V-Ray v3.x
- Adds new presets: SolidRocks rendering quality has been improved
- The RENDER button is now keyboard mappable
- Adds an alert when not using the SR render button
- Better management of 'from scene' color mapping
- Adds interoperability with Rebusfarm
- Automatic Update alert system on startup
- Progressive rendering now follows the quality slider
- SolidRocks now starts faster
- Improved management of V-Ray 3.x goodies options
- FlyWiz: adds 'save for farm' button on Flythrough wizard step 3
- FlyWiz: adds button to auto-adjust frames to current animation range
- Fixes the PNG library I/O error and EXR errors when using the V-Ray framebuffer
- Fixes the resolution change bug when choosing ultra quality
- Fixes an error in Irradiance Map subdivs calculation
- Fixes an error in desired DE subdivs
- Fixes a bad gamma issue with V-Ray RT CPU
- Fixes a bug with the gamma and post buttons
- Hide IM and LC passes are no longer inverted

SolidRocks is available for Max 9 to 2015 and costs €75. A demo version is available here.

Grant Adam has recompiled a load of his freeware and commercial plugins for Max 2015, including Tension, Betterwind, ColorPolyByVert, BlurVColor, Map2VColor, SplineMesher, FrameInfo, SSPropagate, Transmographier, TranslucencyMod and MultiIDMap.

He's also put up an old plugin that wasn't linked up on the site before, called Surface Morph. It allows you to do surface based morphing: rather than calculate a deformation in object space, the deformation is calculated in surface space which is independent of the current pose.

This means you can do things like morph above deformation modifiers in the stack. For example you can deform/skin a low resolution character, then subdivide and morph up wrinkles or other deformations on the animated high res mesh, using morph targets created with the high resolution mesh.

pMorph is a plugin that delivers progressive morphing - the ability to have the animation of a modified object be driven by the selection of frame(s) from the animation of another object.

pMorph has many unique uses that enhance the production pipeline. For example, animating the timing of complex animations, animating an object (or a group of objects) based on external influences, or using the frame specification capability of pMorph to accomplish precise control over your object's timing with ease.

pMorph is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs $75. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v3.50.02 are:
- Minor bugfixes

Changes for v10.51 are:
- Simplified registration process
- Simplified update process
- Fixes the version number not being updated, leading to a registration problem

Polygon Cruncher is available for Max 9 to 2015 and costs $129. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v12.51 are:
- Simplifies the registration process
- Simplifies the update process
- C4D file reading improvements
- SKP file format now supports complex faces
- Many 3DBrowser bug fixes
- Fixes a Batch crash that occurred when using Setup Unit Command
- Fixes a Batch crash that occurred when using batch several times
- Fixes a crash that could occur while searching
- Fixes a crash that sometimes occurred on files without UVs
- Sketchup file support was incorrectly setup for x64 bit version of the software
- Fixes a scale factor error in 3DS export
- DAE export now supports the Max URI format
- Fixes VRML problems with the cube primitive
- Fixes a crash bug when reading older 3DBrowser catalogue formats

3D Browser for 3D Users is available for Max 9 to 2015 and costs $69. A demo version is available here.

RandomControl, SLU have started open beta-testing of their upcoming renderer Arion for 3ds Max v3.0.0. All existing customers with a full version of Arion (as opposed to a demo or educational version) can take part in the open beta.

At the moment there is no real information on what is in the new version (apart from the fact that it is the first of their products based on RCSDK 3), but in the coming weeks they will posting updates on new features to their Arion 3 page.

Changes for v3.01 are:
- Fixes a problem unwrapping an object with one or more large UV charts in tile distribution mode
- Fixes an issue where unwrapping in tile distribution mode sometimes didn't work
- UV data initialization is now faster
- Improved performance for tile mode distribution
- Fixes slowdowns when objects share a plugin instance

Unwrella is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs €149. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v2.10 are:
- You can now bake full scenes to textures using your own predefined UV map layouts
- Adds the unique ability to repack existing scene UVs and bake them without re-unwrapping
- Fixes an issue where 'Flatten Unwrap' sometimes failed due to errors reading the original UV data
- Fixes a compatibility issue between Flatiron 1 and Flatiron 2
- Plugin UV data initialization, map distribution and 'Flatten Unwrap' performance have been improved

Flatiron is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs €299. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v1.3.2.3 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Adds support for controlling instances in MultiPainter with MAXScript
- Adds 'Hide When Moving' parameter in Preview rollout
- Fixes compatibility issues with V-Ray 2.45/2.50/2.55
- Improved performance in viewport
- Fixes some installer and activation utility bugs

MultiScatter is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs €200.

Changes for v0.7.2 beta are:
- Adds support for Max 2015 / Maya 2015
- Optimizes rendering speed a bit
- Increased some maths operations's precision to fix problems with reflections
- Fixes a problem when the number of video cards was greater than the CPU cores
- Adds the benchmark's test type (low, mid, high) to the result dialog's title
- Adds the app's version text to the benchmark final result dialog
- Two active tiles per OpenCL device are now used to maximize GPU usage
- Recompiled with the latest libraries / compiler (VS2013 Update 2, Qt 5.3.0, tbb42_20140416oss)

Changes for SP4 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Adds support for UV hidden channels
- Adds some minor fixes

ThinkingParticles is available for Max 2013 to 2015 and costs €1495. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v2.0 include:
- Adds displacement mapping
- Adds object motion blur
- Adds vertex motion blur
- Adds support for hair and fur
- Adds support OpenSubDiv surfaces
- Adds a rounded edges shader
- Adds a random color texture for instances
- Improved sky rendering
- Adds a cleaner, more organized workspace with a new folder structure
- Adds support for region rendering
- Adds support for network rendering
- Adds new stereo rendering modes
- Adds compatibility with Brigade, OTOY's cloud rendering technology

OctaneRender for 3ds Max is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs €459. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v3.0 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Shattering of objects is now 20% faster
- You can now visualize all shatter params before breaking the geometry
- Reshattering has been greatly improved
- The new 'Conform Voronoi' reshattering reduces the number of straight edges in the shatter pattern
- Adds a new Width parameter for Radial Shatter
- Adds a new 'Undo Last' button for undoing only the last shatter operation
- Adds a new window for controlling dynamic cracks
- You can now set fragment clusters with different parameters in the same fracture body
- Bounded Force fields can now break fracture bodies
- Auto body creation from complex geometry is much faster now
- Fixes a crash when convex hull has degenerated faces
- Fixes the sim start frame not loading sometimes
- Fixes fracture body sometimes resetting incorrectly
- Fixes reset slow down with many objects
- Fixes fracture body->create slow down with many objects
- Fixes pdi nodes loading displaced in Max when parented

Pull Down It Pro is available for Max 2012 to 2015 and costs €395. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v2.0.12.56004 include:
- Procedural field generation using math functions, texture maps, geometry and particles
- Procedural field generation using volumetric data from various sources
- History-independent and history-dependent field simulation capabilities
- Read and write functionality for OpenVDB, Field3D and FumeFX
- Integration with Max sub-systems like MassFX, mCloth and Hair&Fur
- Integration with FumeFX simulations
- Integration with native / 3rd party particle systems including PFlow and Thinking Particles
- Direct Field data sampling from within the Genome procedural modifier
- New Genome operators for vertex and face iterations
- A Stoke Field Follow operator enables advection and control of PFlow particles
- Integration with the Max materials system via a Stoke Field Texture map
- Dedicated field-to-particles conversion object for integration with Krakatoa MX and Frost MX
- An atmospheric effect to render Stoke fields in any renderer supporting Max environment effects

Stoke MX is available for Max 2013 to 2015 (64-bit only) and costs $595. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v2.01 are:
- Fixes a problem packing objects with one or more very large UV charts in tile distribution mode
- Fixes packing in tile distribution mode sometimes not working with certain mesh topologies
- UV data initialization is now faster
- Performance of tile mode distribution has been improved
- Fixes slowdowns when objects share a plugin instance

UV-Packer is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs €99. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v6.0 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Optimisations to pass restoration
- Licensing system has been updated
- New Object/Modifier/Material/Texmap property control system in place
- Preview renderer overrides UI updated
- V-Ray autobuild paths no longer needs the autobuild mode to be on for the main paths
- Per pass V-Ray region render disabling moved to the renderer rollout
- Some cleanup for the V-Ray procedural renderer rollout
- Help menu item now points at an updated Wiki

RPManager is available for Max 9 to 2015 and costs $300. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v1.9.7 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015 and Max Design 2015
- Improved viewport performance in Max 2015
- Adds new 'Alarm Limits' parameter group to the Preference parameters
- Some minor improvements and bugfixes

GrowFX is available for Max 9 to 2015 and costs $325. A demo version is available here.

I'll be leaving for the EndUserEvent 2014 in a couple of hours, so I won't be updating the site for the next few days. If you're coming to the event, make sure to say 'Hi!'.

If you're not coming to the event, take a look at the program and think about joining us, even if it's only for one day. Believe me, it really is worth it.

Dave

Changes for v6.0 include:
- New normal calculator
- Adds support for multiple mapping images / multiple material output while casting
- Adds automatic symmetry and detection
- Improved atlas packing / parameterization when generating texture coordinates
- New scene aggregator / aggregate LOD
- New visibility aided meshLODs
- New visibility aided materialLODs
- Material LOD: material replacement
- Adds user / visibility weighting for UV's
- New and improved next-generation material caster
- Massive speed improvements with multi-core support

Simplygon is available for Max 2010 to 2015. At the moment there is no public information on pricing that I can find. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v1.0 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015

TurboReverse is available for Max 9 to 2015 and costs €30.

Changes for v3.04 are:
- Fixes a Material Editor crash related to the BerconXYZ::seedRandomGen() method
- Fixes a Material Editor crash related to the curve control

Changes for v4.1 are:
- 'Array Filter' allows users to create filter specific parameters
- Adds saving and loading of ParaFlow files (controller nodes only)
- Adds an enable/disable function to the 'Array Variable Override'
- Additional methods have been incorporated into the 'Interpolate controller'
- 'Mesh Controller' returns material ID of face(s) in edit_poly and edit_mesh objects
- Rectangle Packing is now available under 'Packing Controller'
- Initial node loading time has been optimized
- 'Linear Controller' can now select corners
- 'Bitmap Controller' now loads correctly
- Fixes an error with 'Dynamic Update'
- 'Extract wire-frame' now allows use of 'Linear Controllers'
- 'Update All' initiates the update of all Para Nodes within a ParaFlow
- Merging Max files containing Para Nodes is now more reliable
- 'Replace Object' tool now works in conjunction with 'Array Selection' add-on
- Bugs fixed within the 'Array Linker' add-on

Parametric Array is available for Max 2011 to 2015 and costs $150. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v0.1.6 are:
- Adds an option to import as wired bones instead of dummies

Changes for v1.26 are:
- Union Selection is now honored with Make Hollow
- Fixes a bug where Make Hollow sometimes deleted all results

Carver is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and has an introductory price of $2.95 .

Changes for v8.1.3 are:
- Fixes a critical issue where the web API couldn't stream the hosts list in a valid JSON format
- Fixes an API issue where the GetChunks() function ignored the filtering

Muster is available for Max 8 to 2014 and costs $85 per node. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v2.7.0 include:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Much faster motion blur (motion and/or deformation)
- Much faster displacement mapping (specially for fine details)
- Faster warm-up for very heavy scenes
- Built-in material converter MAXScript
- Fixes a bug with 'Pwr_Boolean' in PowerNURBS
- Adds a progressbar when exporting to .rcs
- Arion Sky light is now aligned with the horizon in the viewport
- New BSDF clamp setting for killing fireflies
- Adds full support for Particle Flow standard shapes
- Auto-update option for the material shaderballs
- Proper shaderball resolution
- Per-material preview passes control
- Some statistics added to the ArionFX panel
- Clamp U/V in the FileTex node
- Control-based enable/disable in the UI
- New Arion Toolbar
- New Arion Camera

Arion for 3ds Max is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs €595. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v2.5a are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Minor optimizations

Changes for v1.25 are:
- Now caps holes on carvee objects to alleviate problems with objects with open borders
- Changed the utility for selecting objects with overlapping verts to selecting planar objects
- Adds Undo for both explode and combine

Carver is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and has an introductory price of $2.95 .

Changes for v1.3.0.55681 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Removed support for Max 2009
- Adds 'Enable' checkbox for Viewport and Render to the Loader
- Fixes and error saving Particle Flow particles with scale 0
- Changed to write CREATE_*.MS scripts even if 'Create XMesh Loaders' is off
- Fixes 'Configure License...' crash when no license had been configured before

XMesh MX is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs $495. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v1.4.0.55671 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Removed support for Max 2009 and earlier
- Adds support for reading RealFlow RPC particle files
- Adds support for reading LAS particle files
- Adds support for reading PRT 1.1 CoordSys metadata
- Changed some error messages to include the name of the affected Frost node
- Fixes a crash when adding PRT Loader as a particle source in Max 2011
- Fixes an error in Geometry meshing with Custom Geometry for particles with Radius = 0
- Fixes an error reading CSV, XYZ, PTS, and PTX files when using German locale
- Fixes getting Velocity from a Krakatoa PRT Loader with its Playback Graph enabled
- Adds a horizontal scrollbar to the log window
- Fixes invalid undo messages

Frost MX is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs $495. A demo version is available here.

Changes for v2.6.3 are:
- Adds support for Max 2015
- Adds Standard material support for the Reflect/Refract map in the Reflect/Refract map slot
- Adds Standard material support for cubic environment mapping in the Reflect/Refract map slot
- Adds filter map support to the Standard material
- Adds intensity map support to the Architecture material
- Modified export of the standard material's specular settings
- Fixes a bug with Architecture materials having their maps exported twice
- Fixes XML mesh export causing a crash when the OpenGL render system is in use
- Fixes a bug with the pivot point being calculated incorrectly
- Dropped support for Max 2008 and 2009

OgreMax is available for Max 2010 to 2015 and costs $250. A demo version is available here.