Scene Description Language

• Subdivision surface rendering is supported without a separate mental matter library. (Subdivision surface modeling still requires mental matter.)
• Added shadowmap rebuild merge to light sources to read and add to existing shadowmap files.
• Added a max displace and -maxdisplace override option, useful for using mental ray 3.2 with older translators that do not generate maximum displacement distances.
• Added a -texture_continue command-line option that makes mental ray continue if a texture file cannot be found, instead of aborting immediately.
• Support for limited forward referencing of instances, objects, objects, lights, and cameras.
• Objects that are only visible but not traced are no longer visible to rays and photons. This is an issue for final gathering and all mi_trace_* shader interface functions, in particular mi_trace_probe.
• The maximum length of mental ray tokens was increased to 4095 characters, and message length limits are increased as well.
• Camera output statements now accept the new image format png (Portable Network Graphics), and Alias Maya IFF files accept "+rgba,z" as a data type string.
• New statements in the options block:
  
     scanline rapid
  
     samples collect N
  
     shadowmap only
  
     finalgather rebuild freeze
  
     finalgather falloff N
  
     finalgather depth N N N
  
     finalgather filter N
  
     displace presample on|off
  
     acceleration large bsp
  
     motion on|off
  
     max displace N
  
     filter clip lanczos
  
     filter clip mitchell
  
     photon autovolume on|off
  
  New statements in objects and instances:
  
     visible trace shadow globillum caustics approximate ...
  
     approximate regular parametric N % N %
  
     approximate ... sharp N (with a floating-point N)
  
  New statements in instances:
  
     override ... approximate ...
  
  New statements in light sources:
  
     shadowmap rebuild merge
  
  New statements in cameras:
  
     pass " typelist " ...
  
  New commands:
  
     touch E
  
  
• New command-line options: -scanline rapid
  
  -samples_collect N
  
  -shadowmap_only
  
  -finalgather_rebuild freeze
  
  -finalgather_falloff N
  
  -finalgather_depth N N N
  
  -finalgather_filter N
  
  -swap_dir S
  
  -swap_limit N
  
  -texture_continue
  
  -memory N ( -jobmemory is obsolete and removed)
  
  -displace_presample on|off
  
  -acceleration largebsp
  
  -echo incremental
  
  -motion on|off
  
  -maxdisplace N
  
  

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