Toolbag 5.02 introduces an experimental Low-to-Low Baking mode, letting artists bake from one low-poly mesh to another using a dual-material setup. The new Bevel Shader supports hard-edged UVs, and baking previews can now be edited in the interactive mode. That’s good news for everyone who enjoys less guesswork and fewer bake group tantrums.

Decals, Tubes and Smudges

The new Decal Layer is almost finished, allowing drag-and-drop decal painting directly onto models. These decals are fully adjustable in size, projection, falloff, and rotation. Vector decal projection is also in beta – project curves as 2D vectors, combine them with booleans, snap them to grid, and yes, tubes and solids are supported, even if brush or symmetry settings aren’t yet.

Smudge Tool finally makes its debut, letting users smear paint layers across UV seams, geometry borders, and UDIMs. And Tile Strips can now be used to place tube textures as modular start/mid/end patterns, complete with tapering and tiling. For even more painterly control, a new Tube Mode for vector painting is included, letting you paint curves with warp, taper and brush profiles, and project Tile Strips directly.

For masking, you can now Sample Layers from paint or fill and convert them into reusable masks – non-destructively. Groups now support Sync Points, including adaptive anchors with isolation toggles.

The Fog Rolls In

In rendering, Toolbag 5.02 beta adds Ray-Traced Fog – still experimental, but already supporting multiple fog volumes, height-based falloff, and god rays. Raster rendering also supports fog, though it currently lacks falloff. Ray tracing also gets leaner on memory: Toolbag automatically switches between RTX and generic backends based on available VRAM, with a new GPU Auto mode in preferences that doesn’t require a restart.

If you’ve been longing for more control over your shortcuts, rejoice: the Hotkey Editor is finished. You can bind, reset, export/import and view all key assignments – including a conflict detection view that avoids shortcut chaos. The Scene Search bar is live, letting you filter your scene objects as you type. Multi-selecting scene items like meshes, lights and cameras is now supported for batch transforms. The new Render Window provides a dedicated space for render settings, separated from object properties. Finally, users can now add custom folders to their Asset Library, move/delete assets and folders freely, and even bulk import using “Apply to All” – though drag and drop from the OS still isn’t working.

Price and Availability

Toolbag 5.02 is currently available as a beta. Pricing details remain unchanged and can be found on the Marmoset Toolbag official site. As always with beta releases: stability is not guaranteed. Artists should evaluate these features in non-critical environments before integrating them into production pipelines.

Marmoset Toolbag 5.02 Beta

The post Baking, Decals, Fog and a Smudge of Beta in Marmoset Toolbag first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

Lumion 2025 introduces an AI-based image upscaling system designed for users with less powerful GPUs. By rendering at half the target resolution and then using AI techniques performed locally on the CPU, users can produce high-resolution images, including 8K ray-traced renders, even on lower-end machines. This feature is currently in beta and may result in a loss of detail in fine textures. Additionally, it does not upscale other rendered outputs like depth, specular, and material ID maps.

Enhanced Ray-Traced Water and Fog

Building upon its hybrid ray tracing system, Lumion 2025 extends support to water and fog materials. The Water Material now supports ray tracing, allowing water surfaces to appear in reflections alongside other ray-traced materials. Furthermore, the update introduces ray-traced volumetrics for effects like environment fog, which can be illuminated by emissive materials, volumetric lights, and volumetric sunlight, and can interact with volumetric clouds. These features are still in beta and are described as resource-intensive, with some known limitations.

Expanded Asset Library

Lumion 2025 enriches its asset library with 200 new objects, including 68 new nature assets and 14 new materials. Among these are seven high-detail photogrammetric trees, enhancing the realism of landscape visualizations.

Licensing and Pricing Updates

Lumion has restructured its licensing options with the release of Lumion 2025. The previous Standard subscription, priced at $749/year, has been discontinued. The Pro subscription now costs $999 per Year, and has shifted from floating licenses to named-user licenses. Additionally, a new Studio subscription is available at $1,299/year, which includes a floating license of Lumion Pro and a named-user license of Lumion View, Lumion’s new SketchUp plugin.

Lumion View: Real-Time Visualization Within SketchUp

Lumion View, previously in Early Access, is now available to all SketchUp users. This lightweight plugin offers real-time ray-traced visualization directly within SketchUp, allowing for immediate visual feedback during the design process. Features include customizable lighting, styles, and enhanced material controls. Lumion View supports real-time model synchronization, camera controls with standard views and orthographic options, and navigation shortcuts for efficient workflow. Lighting controls encompass sun and environment settings, as well as artificial lighting with support for spotlights, point lights, area lights, and line lights. The material panel offers additional properties such as emissiveness, glass reflectivity with volumetric options, and water materials with adjustable wave settings. Conceptual styles like clay, wood, styrofoam, and glossy finishes are also available for design exploration. (Lumion View 2025.0 Release Notes – Lumion – User Support, Lumion 2024: Real-Time Ray Tracing & Accelerated Rendering)

For more information visit the Lumion website.

The post Lumion 2025: Rendering Realism Gets a Ray-Traced Makeover first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

Chaos has unveiled Project Arena, a tool designed to bypass game engines and bring full ray tracing directly to LED walls in virtual production. Instead of rasterizing scenes for real-time playback, Project Arena renders V-Ray-authored assets natively—no need for light baking, LODs, or optimization passes.

No Baking, No Rasterization—Why It Matters

Traditional virtual production relies on rasterized game engines, meaning real-time lighting is approximated using tricks like baked lightmaps, cubemaps, or screen-space reflections. This introduces artifacts, light leaks, and compromises dynamic lighting. With Project Arena, all lighting calculations remain physically accurate—true reflections, refractions, and global illumination are computed live on set.

By eliminating baking, artists can update assets without reprocessing textures or rebaking light data. Instead of waiting hours to convert a scene into a game-ready format, VFX artists can move assets directly from Maya, Houdini, or 3ds Max to LED volumes within minutes.

Real-Time Ray Tracing on NVIDIA GPUs

Project Arena runs on NVIDIA GPUs, leveraging ray reconstruction to maintain high performance. In testing, it handled scenes with 250 billion polygons at 60 FPS on a single GPU—without any pre-processing. The system preserves the original shaders, materials, and lighting setups, ensuring that what artists see in their DCC tools matches what appears on set.

Production-Ready or Experimental?

Chaos is testing Project Arena in collaboration with industry veterans, including The Mandalorian’s James Blevins and ASC cinematographer Richard Crudo. While early results are promising, studios should evaluate stability before integrating it into large-scale productions. Those interested can sign up for testing at the Project Arena page.

Project Arena could redefine virtual production, making high-end ray tracing the default for LED volumes. No baking, no rasterization—just real light, in real time.

The post Chaos Project Arena: Ray Tracing Without the Hassle first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

Adobe has rolled out version 3.1 of its Substance 3D Stager software, aimed at improving workflows for scene composition, material editing, and real-time rendering. While the updates won’t rebuild your workflow overnight, they might save you a few hours of head-scratching on a deadline. Here’s what’s new, with all features as listed directly in Adobe’s release notes.

Material Editing Gains New Flexibility

Version 3.1 brings enhanced material-editing options. The new material manager lets users edit the properties of multiple materials simultaneously—great for those moments when you’ve accidentally duplicated a less-than-stellar texture across an entire scene. Materials can now be grouped and organized by layers, making complex scene compositions slightly less chaotic.

Improved Asset Management

Stager 3.1 introduces an updated asset manager that promises better efficiency in handling complex 3D projects. Assets can now be tagged, sorted, and searched with more granularity. For large projects, where every file feels like an identical OBJ, this feature could be a lifesaver.

Real-Time Rendering Enhancements

The rendering pipeline has received some attention too, with updates to real-time ray tracing. Version 3.1 delivers faster preview renders and improved handling of scene lighting. This translates to a smoother experience when juggling last-minute tweaks in virtual production or prototyping workflows.

Scene Composition Improvements

Users working in virtual production or visualization will benefit from new tools for managing complex scenes. Scene hierarchies can now be adjusted with drag-and-drop simplicity, allowing for quicker organization of props, cameras, and lights. While this might not seem groundbreaking, it’s one less reason to yell at your screen during crunch time.

Price & Availability
Adobe Substance 3D Stager 3.1 is available through the Adobe Substance 3D Collection. For pricing, refer to Adobe’s official pricing page.

Final Thoughts
While the updates in Substance 3D Stager 3.1 improve usability, production artists should verify the stability of these new features before integrating them into demanding pipelines. The focus remains on iterative improvements rather than revolutionary changes, ensuring that tools remain simple and stable for professionals in post-production, VFX, and beyond.

The post Adobe Substance 3D Stager 3.1 Beta first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

In its latest update to the V-Ray family, Chaos Group has released V-Ray 7 for 3ds Max. This release amps up the feature set with flexible material management, GPU-enhanced rendering power, and refined ray tracing capabilities.

V-Ray 7 introduces a new material override function, allowing users to apply a substitute material across entire scenes without disrupting existing lighting, reflections, or other render-critical elements. This feature simplifies testing and material revisions, making it ideal for artists fine-tuning a scene or switching out assets in time-sensitive environments *cough* “Client is panicking”. Optimized for GPU use, the material override provides the control artists need to make iterative adjustments without losing the context of complex setups.

V-Ray 7 for 3ds Max further enhances the V-Ray Frame Buffer (VFB), making it a more versatile hub for rendering and post-processing adjustments. With the expansion, users can define custom-shaped render regions, allowing for selective rendering of specific areas within a frame—ideal for focusing on key details without re-rendering the entire image – let’s call it a pixelfucking-protection. A new vignette layer effect, customizable by shape, lets artists easily add stylized camera effects to their renders. Additionally, new colour-correction presets in the VFB offer quick ways to experiment with various looks, streamlining the design refinement process.

The update also introduces powerful tools for instance management via the Chaos Scatter aids. The new Instance Brush allows for precise control when populating scenes with instances, enabling users to add detail or remove elements with ease. Complementing this, the new distribution maps library provides different density options, helping designers craft realistic scatter distributions. For complex, instance-heavy scenes, Chaos Scatter now benefits from procedural management in V-Ray 7 Standalone, significantly reducing export times during network rendering or submissions to Chaos Cloud.

GPU-Accelerated Rendering for Fast Turnarounds

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V-Ray 7 for 3ds Max introduces several optimizations that significantly reduce rendering wait times and improve interactivity. The Faster Time to First Pixel feature brings new efficiencies to scatter rendering, texture-heavy scenes, data uploads, and geometry compilations, resulting in quicker production and interactive rendering experiences. Additionally, Caustics Support on V-Ray GPU now allows for realistic reflections and refractions with caustics based on photon mapping, optimized to leverage GPU hardware for faster results than CPU-based caustics. Out-of-Core Textures further improve performance in texture-heavy scenes, enabling artists to add complex details without sacrificing shading quality.

In other updates, V-Ray 7 offers Selective V-Ray Scene Conversion, letting users convert specific objects, update materials with a new Material Process, and convert textures to .TX files—all of which enhance performance and streamline scene management. The release also expands USD Support to the latest version, USD for Autodesk 3ds Max 0.9.0, enabling access to new features and improvements. Finally, OpenPBR Support now available in V-Ray 7 ensures consistent shading across applications, integrating a new shading model aligned with OpenPBR standards in 3ds Max 2025.3. This update reduces the need for manual adjustments when switching between compatible software, boosting overall production efficiency.

Procedural Clouds and Sky Model: Realism in Real-Time

V-Ray 7 expands its environmental realism with a new procedural cloud system integrated into the Sky model. This feature lets artists generate realistic, customizable cloud formations that adapt dynamically to changes in lighting and time-of-day settings, creating immersive atmospheres with minimal setup. For productions dealing with multiple lighting conditions, the procedural clouds offer flexibility without the need for heavy manual adjustments, cutting down on setup time while improving realism in rendered results.

Unified Chaos Cosmos Integration: Streamlining Asset Management

V-Ray 7’s Chaos Cosmos sees significant upgrades, adding efficiency and realism to asset management and lighting. A new addition, V-Ray Luminaires, brings speed to lighting fixtures in Chaos Cosmos, with each light fixture properly illuminating itself and distributing light realistically within scenes. This luminaire integration streamlines scene population with realistic lighting, reducing setup time and improving render speeds. Additionally, Asset Variants Support offers seasonal asset options, such as summer and autumn versions of vegetation models, allowing users to select and customize variants before or after import. These updates give artists greater flexibility and control over lighting and assets, making it easier to achieve varied, realistic environments in a fraction of the time.

License Options and Pricing

For VFX studios, Chaos Group offers flexible licensing options, including monthly, annual, and perpetual licenses. V-Ray 7 for 3ds Max is priced at $1,180 for a perpetual license, with other subscription options available on the Chaos Group website. Studios and freelancers alike should assess the best fit based on their project demands and budgets. For a Solo-Seat-version, it is about 450€ a year. And, of course, there is a 30 Day free trial if you never played with Vray – – including Vray for 3ds Max, Maya, SketchUp, Rhino, Revit, Cinema 4D, Unreal, Houdini, Nuke, as well as Phoenix Simulation, Chos Scans and Cosmos, and the Chaos Player.

The post Chaos Group Unleashes V-Ray 7 for 3ds Max first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Gerrit Corsmeyer.