Support files for 3dsMax 2025 in Deadline 10.3

Justin_B · September 16, 2024, 5:05pm

The usual steps to patch application support won’t work for 3dsMax 2025, since our intermediary library needs to be re-compiled. That library and the rest of the files needed for 3dsMax 2025 are attached here.

The attachment includes README files to explain how to install these files, duplicated here.

To install the application plugin and Monitor submitter files:

Please add or overwrite the following files in their specified locations:

3dsmax.param → {Your DeadlineRepository Location}/plugins/3dsmax/3dsmax.param

3dsmax.py → {Your DeadlineRepository Location}/plugins/3dsmax/3dsmax.py

3dsCmd.param → {Your DeadlineRepository Location}/plugins/3dsCmd/3dsCmd.param

3dsCmd.py → {Your DeadlineRepository Location}/plugins/3dsCmd/3dsCmd.py

3dsmaxSubmission.py → {Your DeadlineRepository Location}/scripts/Submission/3dsmaxSubmission.py

3dsCommandSubmission.py → {Your DeadlineRepository Location}/scripts/Submission/3dsCommandSubmission.py

deadlineStartupMax2025.max, deadlineStartupMax2025.xml, lightning64Max2025.dlx → {Your DeadlineRepository Location}\maxStartup\2025\

To install the integrated submitter files:

Please add or overwrite the following files in their specified locations:

SMTDMenuCreator.ms → {Your DeadlineRepository location}/submission/3dsmax/Main/SMTDMenuCreator.ms

3dsCmd2Deadline.ms → {Your DeadlineRepository location}/submission/3dsCmd/Main/3dsCmd2Deadline.ms

If you have any trouble let us know!

3dsmax2025_support.zip (9.4 MB)d

gandhics · September 16, 2024, 5:27pm

Great! Thanks a lot!

joescarr · September 16, 2024, 6:33pm

Nice job, folks - really appreciate this.

Let’s open source the lightning.dlx to avoid any issues in the future, eh?

Ignacio · September 17, 2024, 4:41am

it works just fine for me! thank you!!!

MarcoA · September 18, 2024, 4:16pm

Thank You, we could finally move to Max2025…
I’m agree with Joe

Gary_Sanderson · September 21, 2024, 8:01pm

Thanks for update. I have a problem that was raised in other topics. At the moment, OCIO does not work on network renderer. I use Corona Render. Everything is fine on local, but when sending on Deadline, standard frame buffer window appears, the inscription [Color Mgmt: OFF] at the top.

Justin_B · September 23, 2024, 2:27pm

Is this new with the files for 3dsMax 2025 or was it happening in 2024? If it was happening in 2024 could you post a job report to see if there’s errors called out?

And if there’s nothing obvious, could you try using this guide to troubleshoot the render error?

Thanks!

Gary_Sanderson · September 24, 2024, 8:42pm

Thanks for the answer. I did the launch via 3dsCmd. No errors, but I found this line. Is there a way to control this? Thanks in advance.

MarcoA · September 25, 2024, 5:00am

Few Question :
What happen if you are using 3dsMAX (non cmd)?
What happen if you are using “Batch” without deadline?

Look like it’s a corona thing, since i try here with Vray and no issue…

Edit : Ok i did test using Max VFB instead of VrayVFB, and i could confirm that with Vray, OCIO is not taken in consideration, and we switch to no color management

MarcoA · September 25, 2024, 5:27am

Ok i could confirm this one.
This is due to since max 2024, we got new settings for color management, that’s no longer stand in preferences, but in rendering menu / color management.
Here user could pick few choice :
-unmanaged
-gamma workflow (old gamma thing)
New :
-OCIO - 3dsMAX default (AcesCg by default but could be changed to other OCIO profiles for video)(with some rule user could add etc)
-Custum OCIO config (user will point to a .OCIO config file and will be able to edit some rule)
-OCIO - Env Variable (will use system OCIO env varaible, then user will be able to edit some rule for I/O)
3ds Max 2025 Help | Color Management Settings | Autodesk

3ds Max 2025 Developer Help | Interface: ColorPipelineMgr | Autodesk

3ds Max 2025 Developer Help | Color Management Preferences | Autodesk

EDIT : digging deeper, this happen with backburner too, so look like it’s a 3dsMAX issue, where 3dsMAX do not accept OCIO workflow when in network/slave mode.

DB28 · September 25, 2024, 6:58pm

Thanks for the update team.

I’m facing a couple of problems I can’t seem to be able to resolve.

Everything worked fine, and still does work with max 2023 and Corona 9, but for some reason I’m getting these 2 type of errors, that I think are somehow related, when working with max 2025 and Corona 12:

Error 1:
This seems related to deadline not being able to load the additional plugins, and I’m wondering if it’s something like what happened in this post on the forum about max 2024
(I think, but don’t believe me as I’m just guessing and by no means I’m a deadline expert)

I’ve tried to add the Plugin.UserSettings.ini file copying from the ENU folder of Max 2025 on my workstation into the nodes’ ENU folder as the nodes didn’t seem to have that file in the ENU folder at all. That didn’t work and the errors remained the same.

=======================================================
Error
=======================================================
Error: FailRenderException : RenderTask: Unexpected exception (Failed to open the max renderer.
)
   at Deadline.Plugins.DeadlinePlugin.FailRender(String message) (Python.Runtime.PythonException)
  File "C:\ProgramData\Thinkbox\Deadline10\workers\GD-RN-01\plugins\66f43600df07f83d6a55b824\3dsmax.py", line 407, in RenderTasks
    self.MyMaxController.RenderTasks()
  File "C:\ProgramData\Thinkbox\Deadline10\workers\GD-RN-01\plugins\66f43600df07f83d6a55b824\3dsmax.py", line 1636, in RenderTasks
    self.RenderFrame(frame)
  File "C:\ProgramData\Thinkbox\Deadline10\workers\GD-RN-01\plugins\66f43600df07f83d6a55b824\3dsmax.py", line 2533, in RenderFrame
    self.PollUntilComplete(not self.DisableProgressUpdateTimeout)
  File "C:\ProgramData\Thinkbox\Deadline10\workers\GD-RN-01\plugins\66f43600df07f83d6a55b824\3dsmax.py", line 3009, in PollUntilComplete
    self.Plugin.FailRender("RenderTask: Unexpected exception (%s)" % e.Message)
   at Python.Runtime.Dispatcher.Dispatch(ArrayList args)
   at __FranticX_GenericDelegate0Dispatcher.Invoke()
   at Deadline.Plugins.DeadlinePlugin.RenderTasks()
   at Deadline.Plugins.DeadlinePlugin.DoRenderTasks()
   at Deadline.Plugins.PluginWrapper.RenderTasks(Task task, String& outMessage, AbortLevel& abortLevel)
   at Deadline.Plugins.PluginWrapper.RenderTasks(Task task, String& outMessage, AbortLevel& abortLevel)

=======================================================
Type
=======================================================
RenderPluginException

=======================================================
Stack Trace
=======================================================
   at Deadline.Plugins.SandboxedPlugin.d(DeadlineMessage bgo, CancellationToken bgp)
   at Deadline.Plugins.SandboxedPlugin.RenderTask(Task task, CancellationToken cancellationToken)
   at Deadline.Slaves.SlaveRenderThread.c(TaskLogWriter ajt, CancellationToken aju)

=======================================================

Error 2:
This seems to be related to deadline having difficulties to identify which version to load and trying to load plugins for max 2023 while using max 2025 (the last 4 lines)

=======================================================
Error
=======================================================
Error: FailRenderException : RenderTask: Unexpected exception (Failed to open the max renderer.
2024/09/25 19:27:03 INF: [09652] [06336] Not displaying the splash screen because 3ds Max is running in server mode.
2024/09/25 19:27:04 DBG: [09652] [06336] ADP Initialize: Skipped
2024/09/25 19:27:04 DBG: [09652] [06336] Starting network
2024/09/25 19:27:04 INF: [09652] [06336] Application started with secure mode state 'OFF'
2024/09/25 19:27:04 INF: [09652] [06336] Application started with safe scene state 'ON' 
2024/09/25 19:27:04 INF: [09652] [06336] Product version: 3ds Max 2025.2 (27.2.0.20885)
2024/09/25 19:27:04 INF: [09652] [06336] Data collection and use is 'OFF'. Change your participation anytime in the Help menu of 3ds Max.
2024/09/25 19:27:04 DBG: [09652] [06336] Could not find the specified file in DefaultSettingsParser::parse()
2024/09/25 19:27:05 ERR: [09652] [06336] DLL <C:\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2023\Plugins\FloorGenerator_max2023_64bit.dlm> failed to initialize. Error code 127 - The specified procedure could not be found.
2024/09/25 19:27:05 ERR: [09652] [06336] DLL <C:\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2023\Plugins\ChaosScatterMax2023.dlt> failed to initialize properly - not loading.
2024/09/25 19:27:05 ERR: [09652] [06336] DLL <C:\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2023\Plugins\CoronaMaxUtils2023.dlt> failed to initialize properly - not loading.
2024/09/25 19:27:05 ERR: [09652] [06336] DLL <C:\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2023\Plugins\CoronaMax2023.dlr> failed to initialize properly - not loading.

These 2 errors seems to alternate each other, happening one after the other.

All I’ve done is overriding the files as described in the first post of this conversation.

Any help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks

Justin_B · September 25, 2024, 8:56pm

Has Max got a system environment variable that points to the plugin directory? That could explain why the wrong file path is getting used for the 2025 renders.

Also, does this happen if you try and render outside of Deadline on that machine? If you want to emulate what we’re doing when running 3dsMax this guide on isolating a render issue from Deadline will explain it.

DB28 · September 26, 2024, 10:26am

Thanks @Justin_B!

Your suggestion put me on the right track and now it seems to be working OK!

Solution:
There wasn’t a system environment variable pointing to the Plugins folder at all.
This might have been the problem in the first place, so I looked on the Autodesk documentation and after coming across a post from Changsoo explaining how to use the new variables available I’ve added a new environment variable set up like this:

Variable Name: ADSK_3DSMAX_PLUGINS_ADDON_DIR
Variable Value: C:\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max %ADSK_3DSMAX_MAJOR_VERSION%\Plugins

%ADSK_3DSMAX_MAJOR_VERSION% should allow the plugins to be loaded correctly as its value should change according to which version of max is launched by Deadline.

I can keep max 2023 with Corona 9 and max 2025 with Corona 12.
It seems Vray has its own environment variable already set-up.

Thank you so much for your help!

Geoff · September 27, 2024, 5:01am

There wasn’t a system environment variable pointing to the Plugins folder at all.
This might have been the problem in the first place

This seems very fishy, as 3ds Max loads plugins from that directory by default. You shouldn’t need to specify it in an environment variable at all. If you didn’t have one to begin with (in either the System or User environment variables) then it’s quite unexpected that adding one should fix the problem.

I suspect something else was (and maybe still is) misconfigured on your system.

It seems Vray has its own environment variable already set-up.

No, V-Ray uses the recommended Autodesk Plugin Package system, which does not live in the main 3ds Max installation. Plugin packages are found in %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\Autodesk\ApplicationPlugins. That’s why 3ds Max was still finding it.

DB28 · September 27, 2024, 8:45am

You might be right @Geoff, I found that being strange myself to be honest, but the above has definitely fixed it and the farm is now working as expected. I think I’ll leave it as it is for now and dig deeper into it when I have some spare time. Thank you for the suggestions, I’ll try to get to the bottom of this!

NTKKS · October 9, 2024, 6:32am

Hi I am trying to submit job with Arnold (MAXtoA) using the ARV (Arnold’s frame buffer) and it stores the output as just black pixel see my post here MAXtoA 3ds Max 2025 black output with ARV
Might this be problem with the unofficial submitter?