Page History

This page provides information on how the latest version of V-Ray handles scenes saved with previous versions of V-Ray.

Overview

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V-Ray Next7 adds a number of rendering optimization features. However, for compatibility reasons, some features and workflows have been adjusted and are discussed in detail below.

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V-Ray for SketchUp is not forward-compatible, meaning projects done with V-Ray Next6 are not guaranteed to work with V-Ray 3.6 or older previous versions. If a project is opened using an older V-Ray version than the one it was created with, a prompt message will offer offers wiping all V-Ray data to ensure file stability.

V-Ray Next for SketchUp licenses also work with V-Ray 3.6, allowing anyone who purchases an upgrade to complete unfinished projects using V-Ray 3.6 if needed.

Opening a Scene

When a scene saved with an older V-Ray version is loaded in SketchUp an upgrade script will go through all the scene assets and features to account for incompatibilities. V-Ray lights and special objects will be upgraded from groups to a new component definition system. This upgrade can take some time, but only happens the first time the scene is opened in SketchUp with V-Ray Next.  When the scene is saved, the updates are saved with it.

With V-Ray Next, Update 1 a message box appears notifying when data migration is taking place. Note that this occurs only when opening projects. Importing projects with outdated V-Ray data triggers the migration process without any prompt.

Materials

Material Structure

The internal material structure used in V-Ray for SketchUp is updated and modernized. This in turn leads to the material asset UI being updated.

Reflection, Refraction and Diffuse material layers' Transparency parameters are switched to Opacity controls for consistency. Any old materials containing such layers will be migrated automatically to the new internal structure.

Material Environment Overrides

The material Environment Overrides rollout has been removed. This functionality has been shifted to the Override material which now contains an Environment map slot.

Stochastic Flakes material

The Stochastic Flakes material can no longer be created from the Asset Editor’s Create menu. Create a Generic material, remove its default V-Ray Mtl layer and add a Stochastic Flakes layer to use it.

VRScene files

Due to the deprecation of the MtlASGVIS plugin VRScene files exported with V-Ray 3.6 or earlier are missing material options such as displacement/bump.

Proxies

The new built-in material(s) make the use of Multi-materials for proxies obsolete, simplifying the workflow process and storing proxy meshes.

Old projects that contain proxy meshes will retain their multi-material and sub-materials, but newly created or loaded proxies will utilize the new ones. There is no automatic migration. However, manually editing the proxy file settings, e.g. toggling the Proxy's "Materials" section off and on, will populate an old proxy list.

Randomize Project Material ID Colors Tool

Found in Extensions > V-Ray > Tools, this tool allows you to assign a random color ID to your materials. This provides a workaround for materials from v2.0 scenes which all have black color IDs.
Note that it will not affect Material ID numbers, which by default are set to 0.

Preset Library Assets

The Preset Material Library location in V-Ray Next is changed, which may result in UI markers about missing files of associated Bitmap textures. Despite these warnings, V-Ray automatically resolves each incorrect library file path to make sure the render output remains the same.

Legacy ASGVIS Plugins

In V-Ray Next, Update 1, the legacy TexFalloffASGVIS, TexNoiseASGVIS and MtlAngleBlend plugins are automatically migrated. Some minor blend variations from the original result is expected.

The legacy Two Sided material from V-Ray 2.0 is also migrated automatically to a newer plugin. Functionality remains the same. If a material visible only from one side has previously been achieved by leaving the 2-sided "Back material" slot empty, from V-Ray Next, Update 1 onwards, this is done by leaving the "Front material" slot empty instead.

Material .vismat files

There are two types of legacy .vismat files. The ones created prior to V-Ray 2.0 are in binary format, while the more recent ones are in xml. With V-Ray Next for SketchUp, update 2 support for .vismat files is dropped. Nevertheless, the newer type of .vismat files can be loaded in V-Ray by renaming their file type extension from .vismat to .vrmat

Textures

Triplanar texture

Triplanar texture is now affected by SketchUp material size.
In previous V-Ray versions, it was projected at a UV size of 1x1 inch and multiplied by its Size parameter (default value 10). To restore the same way it looked in version 3.6, adjust either the SketchUp material size to 1 by 1 inch or decrease the Triplanar's Size value accordingly.

Lights

Lights viewport widgets

 The viewport widgets for all V-Ray Lights and the V-Ray Infinite Plane are updated. They now come with additional lines to help with snapping, positioning or rotating. To switch back from their new look to the old solid display a new toolbar button is implemented - The Enable Solid Widgets button.

Lights Intensity Tool 

The Light Intensity tool is no longer available. Its functionality is now part of the new V-Ray Scene Interaction Tool. 

Render Elements

Render elements are now treated as assets - they can be created or deleted in the Assets list.

Glossiness Channels

The Reflection Glossiness, Refraction Glossiness and Reflection Highlight Glossiness render elements can no longer be created. V-Ray 3 scenes with these channels will still render them correctly.

Denoiser

The Denoiser is now treated as a render setting and not a render element. Find its options in the advanced render settings panel in the Denoiser rollout. The ‘Effects Update Frequency’ control is moved to the Denoiser section for convenience - now called Update Frequency. It still affects both the Denoiser and the VFB Lens Effect updates

Render Settings

The quality slider presets are changed in V-Ray Next, Update 2.1 for SketchUp to ensure consistent results between CPU, CUDA, and RTX engines, and between the Progressive and Bucket image samplers. The presets count is increased to six and the new preset labels are: Low, Low+, Medium, Medium+, High, and High+. All of them provide better quality than their older counterparts.

Camera

Advanced Camera Parameters rollout is introduced to the advanced settings panel. All the physical camera controls like F-Number, Shutter Speed and ISO (previously listed in the Camera rollout ) are now located there.

Environment

Scenes from v3.6 opened with V-Ray Next may contain an extra Environment texture in the Textures category. It is not plugged in any map slot. It can be safely removed or purged.

VFB

Lens Effects

The Lens Effects were updated with version 4.1 of V-Ray Next. Lens Effects from scenes saved with previous versions of V-Ray will not be loaded and rendered.

Quality Setup

GPU

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Starting with V-Ray 7 the CUDA and RTX are replaced with a GPU tab for render engine. V-Ray GPU uses NVidia CUDA or RTX device(s) to perform the raytracing calculations. The GPU engine can be specified from the V-Ray GPU rollout.

Lights

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The Portal Light option in V-Ray Rectangle light is now a legacy option and is no longer exposed in the UI. This is done because with the introduction of the adaptive sampling for dome lights and environments, the Skylight portals are not needed anymore.

Rectangle lights in files saved with previous V-Ray versions and with Portal Light option enabled will still have it available. Regardless, for best performance consider disabling it and using the Adaptive Dome Light option instead.

Materials

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PBR layers are now automatically converted to regular VRayMtl layers. This is made in order for the PBR material to have all other parameters available - refraction, anisotropy, sheen, coat, etc. The conversion to VRayMtl also makes it possible to import PBR materials from other host apps.

A new Surface Control option (metalness control) is added to the Reflection rollout. It serves as a switch from Glossiness to Roughness and affects Coat, Reflection, and Sheen.

The VRayMtl now has built-in Bump parameters. This allows users to set up linear shaders that are more optimal for rendering. It also keeps the workflow up to date with other host apps, such as 3ds Max and Maya. Materials previously using the Bump attribute now use the built-in Bump.

Preset Material Library materials previously using Reflection Coat layer now use the built-in Coat. The old workflow was to create a base material and a separate Coat material and use a Blend shader to blend them together. The new Coat layer is easier to set up and faster to render. It is suitable for materials that have a reflecting coating similar to a varnished wood floor or a coated plastic. The Coat layer is also more compatible with cloud rendering, vrscene files, and V-Ray Standalone.

Preset Material Library fabric materials previously using Diffuse Coat layer now use the built-in Sheen. The new Sheen layer helps to make soft fabric materials like velvet, satin, and silk. Now that it is built into the V-Ray material, it can be used directly with cloud rendering and it makes it more compatible with vrscene files and V-Ray Standalone.

The Toon material workflow from V-Ray Next is now deprecated and replaced with a new workflow composed of a global volumetric Toon and per material overrides. This аllows you to set a global effect faster.

A new material attribute called Contour is added, which replaces the old Toon material that is no longer supported in V-Ray 5.

Toon materials from previous V-Ray versions are now automatically migrated to Toon Override materials. The Toon Override material is basically a Generic material with enabled Contour and without a base.

The Highlight Glossiness parameter of the VRayMtl layer is deprecated, as it makes the material look more complicated and inaccurate. Highlight Glossiness is migrated from previous versions; however, if it is disabled, the row is hidden and its value is set to 1.

The Glossy Fresnel option is hidden from the UI and enabled by default, even for old scenes. This way it represents physical materials more accurately.

A new Displacement object modifier is implemented. The Displacement material attribute is now deprecated. Note that the displacement effect no longer appears in the Preview Swatch. The Displacement material attribute was unreliable - it was working only if the material is a top-most shader applied to the geometry. The new Displacement object modifier can be applied directly to geometries no matter the applied material, so multiple objects can use the same displacement but different materials.

The legacy Subsurface Scattering material is removed and migrated. Materials created with previous versions are migrated to Raytraced by default. It is done because this method is physically accurate and produces the best results.

Materials with Normal opacity mode are now calculated with the Stochastic opacity mode. Stochastic is now the default mode and replaces Normal in old scenes, as it gives the same results but is faster. The Clip mode calculates faster and gives better and more accurate results when there is only pure white and pure black in the opacity map.

Starting with V-Ray, 6 the Fresnel formula is now calculated more precisely. As a result, some materials, mainly metallic ones, may render slightly differently (with more physically-accurate reflections).

Starting with V-Ray 6, the V-Ray Preset Material Library is part of the Chaos Cosmos Browser. Materials that have already been downloaded with any earlier V-Ray version remain unchanged and can still be loaded as a custom folder.

Starting with V-Ray 7, the Binding section in the materials is now renamed to Viewport Display. The Texture helper has been removed and can now be replaced with a custom texture.

Enscape Compatibility

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 Scenes set up using Enscape will now render in V-Ray. Materials and even the Enscape assets will be automatically handled by V-Ray providing a great starting point when transitioning from the Enscape design stage to the high-end visualization in V-Ray. For more information, go to Enscape Compatibility. 

Special Objects

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Starting with V-Ray 7 there is a new Remove from Selection function. It removes the Special object applied on another object.

Render Elements

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A new Contours Render Element is added. This render element stores a mask for both the global and individual material contours. It can be used for compositing. Note that Contours will only appear in a Contours render element and not in the RGB/Beauty image.

Migration from Previous Versions

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V-Ray 6 for SketchUp licenses also work with V-Ray 5, allowing anyone who purchases an upgrade, to complete unfinished projects using V-Ray 5 if needed.

Materials and other V-Ray data saved with V-Ray older than v2.0 will not be read.

If you need to migrate an outdated scene, you will need to perform a 2-step migration - the first one to V-Ray 3.6 and the second one to V-Ray 5.

To do so, first, visit download.chaos.com, enable the Show older versions checkbox, and download V-Ray 3.6.

Then, uninstall your current version of V-Ray for SketchUp and install v 3.6 instead.
Open your outdated project, inspect the scene materials through the V-Ray Asset Editor, and save the project. This will trigger automatic V-Ray data migration. Repeat the steps for V-Ray 5.

Note that in order to work with V-Ray 5 builds, you need to have the proper License Server. For more information about the License Server, see Installing the License Server.

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V-Ray 6 is the latest version that supports the import of V-Ray 2 models, components and materials.

Scatter Viewer In Previous SketchUp Versions

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Here is what the Scatter Viewer used to look like in SketchUp 2022 an earlier versions. See the Scatter Viewport Preview Workflow for versions 2023 and later.

UI Paths

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Workflow

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