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The following MDL material files are included when installing V-Ray, starting with V-Ray for 3ds Max 3.5. They are located in Local Disk ( C:) > \Program Files > \Chaos Group > \V-Ray > 3dsmax 20xx for x64 > mdl\3ds Max 20xx\mdl.


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The MDL Search Paths rollout hosts the system paths to available mdl modules, as well as options for manually adding and removing additional paths.

System paths are the ones defined with the V-Ray environment variable variable VRAY_MDL_PATH_3DSMAX20YY_x64 and 3DSMAX20xx and NVIDIA environment variables MDL_SYSTEM_PATH and MDL_USER_PATH. Additional Paths are used to add root locations that will be searched when the given mdl module is not found in available system paths. Mdl modules can also reside in a sub-folder and will be automatically searched for without the need of adding the sub-folder's explicit path name. If an mdl module is loaded from a location that is not present in an already listed path, a pop-up window prompts you to add it to the list of Additional paths (or else it will not be loaded and rendered). All path lists are stored on a global level and are not scene specific.

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 The MDL modules are cached when loaded. If two or more mdl modules with the same name are used this may cause only the first one to be actually loaded.

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MAXScript Usage

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mdl.searchpaths

#("C:\ProgramData\NVIDIA Corporation\mdl", "C:\Users\CurrentUser\Documents\mdl", "C:\Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3dsmax 20yy for x643ds Max 20xx\mdl")




The table below lists the available methods for editing the Additional paths with MAXScript:

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In order for the MDL Material to correctly load NVIDIA vMaterials, the following two paths should be present in the MDL Search paths lists:
%PROGRAMDATA%\NVIDIA Corporation\mdl;
%USERPROFILE%\Documents\mdl

By default, on vMaterials installation they are set in the environment variables MDL_SYSTEM_PATH and MDL_USER_PATH which is the proper workflow. An alternative way to add them to the system paths is to append them to the V-Ray environment variable that specifies default location for MDL modules:

VRAY_MDL_PATH_3DSMAX20yy_x643DSMAX20xx=%PROGRAMDATA%\NVIDIA Corporation\mdl;%USERPROFILE%\Documents\mdl

where yy xx is the version of Max installed.

Example:

VRAY_MDL_PATH_3DSMAX2018_x643DSMAX20xx=C:\Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3dsmax 2018 for x643ds max 20xx\mdl; %PROGRAMDATA%\NVIDIA Corporation\mdl;%USERPROFILE%\Documents\mdl

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In some cases, when using MDL files exported from Substance Designer, V-Ray may fail to load some modules. In order to load these modules, a folder needs to be set up before starting 3ds Max.

  1. Make a folder, for example example X:\MDL, that will act as the MDL repository. Put the MDL modules that are exported from Substance Designer into this folder.
  2. Put the textures needed by the MDL materials in the same repository in their respective subfolder (for example,   X:\MDL\MDL_Plywood_02).
  3. Tell V-Ray where the MDL repository is by appending it to the VRAY_MDL_PATH_3DSMAX20yy_x64 environment 3DSMAX20xx environment variable.
  4. Find the folder where Substance Designer keeps its MDL modules (usually C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Substance 3D Designer\resources\view3d\iray\alg but may differ from version to version) and append its path to the same environment variable. 

In the end, the environment variable should look something like:

VRAY_MDL_PATH_3DSMAX20yy_x643DSMAX20xx=C:\Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3dsmax 20yy for x643ds max 20xx\mdl;C:\Program Files\Allegorithmic\Substance Designer 5\resources\view3d\iray;X:\MDL

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