This page provides information on running V-Ray on a machine that does not have it locally installed.
The following instructions apply to 3ds Max 2021 and earlier. Find instruction for 3ds Max 2022 and later at the Running V-Ray Autodesk app packages from Arbitrary Location page. |
It is possible to run V-Ray from an arbitrary location, rather than installing it locally.
In the temporary folder, create a plugin.ini file with the absolute paths to the V-Ray plugins:
[Directories] VRay=\\server\share\vray_adv_max2021_x64.25566\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2021\plugins\ vrayplugins=\\server\share\vray_adv_max2021_x64.25566\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2021\plugins\vrayplugins\ |
In the temporary folder, create a .bat file that contains environment variables that are needed by V-Ray and runs 3ds Max with the custom plugin.ini file:
SET PATH=%~dp0Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2021;%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\bin;%PATH% SET VRAY_FOR_3DSMAX2021_MAIN=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\bin SET VRAY_FOR_3DSMAX2021_PLUGINS=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\bin\plugins SET VRAY_MDL_PATH_3DSMAX2021=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\mdl SET VRAY_OSL_PATH_3DSMAX2021=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\opensl "C:\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2021\3dsmax.exe" -p %~dp0\plugin.ini |
In the temporary folder, create a .bat file that contains environment variables that are needed by V-Ray and runs V-Ray spawner with the custom plugin.ini file:
SET PATH=%~dp0Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2021;%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\bin;%PATH% SET VRAY_FOR_3DSMAX2021_MAIN=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\bin SET VRAY_FOR_3DSMAX2021_PLUGINS=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\bin\plugins SET VRAY_MDL_PATH_3DSMAX2021=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\mdl SET VRAY_OSL_PATH_3DSMAX2021=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\opensl vrayspawner2021.exe -AppName="C:\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2021\3dsmax.exe" -cmdparams="-p %~dp0\plugin.ini" |
Use the specified .bat files to run 3ds Max or V-Ray spawner with the specific V-Ray version.
The preceding commands work with V-Ray 6 for 3ds Max. If using V-Ray 5, use the following commands: SET VRAY5_FOR_3DSMAX2021_MAIN=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\bin SET VRAY5_FOR_3DSMAX2021_PLUGINS=%~dp0Program Files\Chaos Group\V-Ray\3ds Max 2021\bin\plugins |
Starting with V-Ray 6, update 1, the VRAY_OSL_PATH_3DSMAX20## environment variable no longer needs to be set. ## stands for the number of 3ds Max version. |
This approach works well for render servers where V-Ray is used only for rendering. However, it has a few limitations when 3ds Max is used in interactive mode because some 3ds Max paths cannot be controlled; these limitations can be avoided by expanding the .bat file above to copy some additional files from the network location to the local 3ds Max user folder:
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