May 1, 2007

Next Limit Technologies Upgrades Maxwell Render

Madrid, Spain - Next Limit Technologies has announced a new version of its Maxwell Render.
With the release of Maxwell Render 1.5, Next Limit Technologies is changing its licensing policy in a number of areas. Standard licenses will now have no CPU or Core restrictions. Maxwell Render 1.5 licenses will be issued per machine, irrelevant of how many CPU cores the machine has. Performance of Maxwell Render will be dependant on the hardware being used, not restricted by the license.
 
Prices of Standard licences will be maintained ($995/ €895/ ¥118.000).   
 
What about current Maxwell Render licenses? Because there are many existing Maxwell Render customers using multiple single-core or dual-core machines within the old “four CPU core” restriction, the company cannot introduce a new policy that will disadvantage them in any way. Maxwell Render 1.5 will recognize existing licenses as 4 Standard licenses. Each existing license will be usable with up to 4 machines, regardless of how many CPU cores are on each machine.   
 
Next Limit is also introducing a new Maxwell RenderNode license which is aimed at those users who are using their own extra machines as nodes for increased rendering speeds and capacity. These new Node licenses will give users infinite possibilities for expanding the number of machines used in their personal renderfarms. Maxwell RenderNode licenses will be priced at $395/€295/¥49.770 each. 
 
From the launch date until the end of June 2007, Maxwell Render Standard licenses will come with three free RenderNode licenses, allowing new customers to use Maxwell Render on up to four machines for the same price as one Standard license.   
 
Additional features in Maxwell Render 1.5 include:
 
XSi plug-in
Alongside the release of Maxwell Render 1.5, a new plug-in for XSi 6 for both Windows and Linux will be available to all new and existing users.  In line with our policy to promote cross-platform use of Maxwell Render, this plug-in will be free to all users with standard Full licenses.
 
Shift Lens
This camera parameter allows users to shift the film plane up/down and left/right, without rotating the camera. This is very useful in architectural rendering for keeping a 2 point perspective while capturing the entire building in the image. 
 
Blow Up
Render a specific region of an image at more resolution than other areas of the same image for added quality and accuracy. 
 
Z-Clip Rendering
This feature will allow cutting of the rendered object with a plane to show the interior of objects without the need to model the edges. Very flexible and very useful. 
 
Vignetting
Vignetting is the darkening effect that happens on real-world lenses, especially wide angle lenses. The amount of vignetting is controllable from the MXCL interface. 
 
Improved log system
Enhancements have been made to the log system within Maxwell Render with more data available to keep track of renders. A final, detailed feature list will be published when Maxwell Render 1.5 is launched.