RIBit

13 votes
Version: 
0.3.2
Date Updated: 
08/07/2008

This is a free Renderman exporter for 3DSMax. It enables you to render your scenes using any Renderman complient renderer. For now - it doesn't do very much. It is after all a first alpha version - but it is usable to some extent. It exports you camera - lights and geometry (currenty - all geometry is exported using either polygons or subdivision meshes.) It does not export particles - though I would like to add them at some point. A lot of max attributes are not supported yet.

Additional Info: 

Version: 0.3.2
(2008-08-06 15:23:11) 

A couple of minor fixes regarding DOF (thanks to Silvio Falcinelli for the suggestions):

  • Fixed: target camera target distance.
  • Added:
    if camera\'s muli-pass effect set to mental-ray DOF, use the f-stop
    setting in the camera instead of the one set in the render parameters
    window.

 Version: 0.3.1
(2007-01-28 05:50:40)

  • Added a patch by R.J.Wolfe that fixes a bug in the UV mapping export.

Version: 0.3.0
(2006-10-15 18:48:39)

  • Added: The render parameters dialog now saves the settings in the max scene file.
  • Fixed: A bug in the rendering attributes modifier that would not handle point and vector types correctly.

Version: 0.2.9
(2006-10-10 14:23:09)

  • Fixed a bug in the shader parameters parsing that would cause color and point3 values to be exported as strings.

 

Check out the RIBit page for details

What does it not do (and probably never will)?

I made this exporter so I can experiment with Renderman - thus - it will probably never be a full production tool.
If you need a working production tool - there are at least two commercial plugins that will do the job much better.
It does not convert your max materials into Renderman shaders (and it will probably never will - unless someone is willing to take on this huge part.)
Not all of Max's features and attributes are going to be supported.
At the moment there is no primitive support. In fact as mentioned above - all geometry is exported as polygons. I'm not sure if that will change.

How did it all start?

It started with the fact that I wanted to practice some of the Renderman things I learned at work. However - I don't really like working with Maya - and prefer Max. The problem is - there is no free Renderman support.
I thought about writing something like this before - but was quite intimidated by the amount of work required - so it was only after Rudy Cortes (of www.rendermanacademy.com) has offered the code he had started working on for any taker to continue - that I actually started working on this project.
I ended up using parts of Rudy's code - but pretty much wrote it from scrach. However - if it weren't for him - I probably never would have started with this...

OK - So what do I need?

Well - first of all you need a Renderman complient renderer.

Here are a few free one (some completely free - some only for personal use):
3Delight
Aqsis
Pixie

Now download the latest RIBit version from here.

This is an .mzp file - all you need to do is run in using max's 'run scrip' command - and you're all set to go.

Great. It's installed - now what?

The RIBit installation installs two macroscripts: 'RIBit Render' and 'RIBit Setup' - and some modifiers.
First run 'RIBit Setup'. There you can define the render engines you've got installed on your machine - as well as some general directories the RIBit will use.
Now - run 'RIBit Render'. This opens up a 'Render Parameters' window - where you can change your render parameters and send a render.
You can use the RIBit modifers to control object specific attributes - such as shaders - geomtry export type (polygons or subdivision) - and you can add you own RIB commands with RIBBoxes.

I don't like this script - how do I get rid of it?

RIBit installs files in 3 places - to remove it - delete the following:
1. ScriptsRIBit - delete the whole directory.
2. ScriptsStartup - delete the file name RIBit_Startup.ms
3. UIMacroscripts - delete the files beginning with 'RIBit'

Version Requirement: 
3ds Max 2009, 3ds Max 2008, 3ds Max 9, 3ds Max 8, 3ds Max 7
Video URL: 

Comments

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.
JokerMartini's picture

cool, worth trying out.

cool, worth trying out.

John Martini
Digital Artist
http://www.JokerMartini.com (new site)

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.