Material Layer Interface MLI

3 new versions and reduced prices: MLI Light 2.0, MLI 2.0, MLI Pro 2.0

With the Material Layer Interface (MLI) you can create Material Layers and passes in 3D Studio Max and it’s easy to handle them!

Just create the layers and pick the objects. Assign materials to the objects and feel free to use different renderer or render settings for every single layer.

Work within one Max file with dozen of passes – and send them all to the Backburner Manager with a single mouse click. If you want to, the MLI organizes the filenames and path assignments.

Right now it works only with local rendering or the Backburner, but with all render engines. If you need MLI with another render manager, let me know and I will consider an implementation. _______________________________________________________________________________

I created this tool after a long time of wishing to easily handle individual render passes in our projects. No product on the market was close enough to match our needs especially in an easy to handle work flow. So I started to create this tool more than seven years ago for internal use in our company. After the years it grew and changed constantly. Now we decided to sell this tool because it helped us many times in our productions and we are sure it will help others, too.

The Material Layer Interface Light is a free tool.

The versions Material Layer Interface and the Material Layer Interface Pro are commercial Tools. _______________________________________________________________________________

Featurelist:

• Easily create and manage your individual render passes / render layers
• Add with one click an individual set of objects to your MLI layer
• Different materials, lights, render engines, render settings per layer
• An easy and self-explaining user interface, related to the 3ds Max UI
• Interactive tracking of material changes, renaming of materials or objects

A perfect help for other work processes. Optional functions, performed on activating a layer:

• You see in the view port only the objects assigned to the active MLI layer or vice versa
• Changes the camera view port or perspective view to the assigned camera
• Always have the used materials in the Material Editor without loss of unused materials
• Extension of the Material Editor slots to an unlimited number

Makes rendering of dozens of MLI layers in one Max File easy and extremely fast:

• Decide between fast preview, local batch rendering or one-click network rendering
• For fast preview rendering you can create special render settings and output sizes
• Give a layer a single material (override) for all objects during rendering
• Automated cleanup of MLI layers for deleted scene objects
• Automation of time consuming routine processes like creation of file names and folders
• Easily delete a range of rendered images when you don’t need them anymore
• Integrated help file

New features in MLI v2 and in MLI Pro v2:

• Add your information to each layer for traceable processes and better teamwork
• Deactivate and hide temporarily unused MLI layers
• Import your MLI layers to other Max files
• Export and save material libraries from MLI layers
• Added some workflow enhancements

New features only in MLI Pro v2:

• Assign to one MLI layer dozens of cameras:
  - Assign individual render ranges and render engines to each camera
  - Automated creation of folders and file names for the different cameras on the layer
  - Easy and fast rendering of those different cameras
  - Just create one layer and set it up - no need to think about the file organization
• Easily and intuitive handling of object properties per layer
• Add individual Scripts per Layer which will be executed when you select a layer or before rendering

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An easy to learn Interface