Exlevel is delighted to offer GrowFX - a new system of modeling and animating plants for Autodesk® 3ds Max®. Now you can recreate digitally a lifelike 3D model of any plant, from grass and trees to woodland using a refreshingly simple interface and an essential set of parameters that you can set up yourself.
GrowFX lets you create broadleaf trees, conifers, palm trees, flowers, ivy and many other vegetational compositions. Its unique model building tools will help you create creeping plants, entwining scene objects, and shearing plants of any shape. Plants may bend around different objects.
GrowFX is fully compatible with 3ds Max®. All parameters can be animated. You can, for example, create a wind animation, plant growth animation and other kinds of animation you can imagine. There is also an opportunity to edit the parameters using MAXScript.
Creation of realistic trees
GrowFX allows you to create extremely realistic trees thanks to a special technology called Meta mesh. With Meta mesh, it is possible to combine a trunk and branches into a single surface with smooth transitions at the points of contact. Meta mesh can also create tree trunks of any shape.
Create grass and woodland
One GrowFX object can be used to create a single plant or a group of plants. You can do it by distributing either by specified start points, or from a surface of an object. In case of distribution from an object surface, values of some parameters can be controlled by texture maps. For example, maps can control density of plants, height of plants, etc.
Create climbing and trailing plants
The direction modifier called Object reaction direction allows you to create a variety of climbing and trailing plants by using path reaction (reflection / magnetic) to other objects of a scene. Moreover, reactions can help you create plants growing around different obstacles or plants in closed places.
Create sheared plants
The direction modifier named Object slice direction allows you to create sheared plants of any shape. In doing so, you can make use of standard shapes from helper objects of the Exlevel category, including plane, box, sphere, as well as a shape of any other geometric object of a scene.
Create plants of any shape
GrowFX allows users to specify any shape for stems and branches. This can be achieved thanks to splines, using the Spline direction modifier. In doing so, you can use interpolation between different splines, creating smooth transitions from one shape to another.
Animation in GrowFX
You can animate almost all parameters and create any plant animation: growth, wind, etc. It's also possible to use the Affects mechanism to get specific parameters to influence others, so that you do not have to configure animation by hand. For example, you can set up a dependency of the length of main branches from the overall height of a tree, and dependency of small flowers from the length of main branches. Then it'll be enough to animate a tree height to create a fully-fledged animation of a growing plant.
Use of custom geometric objects
GrowFX offers a mesh builder called Instanced geometry. It allows using any geometric objects and even entire object hierarchies made by the user to create leaves, flowers, fruit and many other objects that may be required for a plant. Besides, you can use animation of these objects to show stages of their growth, distributing them over the main plant. For example, you can create a plant with blooming flowers in the lower part and buds on top. A GrowFX object can inherit all materials from the used objects. Objects can deform along path directions which can be used to create custom leaves. By creating only one geometric shape of a leaf, you can make it sway in the wind or make leaves look unique thanks to chaotic directions.
Speed of display in viewport
As a rule, most plants in 3D have many polygons and vertices. It makes it hardly possible to display many plants in viewport. In GrowFX this issue is solved. There is a special display mode called View line only which displays models in viewport as simple lines. Moreover, for paths that generate many lines (for example, leaves or small branches), you can set up the amount to be displayed in viewport by setting the lowest value of Percentage of paths.
- GrowFX works in 3ds Max 9, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 (32/64-bits) and 3ds Max Design 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 (32/64-bits).
- New direction modifier Wind animation and a new Wind helper object enable quick and easy creation of wind animation of any plant
- New direction modifier Hard bend, allowing you to create a hard bend of directions, mostly to create fractures in the leaves of palm plants
- New option Flip normals for Leaves mesh allows you to invert the normals of polygons in leaves
- Support for the Nitrous viewport display mode in 3ds Max 2012
- Some minor bugs are fixed
- Added full compatibility with 3ds Max 2012 and 3ds Max Design 2012 (32 and 64-bit)
- Added ability to save and open model presets
- Added a new option called Use Vertex Color in Surface distributor. This allows the use of vertex colors as part of the distribution density. Where white color is used, the density will reach a value of Density, where black color is used, the density will be zero. Accordingly, it is possible to use the standard modifier VertexPaint to draw on the surface, specifying the place where paths appear
- Now it is possible to scale objects used in Instanced geometry, and they will also be displayed in the scaled form in the resulting model
- Some minor bugs are fixed
- Added a new mesh builder called Meta mesh, that creates smooth transitions between trunks and branches. Using the new feature, you can create very realistic trees.
- Added a new direction modifier called Optimize steps that makes it possible to create more optimized models of plants
- New ability to influence almost all parameters of UVW Mapping for the Cylinder mesh
- Improved interface of Cylinder mesh, for Advanced parameters group
- Some minor bugs are fixed
- Added full compatibility with 3ds Max 2011 and 3ds Max Design 2011 (32 and 64-bit)
- Added an ability to select multiple starting paths in Path Distributor and Path position distributor
- Added a new influencing parameter called Parameter: offset for Distributor in point
- Added a new option named Scale length by Radius to UVW Mapping. The option allows the user to scale texture coordinates by length depending on the radius of Cylinder mesh
- Fixed minor bugs
- New direction modifier: Spline direction. The modifier allows the user to set the direction of a path along a spline. Moreover, this algorithm can be used to make smooth interpolation between splines. For example, low branches may have one shape while upper ones have another
- New parameters for Instanced geometry:
- Current time - Sets time for animated objects, which is different from the current time of the animation. Users can influence and animate this parameter on their own. The parameter can be used in animation, as well as in creation of static models
- Deform along Path - Deforms an object along path directions. The parameter allows the user to create custom geometric shapes by specifying the required direction for them
- Use hierarchy - Allows using all objects from the hierarchy of a selected object
- Generate MultiMaterial - Collects all information on object materials, creates a multimaterial and assigns it to itself
- Display as bounding box - If Combine meshes is not used, objects in Viewport are displayed as boxes
- One BBox for hierarchy - Displays the entire hierarchy as a single box. For example, you can create an animated flower from several associated objects, assign different materials to them. Then, the flower grows on branches / stems at different times. A GrowFX object automatically assigns to itself a new multimaterial where all materials of source objects are collected
- Improved interface:
- There is an opportunity to resize all lists by moving their bottom border
- When the user clicks the right mouse button on the Graphics, Affects, Chaos Mat ID buttons, a context menu appears where one can find more control options
- New option on the main panel called Show x-points on the paths. To make work with graphic parameters more visual, this option enables the mode that displays knot points of a graph as x-points on lines in Viewport
- Some minor bugs are fixed
- New direction modifier: Deviation direction. The modifier allows the user to deflect the trunk in the direction opposite to the growth of branches at the points where they distribute
- Version for render node. This version is built for installation on render-farm or additional network computers, which are intended for rendering. The version does not require activation and has no parameters. To get the version for render node, please contact our support at email@example.com
- New parameters for Path distributor: Range parameters. These parameters allow the user to set the start and end positions for distribution of branches on the trunk (or other branches) in percent or in absolute values. It speeds up calculation for plant animation because the use of Density graph is not required
- New parameters for Distributor in point: Angle bend and Chaos angle. The new parameters replace Min angle and Max angle of Random angle bend parameters. When old files are opened, the values of these parameters are converted to new values automatically
- New parameter for Distributor in point: Chaos offset
- New Scale factor parameter for all graphs
- Minor bugs fixed
- Added compatibility with 3ds Max 2010 (32-bit and 64-bit)
- New option for Leaves mesh: Without central edges. You can delete a central edge for leaves
- Fixed small bug with activation
- New direction modifier - Noise direction. It is used mainly to add curvature to stems and branches without changing their direction
- New feature that adds chaotic behavior to ID materials for all mesh builders - Chaos Materials ID
- New parameter for direction modifiers: Count Rate %. It allows the user to specify the impact of direction modifiers on paths in percent
- New ability to save the position and size of all windows automatically. Also added the Reset windows position button in Preference parameters
- Enhanced algorithm of path distribution on surface: Surface distributor
- Enhanced algorithm to prepare data for building mesh
- Random color for paths while creating new paths
- Minor bugs fixed
- Multi-threaded calculations for multicore computers. Now, the calculations are made very quickly!
- New parameter: Chaos Length Path. It allows the user to set up different length of the paths more easily!
- New options: Auto radius and Radius < Parent radius for automatic reduction of radii for Cylinder mesh. Now, you don't have to influence radii of Cylinder mesh to reduce them along with the reduction of the radii for parental paths.
- New variants for Vector direction and Vector orientation direction: Another point target, Another target surface and Use view as point target. Another target surface allows the user to lay leaves more correctly on a surface when creating clambering plants. Use view as point target allows the user to direct leaves to viewport or camera view.
- Use object pivot as a starting point for Instanced geometry
- Restore windows with parameters when selecting GrowFX object
- New faster algorithm for Instanced geometry when using Combine meshes and converting to Editable mesh. For faster viewport, please, enable Combine meshes.
- Improved interface and added new features:
- Copy/Paste components (paths, distributors, modify directions and meshes)
- Enable/Disable components (paths, distributors, modify directions, meshes and affects)
- Move Up/Move Down for components
- Fixed bug in rendering animation when using Instanced geometry (ScanLine and mentalRay renders)
- Fixed bug of a little jump of branches when using animation
- Minor bugs fixed
Licensing & Installation
Once you have completed your ordering process, you will receive your serial number and instructions to download and install the software via email (usually within 1-2 business days in Central European Time). Using this Serial number you will be able to activate your product and start using it right away. The "Individual License" can be used by one person. You can activate and deactivate the licence if you buy a new workstation for example.
Buy now for €240 (individual licence)