This is a summary of frequently asked questions about mental ray®. Further information about the availability and specification are given in the appropriate pages Specs, Availability, and Supported Platforms.
Where can I buy mental ray? What are the prices?
mental ray is distributed by mental images' OEM partners only. For pricing information please get in contact with these companies.
Who are mental images' OEM partners?
Autodesk, Dassault Systèmes, and others to be announced.
Who provides support for mental ray?
Support for mental ray is provided by the company/dealer where you have purchased the software.
Is there any literature or additional documentation about mental ray?
A series of books about mental ray is published by Springer Verlag Vienna/New York. A number of books has been published independently by different authors which cover mental ray usage inside DCC applications of our OEM partners like Autodesk Softimage (former AVID Softimage|XSI), Autodesk 3ds max and Autodesk Maya. Many Internet communities in the computer graphics space also discuss mental ray topics. The Los Angeles User Group collects useful information and details about mental ray.
Where can I get an educational, test, demo, or evaluation license of mental ray?
Please contact one of mental images' OEM partners, depending on the front-end you are using or planning to use mental ray with. A demo version of mental ray standalone and library is coming with the mental ray Series of Handbooks.
Which platforms does mental ray support?
Please visit our webpage Supported Platforms.
With the stand-alone version of mental ray, can I import Autodesk 3ds max, Autodesk Softimage, and Autodesk Maya scene files?
mental ray standalone reads files in the native .mi scene description format, no matter which front-end has been used to create them.
Can I render mi files generated with an application from one vendor using mental ray stand-alone obtained from and licensed by another vendor?
The mental ray stand-alone product that is sold by our OEM partners can be used in conjunction with any product from any vendor that contains mental ray. However, the appropriate shader libraries are required for rendering images. These libraries are part of the respective front-end products and must be obtained from the product's vendor. When using multiple products utilizing mental ray, at least the major version numbers (first two digits of mental ray version number string) should match. If they don't, the versions of mental ray may be incompatible and shaders may fail to work with one or more of the products.
What about host-parallel network rendering in an inhomogeneous environment?
mental ray supports host-parallel network rendering in an inhomogeneous network of all supported platforms.
How many licenses do I need to render on a multiprocessor machine and/or on a network of machines?
One license per physical CPU (processor in a socket), no matter how many cores the CPU has.
What is your licensing policy?
mental ray supports floating and node-locked CPU licenses.
Is mental ray multi-threaded?
Yes.
On what hardware can I use mental ray?
mental ray is available for many platforms, defined as combinations of hardware and operating systems. You can use mental ray on any of the supported platforms.
Does mental ray support radiosity?
mental ray supports full physically correct global illumination. This includes radiosity as a special case, but additionally simulates all light transport modes possible in nature.
Does mental ray work with IES light profiles?
Yes, mental ray does support light profiles for rendering, both in IES and Eulumdat format.
Does mental ray render hair?
Yes. mental ray provides optimized hair rendering based on a specialized hair primitive. It also supports to render polygonal, free-form surface, and volume hair and fur.
Does mental ray support subdivision surfaces?
Yes, mental ray supports rendering of hierarchical subdivision surfaces, and provides a fast rendering solution for non-hierarchical Catmull-Clark meshes. Full surface modeling and editing support is available in conjunction with the optional mental matter® product.
Where do all the shaders and Phenomena come from?
mental ray ships with the base, physics, and contour shader libraries, including source code. In addition, it provides optimized shader packages for architectural and design visualization, car paint shading, subsurface scattering, and shaders targeting film production like 2.5d post motion blur. All OEM versions ship with the corresponding vendor-specific shader libraries. Custom shader writing is fully supported and described in the mental ray books and manual. Shaders can be connected to complex visual effects called Phenomena (a generalized form of shader graphs). Some vendors provide graphical user interfaces for creating Phenomena.