NEWS FLASH
Autodesk Announces Connection Extension for 3ds Max Design 2010 Software
New Release Improves Interoperability with Popular AEC and Manufacturing Software and Simplifies Work
with Complex Scenes
NEW ORLEANS, Aug. 3, 2009 — At SIGGRAPH 2009, Autodesk, Inc., has announced the Connection
Extension for Autodesk 3ds Max Design 2010 modeling, animation and rendering software. The release
makes it easier and more cost-effective to turn design data into accurate, realistic visualizations. New levels
of interoperability — based on intelligent data workflows — between 3ds Max Design and CAD software
makes it easier for architects, designers and visualization specialists to minimize rework by taking advantage
of existing design data.
Connectivity and Intelligent Workflows
The Connection Extension for 3ds Max Design 2010 software helps improve interoperability with several
products commonly used by architecture, engineering, construction and manufacturing design professionals.
The addition of new, high-fidelity CAD data translators for SAT and SKP file formats, along with a rewritten
OpenEXR translator, delivers:
• Importing and exporting of SAT files for moving solids-based design data between 3ds Max Design
and Autodesk Revit Architecture, Autodesk Inventor Professional, the Alias family of products and
third-party CAD products SolidWorks, Rhino and FormZ.
• More efficient, accurate importing of files from Google SketchUp sketching software — a common
tool in the architecture and design communities — and support for reading the thousands of 3D
objects in Google’s 3D Warehouse.
• Importing and exporting of multilayer OpenEXR files with advanced options for transferring extra
elements to support workflows with compositing applications. This helps to reduce the number of
iterations required to achieve the final result.
The Connection Extension for 3ds Max Design 2010 also provides smarter, more effective workflows that
help users to deal with complex scenes through:
• More optimal display and rendering of imported solid and NURBS-based bodies. Maintaining a
model’s procedural nature, rather than reducing it to triangles, ultimately helps save time and
prevents costly geometry cleanup work.
• Procedural and resolution-independent workflows enabled by the new “body” entity for artifact-free
cutaways and reveals, along with finer control over rendering performance versus quality.
• An improved materials workflow that allows individual layers from an OpenEXR file to be used in a
material.
• Quick setup of imported SketchUp scenes and objects. Layers, groups, components, materials,
cameras and even the daylight system are extracted from the SketchUp file and efficiently mapped
to the corresponding 3ds Max Design system.

Autodesk, Alias, Inventor, Revit and 3ds Max are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., and/or its subsidiaries and/or
affiliates in the USA and/or other countries. SIGGRAPH is a registered trademark of the Association of Computing Machinery, Inc. All
other brand names, product names or trademarks belong to their respective holders. Autodesk reserves the right to alter product
offerings and specifications at any time without notice, and is not responsible for typographical or graphical errors that may appear in
this document.
© 2009 Autodesk, Inc. All rights reserved.
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