General Questions

How can I find out more information on these new tools and workflows in Alias and VRED?

The Autodesk Design Studio blog is a good source of information and links to content.

Where can I download the new Alias 2021  and VRED 2021?

Alias 2021 trial has not updated yet. It will be found here.

VRED 2021 can already be downloaded here.

Which operating systems are supporting the new 2021 products?

Supported Operating systems for Alias products:

• Microsoft® Windows® 10 (64-bit)
• Microsoft Windows 8.1 Professional (64-bit)

See link for more info: System requirements for Autodesk Alias 2021 products

Supported Operating systems for VRED products:

• Microsoft® Windows® 10 (64-bit)
• Microsoft Windows 8.1 Professional (64-bit)
• Additionally, for VRED Render Node:
  • Linux Version: Linux with GNU C Library stable release version 2.5 with installed X-Server
• Redhat 6.x, using version 2.12 of the GNU C Library or above
• Redhat 7.x, using the stable release version 2.17 of the GNU C Library

See link for more info: System requirements for Autodesk VRED 2021 products

Important: Windows 7 is not supported as of version 2021 and MacOS is not supported as of version 2019.1.
Discontinuation of Mac Support for Autodesk Alias and VRED

Alias 2021 Questions

Is the History Visualiser available in all Alias packages?

Yes, the History Visualizer is available in Alias AutoStudio, Alias Surface and Alias Concept.

 Is the Retopo feature available in all Alias packages?

Yes, the Retopo feature is available in Alias AutoStudio, Alias Surface and Alias Concept.

When and where can I get more tutorials and learning content for Sub-D modeling? Where we can find SubD training?

Autodesk’s latest addition to our offerings is the Subd Starter Pack. Please contact your Autodesk Account Manager for more information.

Is the history visualizer dependent on keeping history or is it linked to metadata?

Items without history will not show up in the History Visualizer. The History Visualizer is a window that allows you to visualize only the current history commands and associated targets/constructors. Metadata is not deleted when construction history is deleted.

See the links below for more information:

Work with construction history using the History Visualizer

History Metadata

Can VRED load the new Alias Assemblies?

Currently VRED cannot load Alias assemblies.

Can I work in Dynamo using Alias SubD surfaces?

We allow the ability to send SubD data to Dynamo and apply scripts to the imported geometry that can then be sent back to Alias.

VRED 2021 Questions

Is VRED Go in VRED Design?

The VRED Go feature is only available in VRED Pro.

Does streaming work in VRED Design?

The streaming workflow is only available in VRED Pro and VRED Core.

When does a VRED Go file expire?

Files created with VRED Go expire after 60 days.

How can I license an RTX Server?

Either by using 4 VRED Pro Licenses, 6 VRED Core Licenses, or a mixture of both.

Which Graphic Cards support GPU raytracing?

VRED GPU raytracing is supported by NVIDIA GPUs of the Turing, Volta, Pascal, and Maxwell architectures. RTX GPUs are highly recommended.

Are VRED Go, Stream and GPU Raytracing part of VRED Design?

No, VRED Go, Stream and GPU raytracing are part of VRED Pro. A full overview can be found in our Comparison Matrix.

Where can I find your online Python documentation?

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/vred-products/learn-explore/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2021/ENU/VRED/files/VRED-Python-Documentation-html-html.html

Python Documentation V1 is the current one and V2 is the new version including decoupled modules. As we are progressing with the decoupling project, more and more functionality will be added to the V2 Python interface.

Is VRED Core going to replace VRED Render Node?

No, VRED Core is an addition to our portfolio. It has a superior feature set to VRED Render Node including GPU Raytracing, streaming and a full Python API. As VRED Render Node is still a great product to e.g. scale CPU based raytracing systems, the product will continue to exist moving forward. 

How do you see customers transitioning from current raytracing? Do you plan to retire CPU raytracing?

No, we are not planning to retire the CPU raytracing capabilities in VRED. We have added GPU raytracing and thus provide even more flexibility now. So, customers can choose between OpenGL, GPU and CPU based rendering. We want to leave it up to our customer to decide which technology is the right one for them to use, because each of them has benefits in certain areas, meaning that we would assume that customers even use a mixture of the 3 rendering modes depending on the scenario they use our software for.

ShotGrid Questions

What integrations does ShotGrid support?

We have both Autodesk-built and community-built integrations that we can share links to. All of our integration are built using Python and shared via github, which means although the product is not open source, we allow access to the code for studios to extend and modify for their needs.

Is ShotGrid integration available in older versions of Alias or VRED?

We started supporting ShotGrid integration with Alias 2019 and VRED 2020.

How can we start using ShotGrid?

Pick a small project, pick a few key stakeholders and run through a test project. Don’t worry about configuring ShotGrid at the beginning, ShotGrid is built to make changes overtime throughout projects. Use it out of the box and learn what works and what doesn’t. Ask yourself why you are doing this and most importantly, what problem you are trying to solve. Follow this guide here to begin getting started with ShotGrid.