Having trouble getting the lume shader working in metal ray. I am using Max 9 and I have a scene which is an indoor-outdoor cafe, using mr Sun and Sky system as well as interior omni lights. I set-up the lume shader in camera effects as well as drag an instance into the materials editor (as instructed by various documentation I have read)...When I test render - I get a blank black image. Any ideas as to what adjustment(s) I am missing....

this area is for max 2009… try posting in the “max untill 2008” area instead :)

Intel 7 - 2.8Ghz
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3D Studio Max Design 2012 x64

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Yes this is the wrong forum, but anyway.
Lume Tools is a collection of shaders eg. Beam, Glare, Mist, Ocean. Firstly what type of Camera Efect is it, Lens, Output or Volume, and which Lume shader are you trying to use?
I suspect the problem is, because you are using mr Sun and Sky it is a HDR scene which requires Exposure Control. I’ve found that many Lume shaders are not bright enough for a HDR scene, Mist for example will render black even if you set the Solid Colour to white, altough you can fix this by adding a Glow shader to the Solid colour Map Slot and cranking up the Brightness value very high (at least 5000) that will make it render grey.
The same applies to your Omni Lights, the amount of light they produce is so small compared to the mr Sun they will show little or no effect when rendered with Exposure control, you need to use Photometric lights in a HDR scene.

Sorry all for posting in the wrong area...Samab – I am simply trying to get the glow of the incandescent lights (omnis) to show in the render. I was using the glow lume shader in camera effects. When I redered the scene I got nothing but a blank gray image - nothing at all visible…

No problem with the wrong conference thing… it happens.  Don’t worry.

Maneswar Cheemalapati [FA]

I’m still a bit confused about which shader you are using where. Glow is a material shader that has an effect similar to self illumination, I can’t see how to use it as a Camera Effect. I’ve put it in the diffuse map of the material on the knot on the left, it’s useful for things like flouecent strips, neon signs or TV screens (with a picture map). The advantage over self illumination in a standard material is that you can put the Brightness value right up to be visible in a HDR environment.
To get a glowing effect around your object, there are two methods I’ve found that work in a HDR scene, one is the Glare shader in the output slot of Camera Shaders. This puts a soft or streaky glow onto the brightest areas of the image after rendering, it can effect lights, brightly lit parts of the scene, the overexposed exterior through the window and highlights on reflective objects.
The other is the old Lens Effects found in Environment and Effects, this can be set to act only on the lights you pick.
Methods I’ve found that don’t work in HDR environment are the old Volume Light atmosphere effect and the Beam shader in the volume slot of Camera Shaders, these both result in dark renders.
I did a quick test scene to try this, it’s just a room withe a couple of windows on one wall and a couple of Photometric Lights on the other wall (As I said before you need to ditch the Omni Lights and replace them with Photometric Lights), there is mr SunSky outside and a few random objects on the floor.
The first render has no effect, the second uses Glare and the third one Lens Effects Glow.

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That’s it. You’re examples are right on...exactly what I am looking to do...I do have some neon and flourescent lights using the self-illumination now. You referenced the method I was trying which didn’t work – the Beam shader in the volume slot of Camera Shaders. I will try your first two examples above. Thanks a lot!!!