Dynamic Level of Detail Objects in Scene

Hello- At my job, we render medium to high poly environments consisting of restaurants, clubs, sport venues, etc. Often time there are furniture models that are instanced in the scene dozens to thousands of times. Additionally, we may render this venue from up to 200 different camera angels.

I'm wondering if I can create 2 or 3 different levels of detail models for these furniture pieces, and then have max dynamically detect which version of the model to render based upon its distance from the camera. Because we render from so many different locations, it wouldn't be practical for us to build the scene with these different levels of detail already in place- they would need to be updated for each camera position.

Also, is there any related terminology I should look up on this topic other than "level of detail"? When I google that phrase I mainly find descriptions of how/why it is done in gaming, and advice on how to model different levels of detail of a particular model. I need a solution for max to automatically detect which version of a model to use.

Thanks for your time.