Render farm/network?

[Ian Jones]

Should be fine, quite easy so long as your wireless doesnt play up. Basically you need to specify a shared folder on the computer you want all your frames to be rendered to. I strongly suggest rendering a sequence of frames in *.tga ot *.png and then useing a compositing / editing program later to bring them back together as an animation ready for final output. I use afterfx for this process.

Ok, so I got a little sidetracked there. Basically make sure you setup a shared folder on the desitnation computer. So, if you don't know how to do that just right click a folder > sharing and security. You may have a blue hyperlink of text going on about 'if you understand the security.... click here' just avoid the wizard. Just check 'share folder on network' and 'allow other users to change my files' this just allows the other computers to write there images to the folder.

ok, now for the Max Backburner render system. Basically there are 3 components...



Manager (start this on one computer, the main one...it is the central server and must be started before the others)
Server (this can be run on the main computer too, but basically its the rendering server program for all the 'nodes' on the render farm.)
Monitor (you can start this on any of the computers, its just a monitor and management tool for looking at the render quee, assigning tasks, checking progress etc.)
Remember the order... Manager, servers, monitor. Connect them, just leave the default port settings... and all should be good.

Ok, now all you need to do is check 'network render' in the 3dsmax render dialog and also specify a network folder to render to. It must be a network path. See image:

http://www.visions-unleashed.com/misc/uni/3dsmaxNetRender.gif

Hit render and a dialog box comes up... for your scene (with the 2500*2500 map) check 'include maps' so that the other computers have the map included. hit connect and it'll render away. Hopefully all will be good.

[nanogirl]

Okay my main computer here (my purple laptop) has Max on the c drive and then I have a very large external F drive hooked up to it that I thought I would render to. So should I make F shared and then make my shared folder that you mention on there? In my back office I have a dell desktop and a tablet pc that I already have hooked up via wireless network.
You use fx - I could probablly do the same in Combustion then... your side track is really the whole reason why I am looking at the render network because I've come to the end of a rather large project that I had been working on in sections and I was rendering out each section as .movs for approval. NOw I'm about at the end, and it dawned on me that there is no way I can render the whole thing - so I have been looking into this render farm idea and alternative rendering ideas. One problem I have however is that in Max I am using a ton of morpher slots that have jpgs and movs and I can not now change these materials to anything else - so I hope it's okay when I render with these mats - but I have heard like you mention that I should render to png or tga - and I would do that the same way that I usually render .movs or? Some one was telling me about video post - which I don't know alot about how to use.
So for Backburner - since this purple laptop is my main man (he actually has the best specs too) I would just open manager on it first before anything else - so I don't do anything in here, I just go open server on..... only one of my other machines or both? For monitor that is only on one......... do I do anything in there?

Do all of my computers have to be running the same version of Max?

Thank you for helping me out with this.

Gina`

[Ian Jones]

Max must be installed, or at least backbuner installed on the render nodes. Share your F:\ or a folder on it. It has to be the same version of Max and if you have use any special plugins that are present at render time you'll need them installed on every machine. Startup manager on your main computer first. You can also start up 'server' on the main one aswell if you want it to render too. Basically every computer with 'server' running will be rendering. Monitor just lets you view the progress, start it anywhere you wish but after everything else (at least after the manager).

I'm not sure if the network render will handle really large texture files well, I haven't really experienced that yet. Rendering to a sequence of images is always best because if any of your computers crash during rendering you'll only lose a single frame and can start back up at the exact frame again and save time... rather than a half compiled movie file with 100 frames of which you would lose all if it crashed during rendering giving you a headache and hours worth of re-rendering.

[nanogirl]

Max must be installed, or at least backbuner installed on the render nodes. Share your F:\ or a folder on it. It has to be the same version of Max and if you have use any special plugins that are present at render time you'll need them installed on every machine. Startup manager on your main computer first. You can also start up 'server' on the main one aswell if you want it to render too. Basically every computer with 'server' running will be rendering. Monitor just lets you view the progress, start it anywhere you wish but after everything else (at least after the manager).

I'm not sure if the network render will handle really large texture files well, I haven't really experienced that yet. Rendering to a sequence of images is always best because if any of your computers crash during rendering you'll only lose a single frame and can start back up at the exact frame again and save time... rather than a half compiled movie file with 100 frames of which you would lose all if it crashed during rendering giving you a headache and hours worth of re-rendering.

For the plugins, do they have to be installed on the other machines if they are not being used in my scene?
So you don't think doing a network render like this will save me any time, it might actually be a problem?
I will do the render to sequence - I'm assuming doing this Max will name my files in frames so I know where to start again if I do crash right?
Thank you for your other details, it has really helped me understand the process.
Gina

[CGTalk Moderation]

This thread has been automatically closed as it remained inactive for 12 months. If you wish to continue the discussion, please create a new thread in the appropriate forum.