Now that Hash Inc has provided Netrender to every A:M User I want to explore the idea of never using A:M itself to render images. The idea being to use A:M exclusively for setting everything up and perfecting what is then wisked away to be rendered (or re-rendered) via Netrender.

I'm curious if anyone already does this exclusively and pitfalls (if any) to avoid in the process.
I'm hoping to lock this down in my own workflow so that I can then concentrate on animation in the coming year.

Any recommendations for optimal organization and locations to render out to will also be appreciated.

Thanks!

Is that possible to automate that? AFAIK, you have to manually save something out of A:M and reload it into Netrender.

If we have Netrender continuously render a job named 'TheBigKahuna.cho'* then when we save an update to 'TheBigKahuna.cho' then it should automatically pick up where we left off when it reads the next frame into memory.

Right?

Note: This is something of a rhetorical question because even if it didn't we should be able to use Netrender's postrendering commands to move on to the next user-specified render. We can even convert files, composite and automate other tasks as we go.




*Sorry, I'm in the habit of typing .prj all the time!
I'll try to get my terminology in line.

Ah, great topic of discussion, Rodney.

It may be too early to tell, as it is a new feature... and many of us are used to striking-up several instances of A:M to do essentially the same thing as NetRender does. Why use A:Mrender over NetRender, you might ask? What features could it give that NetRender does not? Well, for one- a BIGGIE in my little book... how about a preview window? How many times have I started a render and took a peek at it only to see... oh crap- I forgot to turn on particles (or something like that) and I can quickly abort, reset the settings, and commence a new render. It's called 'What You See Is What You Get' or WYSIWYG. It's tough working blind!

Another thing I might suggest would be a 'bridge' from the standard A:M renderer to NetRender... meaning a button in the render window that simply ports the whole she-bang(your current settings)... or saves it... so that NetRender would automatically pop-open and take over... kinda like when you hit the 'advanced' button in the original A:M render Queue. Sorry to use the word- 'bridge' it's so... Adobe.

I'll think on it further... just got back from the bar, seeing pink elephants. (I walked home) Need sleep.

Thanks Robert and Matt for getting this topic going.
There are great things ahead of us here.



This is an excellent point but interestingly it's also one of the reasons I want to try to move to a Netrender-centric workflow. I've simply got to stop 'previewing' my images all of the time. Better to let Netrender 'preview' them for us. (More on that aspect later)

Keep in mind that I am not considering a real time viewing of a scene in A:M as 'rendering' in the strict sense of the word so in that way we are still 'previewing' our images as we work. It's when we go to hit that render button... now for me... that has gotta go. What I'm really wanting is to get Netrender working on those 'final renders', even if they are incrementally updated final renderings on the way to the end goal. (Whisk 'em away to a timedatestamped folder and you've even got a historical record of your workflow.

So... I am trying to kick the habit of stopping and previewing renders in A:M when those images could simply pop up (and update) on a screen on another computer every time I save a file in A:M.


Sleep well Matt!

Thought of one exception to the Netrender only workflow:

I believe A:M will prove more effective than Netrender when using A:M Composite.
While I know that Post Effects can be applied to any camera and therefore be used in Netrender I don't know of any direct way to use the actual Composites in Netrender. Exception: A camera with a composite applied to it as a rotoscope should work. (There are some issues there however and I'll need to test further)

AFAIK the only way for Netrender to be A:M Composite-aware is through the Camera's rotoscope, so that'll keep me 'rendering' some shots in A:M.

I don't think this will work. I'm pretty sure Netrender reads in the length of TheBigKahuna.cho when it starts and doesn't consider added frames after that. You'd have to manually reload the chor to have NetRender see new parameters.

I understand and expect what you state is mostly the case. I do hope to see a way or two past that because the whole point of having a program like Netrender is to save time in rendering. I understand that one important part of that is using multiple systems to speed up the process but if we can't automate rendering then that rather defeats the purpose of the whole thing.

In Tools/Options/Customize on the Event Command tab we should be able retask Netrender after a frame or pool is completed rendering.

I suppose that even if this was not an option we should be able to populate Netrender with a long list of proxy jobs whose assets are not yet fully updated in the system. Surely Netrender doesn't read all jobs into memory and then just sit on them.

There is a lot to test here. For instance, if as you state Netrender reads the full length of the cho. file and doesn't consider added frames then we should (theoretically) still be able to swap out the Chor file as long as the number of frames hasn't changed. This seems to me to be an awkward approach because ultimately we don't care how many frames Netrender renders (theoretically it should constantly be rendering) we just want it to keep rendering frames. If it has to wait for us to tell it to add frames... then we potentially become an unnecessary bottleneck in the workflow of Netrender because it will have to wait on us to render frames.

That of course is only one aspect of Netrender and not a deal breaker.
There are many other things I hope to be able to do. One such thing is to start rendering all 'final' sequences to a minimum of two formats (EXR and PNG). The EXR is to maximize image manipulating capability and the PNG is to facilitate file viewing. While I don't know that I will pursue it, it wouldn't be too difficults to set up an html page that automatically displays all PNGs rendered (or every four frames... or every 24 frames... etc.) Before the image exists the html page might display a default image that lets us know that is has not rendered yet. Once in place it then becomes available within the page. Need to share all the rendered images with someone online? After an image is rendered or a pool is finished Netrender can launch a script that will convert files and copy smaller preview imaes to a FTP site or SVN repository so that other people can see the current status of frames rendered visually. Of course this doesn't have to be the actual image, the script can simply instruct the site to record that the image was rendered.

There are of course many things we could do but its usually best to concentrate on those things which we must do.
At a minimum, Netrender should be able to render out several 90 minute movies simultaneously with little or no additional user input outside of the files actually being in place, all systems working and the initial launching Netrender.

I expect a lot don't I?

Giving a user the option to make it their default renderer is fine, but why the "exclusive" bit? Why penalize users who are more comfortable with the existing renderer?

Eh?

This isn't a feature request Mark. It is setting up Netrender and optimizing my personal workflow on my computer(s).
If you are using my computers you will be penalized (mostly by limited RAM and such) but otherwise my settings should have no effect on you.
Of course, you are free to use any methodology that I share at your leisure.
I will accept no credit for discovering optimal rendering solutions however.

Perhaps you read other people's wish fulfillment as my own.
I merely expect to use Netrender as it is currently with some optimizations of my own.

To answer your question though about making Netrender my exclusive renderer I outline that above in another post.
In a way this is doing my due diligence for suggesting Netender be folded over into the standard A:M release many years ago.
I never actually thought Hash Inc would do it. Now that they have I want to make the most of it.

Oops.

This is what happens when you become sleep deprived working in A:M. :-)