sharing Irradiance map in distributed rendering?

[appius]

is it possible? as far as i tried it wasn't using max5. what about using max6?
thx

[deneb26]

hi appius

yes it's possible, you can use a saved ir-map for dr.
just setup your pc's the right way.

greez
ale

[appius]

well, according to the manual : "Rendering scenes with irradiance maps may not be very productive as the irradiance map calculations are not distributed. Each render server calculates its own irradiance map so it may not be very efficient as the rendering time itself may take much less time than the preparation of the irradiance map"
how do you get it work?

[deneb26]

that's true, you can't disribute the 'calculation' of the irmap,
but surely you can 'share' it accross the 'render-farm'.

ale

[UBIKmh]

Yes, but there's no DR in MAX6, is there?

Marc

[appius]

opening the temp max file the server uses, i guess i see the error. the path to the irradiance map refers to a local one, that of the client. wherever i put it it remains the local client path.. how do i solve it?

[appius]

about max 6 and the distributed rendering:
http://www.chaoticdimension.com/foru...uted+rendering

[appius]

damn! got it!
i've to put the browse to the mshome in order to get a path like this:
\computer1SharedDocsirradiance.vrmap

ahrem...

[cgrande]

so how exaclty do you make all your slaves see a precalculated irridiance map (.vrmap)? I entered the path in 'From file:' but my other machines dont see the vrmap and render black. What exactly are you referring to by mshome? Can all the servers use a presaved irradiance map?

[RErender]

He is refering to the UNC path like "\\ComputerName\sharedfolder\imap.vrmap" One way to get this path is by browsing through mshome xp? or mynetworkplaces in nt/xppro

[cgrande]

I actually tried this before. Using Windows 2000 pro but doesnt work for Distributed rendering. To test it I just turn on a networked slave but it renders black! Nothing there because it cant find the irradiance map. The local machine I'm working on is the only one that renders fine even with this path.
I'm also unsure about rendering animations across many machines. If this doesnt work this way, I'm sure that wont work either.

This is what I did. BOXX03 is the name of the computer the map is on. Searched using My Network Places. The vrmap is on the desktop of that computer.

- Vray:: Advanced irradiance map parameters
- From file: (Browse using My Network Places)
\Boxx03Desktop est.vrmap

Doesnt work on any computers just renders black.

[cgrande]

Doing further tests, we found that the the computers only recognize their local drives even if you use a UNC path. We found this out because we're just using UNC paths now but a specific computer will render correctly with the map only if the map is in its local drive. We did this and rendered with only the computer sending the DR stuff and it did not render.
Is this a bug? We've been network rendering for a while with 8 systems and never had this problem. You would think that a UNC path is fool proof. Really dont know what the deal is. All computer sshow up in ANY My Network Places on any machine. Furthermore, some network drives are named the same with the same drive letter. Meaning, if we have a drive named 'renderings' as Drive letter R: its mapped the same on all the machines.

[Dynedain]

Doing further tests, we found that the the computers only recognize their local drives even if you use a UNC path. We found this out because we're just using UNC paths now but a specific computer will render correctly with the map only if the map is in its local drive. We did this and rendered with only the computer sending the DR stuff and it did not render.
Is this a bug? We've been network rendering for a while with 8 systems and never had this problem. You would think that a UNC path is fool proof. Really dont know what the deal is. All computer sshow up in ANY My Network Places on any machine. Furthermore, some network drives are named the same with the same drive letter. Meaning, if we have a drive named 'renderings' as Drive letter R: its mapped the same on all the machines.

the vrmap needs to be in a shared directory on one of the machines, ie:

\MachineNameShareNamefolderfile.vrmap

AND if you have that many machines, the share folder should be on a machine running a server OS, not workstation - there's a limit to the number of "connections" that win2k and xp workstation support

[cgrande]

10 machines is the limit for windows, dont need a server quite yet for this network but this test is on 2 machines! not all of our machines and the problem is obviously not a windows file sharing problem because as I said, using UNC path the local machine cannot find the vrmap if its on another computer and we have rendered over the network before. Trust me. We have windows server on our farm but we're just testing vray for now.

Can I get an authority to answer on this problem?

Like I said many times already in the 'From file' area of the irradiance map parameters we have entered to location of our vrmap.



Boxx03 = computer on our network
vray = shared folder on that machine that is visible on ALL machines
test.vrmap = vray irradiance map inside that vray folder.

Directory was located using the following method:

My Network Places
Computers Near Me
Boxx03
vray

Lastly, disregard the fact that we have 8 machines. the test was done only on one machine on our network. Also, we're doing DR on Boxx03 so if we turn on that server in the Manager Settings window it works but if turn on another machine, that one renders without the map. If we put the file on another machine using UNC universal naming convention, Boxx03 cant find it but the machine we put it on can.

[Dynedain]

make sure the user that the vray spawner process (or max netrender service) is running as has the appropriate permissions