Vray Standalone and PhoenixFD with Deadline

[tim_luecker]

Hi there
We started to work with Vray6.1 and PhoenixFD for Max 22 with Windows, using Deadline 10.2.0.9

Currently the idea is to keep as much as possible in a centralized workflow. Vray6.1 runs fine with Deadline but my initial test with using Phoenix had no luck.
Submitting a .vrscene will trigger the render but reports of the missing phoenix ocean texture:




We tried to load the the phoenixfd_vray.dll with the extra vray_plugin environment variable, and also placed it to the bin/plugins/ folder so it would get picked up.

Can anyone guide us how to submit a vray standalone submission that also works with the phoenix ocean texture for example ?
I would like to avoid having to install any version on any blade and rather have it getting pulled from the server if needed.
So far i can not see any standalone for phoenix just workstation version.

Also how would i trigger in the same way a simulation ? Do i point Deadline to the simulation.exe ?
Sorry i looked for hours in the manual together with our TD but we could not find a clear explanation/scenario.

Thank you for any tips !
Cheers

[Svetlin.Nikolov]

Hey, sounds like you have the wrong dll - you need vray_phoenix.dll for the V-Ray standalone. phoenixfd_vray.dll is used only when running V-Ray inside of 3ds Max.

Phoenix's installation should place vray_phoenix.dll in C:\Program Files\Chaos Group\Phoenix FD\3ds Max 20XX for x64\vray6plugins - in order to make sure rendering with the V-Ray standalone works correctly, you need all files from this directory. By default, for a 3ds Max installation, Phoenix appends VRAY_FOR_3DSMAX20XX_PLUGINS with this path, so you may add it to VRAY_PLUGINS if you are using that with a custom installation.

These dlls must be available on the remove machine just like the V-Ray dlls. Phoenix no longer has a "standalone" installation - it always does a full install. The extra install version was just one more thing to get wrong and the number of files is not so different between the full and reduced versions anyway. Also, now there is Phoenix Standalone Simulator and Phoenix plugin for the V-Ray Standalone renderer, so this could create unneeded confusion during a custom install.

There is also a way to render using V-Ray standalone Without installing Phoenix - from the Phoenix Atmosphere settings (https://docs.chaos.com/display/PHX4M...phere+Settings) you could choose to export as a V-Ray VolumeGrid to vrscenes, which would use the Phoenix code in V-Ray's vray_phxshader.dll, which is analogous to Phoenix's vray_phoenix.dll. The difference is that if you are using older V-Ray and newer Phoenix, you won't be able to use the new Phoenix features, but otherwise it's much more portable. Since you are using latest official Phoenix and V-Ray versions, maybe this could be a better option for you?


As for submitting Phoenix simulations via Deadline, there are several ways - please check here:
https://docs.chaos.com/display/PHX4M...+a+GUI+License
and here:
https://docs.chaos.com/display/PHX4M...ine+Simulation

We also did some improvements and fixes to the Deadline simulation submission, so if you want to use that, please grab a latest nightly build from here instead of the official 5.10: https://nightlies.chaos.com/#/phoeni...ghtly/20230429

Hope this helps make thing a little clearer, cheers!

[tim_luecker]

Hey Svetlin
thanks for the quick reply. Yes it was the incorrect dll.
I was unable to find this specific info in any of the manuals ? Would you be able to add it to it ?
We changes it and it now works fine !

Thanks again

[Svetlin.Nikolov]

Hey, thank you! Added the env var info to this page: https://docs.chaos.com/display/PHX4M...trary+Location