(Resolved) Vrscene / deadline

[tobiasroesli]

Hello,

I found several Bugs or strange behavior.

I use following Vray Version: V-Ray for Houdini number:22132 hash:4344ab5 from 20 Aug 2022 01:37
V-Ray Core 5.20.24 [493f4a2c] from 15 Aug 2022

First Bug:
When I use the Vray Deadline submitter it won't submit any "Command Line Args".
The AWS Submitter does it. (Attachment)

Secound Bug:
If I submit a vrscene to Deadline with the Vray submitter it asks me to put in the ${F} expression into the export name. The thing is that i didn't checked "write seperate files" in the ROP export settings. If I denied it givs me an error.
If i put in the ${FBATCH} it works. But if I export for a secound time it asks me again to put in the ${F} expression ("write seperate files" still not checked).

I think it should ask you to put in the ${F} expression when "Seperate Files" is checked and if it is unchecked it should ask for the ${FBATCH}. And of course it should not ask again if already a expression exists.

Third Bug:
I read the documentation(https://docs.chaos.com/display/VRAYHOUDINI/Export+Tab) about VRSCENES and VDB. My question is am I doing something wrong or is it not the same behaviour with geometry?

I tought you can use Material SOPs, Transform SOPs and Merge SOPs with Pack Disk Primitives? Or am I wrong?

If I now export the Scene as VRSCENE it takes ages to export 40/50 Secs per Frame and it also uses 2 GB of Space per Frame.
Is that a bug or it's me no knowing how to deal with it ?

I think it must be that the transform SOP is animated because Motion Blur is not the Problem. If I make the Transform static it works as expected. Anybody having a workaround?

By the Way, Scene is here and it includes all three bugs:
https://we.tl/t-gVkxP1C0el


Cheers
Tobias

[Gosho.Genchev]

Hey tobiasroesli ,

We implemented the V-Ray Deadline submitter during the V-Ray Beta because ThinkBox had little interest in supporting V-Ray at that point - the software was new and the userbase was low. That changed after a few larger studios picked up V-Ray in Houdini and V-Ray support was added to the Deadline submitter provided by ThinkBox with the Deadline installation.
Ideally, we would like to deprecate the V-Ray Deadline node, and it seems to be the case that most artists have moved over to the submitter shipped by ThinkBox. That works much better for everyone as we are no Deadline specialists - the ThinkBox devs will undoubtedly do a better job than us at supporting their own software.

Is there a particular reason you prefer the submitter coming with V-Ray for Houdini over the 'official' node?

I read the documentation(https://docs.chaos.com/display/VRAYHOUDINI/Export+Tab) about VRSCENES and VDB. My question is am I doing something wrong or is it not the same behaviour with geometry?
I tought you can use Material SOPs, Transform SOPs and Merge SOPs with Pack Disk Primitives? Or am I wrong?

You can use any node with Packed Primitives - the only requirement is to not unpack them. Besides that, anything else is on the table.

I'll take a look at your scene now and get back to you with any findings.

Best regards!

[Gosho.Genchev]

Hey tobiasroesli ,

Looking at the scene at the moment - indeed there seems to be a slowdown caused by the Transform SOPs.
However, the major reason for the slow export speed is the bgeo file - you would find the time to first pixel significantly better if you stick to Alembic for geometry, hair and particles, and VDBs for volumes. BGEO is not a native V-Ray file format and anything cached to disk using it will be written again into the VRScene --> which is the reason for the slow export and large VRScene sizes you are getting.
Simply re-exporting those BGEO files to Alembic will significantly improve your workflow.

Best regards!

[tobiasroesli]

Hello Gosho.Genchev ,

Is there a particular reason you prefer the submitter coming with V-Ray for Houdini over the 'official' node?

No, not really, the point is that the AWS Deadline node is stable and works but some features are not supported which on the other hand work with the Vray Deadline submitter

For example, the Deadline Submitter has an input box for Frames per Task but its not applied when sending. Every Frame has it's own Task. You can make a workaround with submitting the task suspended and then resubmit it within Deadline with the right task size. (Attachement)
AWS Deadline Submitter has also no support for reading the frame range from the ROP. And both have no support for Takes >"Take from ROP".

I'll write to AWS soon for sharing my experiance with Deadline/Vray/Houdini. Maybe they're willing to improve it. Like you said it's hard for Chaos to program a Deadline Submitter without the support of AWS. Makes not so much sense and fun

Simply re-exporting those BGEO files to Alembic will significantly improve your workflow.

That's mindblowing I made some quick tests and it's really so much faster, thanks for the tipp!!!

Cheers!