Different render results from remote slave versus workstation slave

[gfmarsh]

I have a problem where I am getting a slight difference in in the overall lightness/darkness of a CPU render animation result from a network render from a remote slave versus the workstation or host slave/pc. This does not occur in a DR render only in a batch render through both Backburner or Deadline. It almost appears as a gamma difference, but I get the same bad result rendering a PNG or an EXR. They two machines are fairly decent dual Xeons, and have not noticed differences in the past using different programs/engines. I have tried to send the Color Mapping gamma with the file, which still does not correct it (I've read that doesn't work in a network render anyhow). I get the same result rendering Brute Force + Light Cache, along with a baked GI Irradiance Map with a baked Light Cache, and I still have the same issue. File is an Xgen fur scene. The difference between files is slight but it is enough to cause a strobe in the animation.

[vlado]

Would it be possible to get us a (potentially simplified) setup that has this issue?

Best regards,
Vlado

[gfmarsh]

Thanks Vlado. I just figured it out looking at the render slave logs. I could see the wrong file path for it. One of my textures never got exported correctly when I archive exported the scene (actually there were a few them but thought I fixed them all). I went through the file with the file path editor and cleaned up the reference asset character as well. I guess if those file aren't in their proper project folder they won't export properly. I am new to Maya and Vray, so beginner mistakes I guess. Glad I figured it out as I spent all day trying different solutions. Thanks anyway.

One quick question, do I use the Optimize Scene function to get rid of old render engine nodes that are no longer associated with the file?

[yolov]

It doesn't sound like optimize scene would do any good for this case, but I might be wrong. It will just compact the scene file by removing any unused nodes or node history, but it won't resolve any path issues, I think.

Although in a perfect case, you would have all of your paths resolved (with the filepath editor), I think the "archive scene" option creates a folder structure that is not always resolved correctly relatively to the workspace.

You can use the VRAY_ASSETS_PATH environment variable to list paths where VRay should look for an asset it can't load from the path provided by maya. You can list as many paths in the variable as necessary and VRay will look there. The only drawback is that it won't look into folders within folders, so if for example you specify VRAY_ASSETS_PATH=<assets_folder> but the assets_folder also contains another folder, you'll have to pass both paths to the variable. See here for more information: https://docs.chaosgroup.com/display/...ndRenderAssets

This should save you the trouble of opening the scene and editing the paths. Do you think that would help?

[Morbid Angel]

gfmarsh - make sure your maya versions are the exact same number on all machines. Same goes for vray, but being xgen this is most likely the case.

[gfmarsh]

Hi Alex. It wasn't too big of a deal to to correct the file path once I knew about it. I will look into the VRAY_ASSETS_PATH environment variable.

Yes. All version are the same Dmitry. Thanks.