#Rendering Service
10 messages in this thread
I have access to 6 pc's that are not used after 5pm. They are running Lantastic
for Windows. The pc's are as follows:
3 486/33 DX with 8MB of RAM and 240MB hard drives
1 486/50 DX with 8MB of RAM and 240MB hard drive
1 486/33 DX with 12MB of RAM and 240MB hard drive
1 486/33 DX with 16MB of RAM and a 1.8GB SCSI hard drive and a 240MB IDE
With the above configurations, do I have the resources to set up a rendering
service for those wishing to perform a lot of rendering with 3D Studio?
If not, what would I need to change or add to the set up to be able to provide
this service? What software would I need?
John Ballenger
Modify all your machines to either DX2-66 minimum or Pentium 90 motherboards
and cpu's. Put 32 megs of ram on each. Each slave should have about 100 megs
free for maps and IPAS locally. the 3DS workstation should have 2 G. free
space minimum. Then have a PAR or MAX for output as well as a single frame
controller with an ATVIsta and a betacam SP edit recorder and a SVHS recorder.
If you charge about 15 cents per frame you should get a bit of the business
that's going to render farm operations such as you propose.
How many machines are recommended? Also if you would, explains some of your
terms such as PAR, MAX, ATVIsta.
John, please don't take offense but I was trying to explain to you in a round
about way that you are not equiped to offer this service and this industry
really doesn't use services like what you have in mind that frequently. By the
nature of your questions you indicate you know very little about this industry
and the equipment in use by today's animators. Therefore you would also have a
tough time selling your services. After all, would you take your car in to a
shop for service if the mechanic didn't know the difference between a car with
carbs and fuel injection? If you said you thought the timing was off and he
responded with "We can get you a new clock from the factory" What would you
think. Running a rendering farm is not a simple process. It takes an intimate
knowledge of networking, memory management, video field order, output video
knowledge and the rendering process, maps, and IPAS management in general. If
you want to learn more about this stuff, hang out here and read every thread.
There is a wealth of learning curve presented right here. The answer to all
your questions have been in threads or down loadable files within the past
week.
Yeah, I see what you're saying. But I would never attempt to get such a
business going without knowing all that went into it. I guess this was just my
feable attempt to attain more information. I may not know very much about the
field of animation right now, but I'm hardly new at computer equipment and
architecture. Anyway, I'm not even close to having the kind of money it would
take to run such a service. I come from a desktop publishing background and I'm
begining to migrate to the 3D animation world. I'm interning at a local
university at their multimedia production & presentation lab. That's where I
get all these crazy ideas. Sorry to appear such the fool, but I guess I'm just
an inquizitive guy.
John:
Just out of curiosity, I'm wondering what University you're at and what you're
learning to do. Since I'm into rendering, I'm trying to find out about a lot
of things.
Thank's,
George
It's the University of Central Oklahoma but there is not a class on
3D rendering or any thing of the sort. I am only doing an internship
where I am helping to create interactive multimedia applications
using authoring software called Macromind Director. Most of our
animation and 3D stuff is done by a guy with a lot of experience in
Strata Pro. All other graphics are done with PhotoShop.
I am learing a little bit here and there from the guys I work with but
nothing major yet.
John:
Sounds like you're headed in the right direction. Just hang in there
and give it your best.
Go Broncos… I used to play football in the early 80's at Central State not
the UCO you now refer to. BTW we do offer rendering service.. Our company can
place up to 100 pentium class machines with up to 128MB of RAM on any one
rendering job. If you have to have it done, and done right! call us.
Thanks Matt
>>Sorry to appear such the fool, but I guess I'm just an inquizitive guy.
No problem, John, A fool you are not, but your naivity of this business
showed. I've heard many talk about doing a night time render farm business with
the employer's computers designed for office stuff and have never heard any
success stories yet. I know about computers too but I wouldn't attempt to
design something like a NOS or a Unix based workstation without first learning
this specialty. One thing I did learn about the animation business is every
major project I get I have to buy some new software or hardware to do it.
There's always some new technology in demand.