Octane 2024.1.2 - Network Rendering

[LFedit]

After along time away from using Network Rendering, I am going to be setting up our network rendering network again. Anything anyone can offer as far as suggestions, performance, stability etc? When I last used network rendering we had a lot of problems with nodes locking up and not saving frames and essentially crashing the render. I moved to Team Rendering, but required a lot of licenses. This however we fairly stable and efficient. Just curious if anyone can comment on the state of network rendering currently in the latest stable releases. Thanks.

[bepeg4d]

Hi,
I'm using Network rendering in multi platform environment without issues everyday!

Please note that only the Primary machine is saving the results, Render-Node machines are used only for calculating the current frame.

What is important is to have enough VRAM on Render-Nodes, compared to the Primary machine.

Please, keep us informed on your progress.

ciao,
Beppe

[LFedit]

Thanks bepeg4d.

I'm running into "No OCIO config loaded". Do I need to launch the standalone on each computer to enable this?

[frankmci]

As a data point others might find useful, I just started fooling around with network rendering between an M4 Mac Mini with a 10 core GPU, 32 GB RAM and a single Windows PC with a 4090 in it. So far I've been lazy and only used wi-fi, so the render startup lag for the render node on heavy scenes is as noticeable as you'd expect. Still, the test scene I've been using goes from taking 06:39 per frame with the Mini alone, to 00:32 with the PC render node contributing, even with several seconds of lag before the 4090 kicks in.
Not too shabby.

I'll certainly have to do more testing before I make any hardware/software recommendations to the rest of the animation team, but it may finally be possible to move several of our folks back to Mac OS for C4D/Octane work. Compared to this Mini using an M4, I'm guessing a MacBook Pro running an M4 Max 32 core GPU would be a perfectly usable mobile 3D workstation, and plenty powerful in a networked rendering environment.

One caveat: we are all still running C4D 2023.x, and I haven't tested Octane Mac/PC network rendering with any newer versions. I'm guessing that later this year we will make the move to both C4D and Octane 2024.x and lock in a new pipeline for another year or two.

[LFedit]

Thanks for the feedback framkmci, I think based on my testing I'm going to need to look into team render again. Network rendering does work for long renders, mostly for stills stills. It just isn't contributing enough to render times for animations. It's an expensive option though, is there a headless render option for this specific use case?

[bepeg4d]

Hi,

Happy New Year to everyone!

WiFi connection is not good, it has too much latency, you need at least 10Gbit Ethernet connection between Mac and PCs for animations.

ciao,
Beppe

[LFedit]

i'm using a 10gig network. Network rendering scales quite well when longer render times are needed. But for shorter renders, there's a lot of node downtime when updated frames and saving the file. It's just hard to justify an extra $230 a year per node. I have 11 nodes.

[bepeg4d]

i'm using a 10gig network. Network rendering scales quite well when longer render times are needed. But for shorter renders, there's a lot of node downtime when updated frames and saving the file. It's just hard to justify an extra $230 a year per node. I have 11 nodes.

Weird, please make sure that "Minimize Net traffic" option is disabled in Kernel panel.

ciao,
Beppe

[boxfx]

Can you elaborate on this? Why would a user disable minimize net traffic?

[bepeg4d]

Hi,
"Minimize net traffic" works well with slow network connections, or if Render-Nodes have different network interface speed.

If all your nodes have the same good network interface speed like 10Gbit Ethernet, better to disable thee option, in my experience.

ciao,
Beppe