[KurtS]

You can now upload a project once and render several views of the same scene!

that's a great improvement!

[jurX]

sounds good!

[RenderFred]

Hi everyone,

two interesting news for RANCH users:

- you can now download your files with your web browser, directly from the RANCH web site. Just go to 'My projects', click on '+more' to open the project details, and click on the 'Web download' link. Very convenient when you do not have a ftp client installed.

- on the technical side, we have again improved our merging algorithms, with a speed increase of no less than +25%! We can now merge 100 x 2 GB MXI files in less than 30 minutes (don't try this at home ).

Fred

[RenderFred]

Following our previous announcement a few days ago (previous post), we have finished our big software and hardware optimizations on the RANCH network. The result went beyond our expectations: a further +33% speed increase for gathering and merging MXIs!

From a practical point of view, it means that we can merge 102 MXI files of 2 GB each in only 20 minutes (or 102 x 1 GB files in 10 minutes, it's fairly linear)! Which means less time is spent in that phase -> and even better prices for short projects (when the render time is >= 1 hour, this phase is free anyway).

Fred

[piem]

I have delayed my plan to buy an even more powerfull station..and an even more powerful again and again.

hyperRanch rocks .

I didn' had big projects for now, but I all I can say is that it's very usefull , especially the draft/ blitz render for stills images < 1024 px / 10 minutes can bring you more or less than SL20/21 for a little bunch of euros.
Very useful for little projects and little bugets.

[Bubbaloo]

Is there any way to re-render a previously uploaded project at a different resolution without having to re-upload it?

I have sent a couple of 10 minute blitzes and if they come back looking the way they should, it is a go for high res renders. Would be nice to be able to skip the upload process. My upload speed at the office is slow...

Parden me if it is already possible and I just don't know how to do it.

[RenderFred]

Is there any way to re-render a previously uploaded project at a different resolution without having to re-upload it?

I have sent a couple of 10 minute blitzes and if they come back looking the way they should, it is a go for high res renders. Would be nice to be able to skip the upload process. My upload speed at the office is slow...

Parden me if it is already possible and I just don't know how to do it.

Watch your phone we are going to call you

[Bubbaloo]

Oops, I am at the office and I gave my home phone number. Perhaps you could pm me or email and we can work it out.

[marked001]

perhaps this has been covered, but i dont see it... how is multilight handled when using the farm? how are adjustments made? thanks! really want to try this for my next project..

[RenderFred]

perhaps this has been covered, but i dont see it... how is multilight handled when using the farm? how are adjustments made? thanks! really want to try this for my next project..

@ marked001,
Very simple, you get the final merged MXI back, so you can do whatever you want with it on your system afterward. That way you will always have the original HDR data available when you need it, even several weeks or months after.

Fred

[marked001]

ah ok..duh.. thanks fred.

[oliver panrok]

cool service . already tried it and i'm very satisfied

cheers . oliver

[RenderFred]

Hi everyone,

just to say that the RANCH is now running with Maxwell 1.7 x64

Fred

[Bubbaloo]

Thanks, I was wondering about that.

[RenderFred]

As you all know, the Sun model in 1.7 is completely different than in previous versions. It means that all the scenes done with 1.5/1.6 and that use the physical sky will also look different (try with 8balls or James in the download section of the Maxwell Render site and you'll see what I mean ).

For this occasion we are going to do new benchmarks, and I thought it would be a good idea if the scenes came from the Maxwell community. So here is what I propose: if you have one or two scenes that you can spare, and that in your opinion could make a good benchmark for the RANCH, contact us by e-mail. If the scene is too big for an e-mail attachment, just tell us and we will created a ftp temp dir for you to upload it.

We will select and publish two scenes for our benchmarks:
- one will be exterior, lighted by the new physical sky
- one will be an indoor global illumination scene

Here are the rules for the scenes submission:
- you can send a maximum of two scenes
- the scene must be sent by the person who created it (of course)
- the scene must be saved / compatible with Maxwell 1.7
- the project must be sent in a pack'n'go archive
- you can submit scenes until June 30, 11:59 PM GMT+1.

The benchmarks will be presented the same way as our current 'Pool' benchmark: one hour render on a single system, vs one hour on the RANCH. The final render will be done in 3K pixels max (width and/or height).

Now the rewards:

- the two winners (one for the outdoor scene, one for the indoor scene) will be offered one hour of render time on the RANCH (worth $232.56).
- the winning scenes will be permanently displayed on our benchmarks page, with of course the name of the author.

If we have many submissions, we may consider opening a gallery to showcase the other scenes, with authors credits of course.

Thanks, and good luck!

Fred