Rendering Services

[ddustin]

I like a lot of people on the forum, have a render farm.

There are times where it sits idle.

 

Is there an interest in people on the forum to contract/rent/barter for rendering services?

 

Seems to me (reminds me of an old James Gang Song), there was some discusion about this a couple of years ago, and it didn't go anywhere.

 

For those of you that don't know, a render farm greatly decreases your render time as the farm distributes your frames across the slaves and deposits them in a central location. The files are rendered out as .tga frames only (till V12 comes online), all audio work has to be done seperately.

 

All files could be transfered back and forth between you and me, via ftp, on one of my sites.

 

Just a thought, might as well use them.

Let me know what you think.

Thanks,

David

[dimos]

Not yet, but I know in the future (hopefully soon) I would probably need assistance in this area.

 

Dimos

[D.Joseph Design]

I'm still developing my own sales plan for this. Realize, thought, that there is an extra burden of spotting the NetRender oddities (like particles, reflections, and light flares).

[Flog]

I will definately need your assistance later, and will help you advertise as well when I'm done with my animation and ready to render.

 

[D.Joseph Design]

Here's a basic concept of what I may do. RenderMuscle, which used to be the only A:M render farm, normally charges about $2 per hour per computer. Commercial places can be almost twice that. I'm thinking of charging between 50¢ and $1 per hour per computer plus a setup fee.

 

But personal projects are often low-priority (to the client) and very slack deadline. Obviously, Average Joe can't afford $2,000 for a five-minute animation. For these, I would probably reduce the price. Basically, a tiered system based upon urgency.

 

Thoughts?

 

On something like this where David and I would be offering identical services, I really don't want to create competition. So maybe he, I, and anyone else with a large render farm, should collaborate to share clients or take turns. That's the socialist idea.

 

Or we could just battle it out in economics. That would be the capitalist idea.

 

BTW, do you know the difference between communism and capitalism? Communism is one man taking advantage of another. Capitalism, however, is the other way around.

[Gaijin]

Daniel,

 

Having a sliding rate based on deadline urgency is a very workable concept. I've been commissioning artwork for one of my fanfics from a very talented young lady in Singapore, and that's exactly the sort of fee structure we've agreed on. If I ask for a "no deadline" job she charges considerably less than if I ask for "be done in XX weeks". The "no deadline" jobs allow her to fill any idle time between other paying commissions she's working on that *DO* have tight schedules and the low-pri jobs are subject to being bumped when something hot is dumped in her lap.

 

The only thing I have of concern in trying to address the hobbyist market for rendering is that you may find your minimum fee after setup charges is too high even at your lowest level. This is especially true when you consider that most folks seeking the personal/hobbyist prices won't have a good grasp on how long a render pass would take, and I serious doubt that anyone would be willing to sign what is basically a blank check for the services. Asking a hobbyist to commit for payment based on "finish until it's done, then charge for hours" is very much akin to taking you car into a shop for repair work and authorizing the shop to "fix it" without insisting on a firm estimate. Guaranteed to leave you with unhappy customers.

 

I would think that a more workable fee structure for the hobbyist market would be based on the number of minutes of animation output requested instead of the amount of computing time used. You'll end up averaging plus or minus on actual comp time spent versus what you charge, but it would be a fee structure the customer could easily understand and allow for in costing.

[ddustin]

Here's a basic concept of what I may do. RenderMuscle, which used to be the only A:M render farm, normally charges about $2 per hour per computer. Commercial places can be almost twice that. I'm thinking of charging between 50¢ and $1 per hour per computer plus a setup fee.

 

But personal projects are often low-priority (to the client) and very slack deadline. Obviously, Average Joe can't afford $2,000 for a five-minute animation. For these, I would probably reduce the price. Basically, a tiered system based upon urgency.

 

Thoughts?

 

On something like this where David and I would be offering identical services, I really don't want to create competition. So maybe he, I, and anyone else with a large render farm, should collaborate to share clients or take turns. That's the socialist idea.

 

Or we could just battle it out in economics. That would be the capitalist idea.

 

BTW, do you know the difference between communism and capitalism? Communism is one man taking advantage of another. Capitalism, however, is the other way around.

Daniel,

I agree with your concept.

It's not my idea to rake anyone over, just thought I might as well use the hardware when I don't need it for my stuff.

 

Actually I was just mentioning to one of my project collaborators today that I should look into purchasing more render slaves, as it almost always seems like the renders aren't completed fast enough.

 

What ever we agree on for a scale is fine, and Emergency jobs would use a sliding scale.

 

Shoot me an email or private message and we can kick it around.

 

Forum note: I don't think this qualifies as price fixing, just making sure our time is worth something.

 

Too bad we can't link up our services, to really provide some horse power.

We'd probably set quite a few network timeouts though.

 

There would need to be a consistant file structure maintained, to eliminate lost files when setting up.

 

David

[ddustin]

The only thing I have of concern in trying to address the hobbyist market for rendering is that you may find your minimum fee after setup charges is too high even at your lowest level. This is especially true when you consider that most folks seeking the personal/hobbyist prices won't have a good grasp on how long a render pass would take, and I serious doubt that anyone would be willing to sign what is basically a blank check for the services. Asking a hobbyist to commit for payment based on "finish until it's done, then charge for hours" is very much akin to taking you car into a shop for repair work and authorizing the shop to "fix it" without insisting on a firm estimate. Guaranteed to leave you with unhappy customers.

 

I don't think averaging is a good way to go.

 

Someone will want 5 passes where others will want 50.

it needs to be according to how much time the hardware is tied up.

 

Something that renders in 15 minutes per frame can't be charged the same as one that takes 3.

 

You would need to provide an approximate time as to how long one frame takes on your own system by rendering one frame. then give your system specs and do some rough comparison.

Have a not to exceed price, and communicate as to the progress of the rendering.

 

We would need to have some sort of agreement to not use someones models without their permission. Which leads me to the barter approach.

 

In my case I'm always looking for models to use for my forensic animations.

if the project involves some nice models, we could work out an agreement where we could use a model a certain number of times for projects (honor system I guess).

 

Nuff from me

[D.Joseph Design]

We've got some great ideas going in here!

 

I would think that a more workable fee structure for the hobbyist market would be based on the number of minutes of animation output requested instead of the amount of computing time used. You'll end up averaging plus or minus on actual comp time spent versus what you charge, but it would be a fee structure the customer could easily understand and allow for in costing.

 

Yes, the hobbyist is the concern. Because I want to help Mr. A:M Guy out there, but I realistically can't afford large amounts of time.

 

Maybe a mix between render time and play time is calculated more on passes. So a one-minute animation at 30 FPS, one pass (1,800 frames) would cost the same as a 1.2-second animation at 30 FPS, 25 passes ( 1,800 frames).

 

But that still may not be realistic because in my previous Creation Museum logo animation for Answers in Genesis, some frames took 26 hours to render because of the complex particles, reflections, and 16 passes.

 

Too bad we can't link up our services, to really provide some horse power.

We'd probably set quite a few network timeouts though.

 

Actually, I have done this. With my render server and farm at the offices, I can VPN over a broadband connection and then my computer shows as a client to the server. But the speed and reliability of connection could be in question.

 

In some cases, maybe some of us "farmers" could also lower the price if the client agrees to include a "rendered by ____" thing at the beginning and/or end of their video. Basically giving us advertising.

 

But how about some words from "Flog," Dimos, or anyone else that needs a farm to render? Describe your projects (length, resolution, FPS, passes, how many lights, detail, etc.) and we can make "virtual bids" (but not at all representing actual quotes) to see how reasonable they seem for either commercial or hobbyist application.

[heyvern]

I can see the need for this for me... in the future... when I get to a point where I need to pump out frames quicker than my machines can handle.

 

Unfortunately... you would need a lot of people like me to keep this kind of thing going as a "business".

 

If it is just rendering during spare time... and not a specific stand alone business model... then... you might still be around when I need you.

 

There was someone else on the forum who had offered this service in the past. I basically said the same thing... I would need this in the future at some point... here I am no closer to "needing" but still like the option. I don't know what happened to this other person. I do recall that several people did use his rendering services.

 

Sort of like... I don't buy enough light bulbs often enough to keep GE in business... but a lot of others need light bulbs besides me... so... I know I can get them when I do need them.

 

Vernon "!" Zehr

[luckbat]

All right, I'll bite. I've got a 24-fps animation that I estimate will be about 3000 frames in length, to be rendered at DVD resolution. Let's imagine I need a base pass with alpha (30 seconds per frame), a shadow pass (1 min per frame), a highlight pass (1 min per frame), a toon-lines pass (3 min per frame). I also need 30 camera shots rendered as still images for the backgrounds (25x multipass, 60 minutes per still). Finally, a few moving background shots--let's say 500 frames' worth--rendered at final quality (10 min per frame).

 

Output to be delivered as targas, each render in its own folder.

 

My math says that'll take about 388 hours or so. Hardly an epic undertaking, but still a bit more than my laptop can handle. What would you say your virtual bid might be for a project like that?

[Nosferatu]

I will most definitely need one of your services as I'm working on a commercial 30 minute children's video.

 

I'm assuming that you both have different capabilities depending on your available hardware. How many PCs do each of you have "down on the farm"?

 

Nos

[D.Joseph Design]

I've got a 24-fps animation that I estimate will be about 3000 frames in length, to be rendered at DVD resolution. Let's imagine I need a base pass with alpha (30 seconds per frame), a shadow pass (1 min per frame), a highlight pass (1 min per frame), a toon-lines pass (3 min per frame). I also need 30 camera shots rendered as still images for the backgrounds (25x multipass, 60 minutes per still). Finally, a few moving background shots--let's say 500 frames' worth--rendered at final quality (10 min per frame).

 

Those are not a few numbers! Those are a lot of numbers! I'll think about it later when I can ... think. But if your job is still a combined ~400 hours on my farm, and you need the job within a week, I'd charge $250–$500 including a setup fee. ... I think. And if project doesn't have problems and I only render during the week, then I'd estimate a two- or three-day turnaround.

 

If it is just rendering during spare time... and not a specific stand alone business model... then... you might still be around when I need you.

 

I think that's the case for both David and I. We both have a bunch of computers in our respective offices and we have permission (at least I do ) and access to use them for rendering. That's my whole reason behind the "Nights & Weekends" name is because that's when I can use the systems—when the other employees are gone.

 

Something that we should definitely do is collectively write a "Preparing your project for NetRender" guide that points out NetRender's oddities (like particles with multipass motion blur, reflections, light flares, etc.), workarounds (if there are any), things to check in the rendered frames (like color blotches), how to compile the project and it's relevant files, and how to reduce render times and thus render cost.

 

A render farm submission form would also be a good idea.

[luckbat]

That sounds like a pretty good turnaround for a non-"rush" job. Thanks for the estimate.

[ZachBG]

OK, I'll bite.

 

My Cell-Phone film--once I find time to tweak some of the animation--is about five and a half minutes. DV rez at 24 fps, 16 pass for the motion blur, but no special passes needed, and no special effects except for one volumetric effect in one scene. Each scene is a separate choreography, total of about ten or so, probably. All the post effects (film grain, B&W) are done with QT Pro, so no need to consider that.

 

If it were to get accepted at a film festival (which I would describe as "possible but unlikely"), it would be a SERIOUS rush job--like, as fast as you can go.

[ddustin]

Daniel,

From what I remember of your setup you have 16 AMD Pc's and 3 or 4 Mac's.

You can use this on nights and weekends. That number may have grown.

 

My farm is currently comprised of 8 machines.

4 dedicated machines and 4 (nights and weekends). I plan, as finances allow, to add more slaves, partly because I'm a horsepower junkie and I like to render my stuff out ASAP. Plus... the lawyers I work with are always wanting last minute changes to a sequence that took 18 hours to render.

 

Vern,

It's not my intention to make this a business; it's just an extension of of my existing business. I consider it an additional service like web design, video editing etc. So hopefully I'll "be here" when/if you need me. Daniel is part of a larger company and from what I see of his work, is extremely talented, and not in jeopardy of "being encouraged to pursue other employment".

 

Daniel is more savvy than I as to the more complicated renders involving post effects and the like, and you the hi-end user would be better served using him, until I have the need to cultivate those areas (you know... you learn what you need, when you need it).

 

My farm is in my studio, my studio is in my home (yes I work from home, zero commute... wha hoooo), which means I monitor it most of the 24 hours, check it in the middle of the night, when I can't sleep etc..

 

ZachBG,

let me crunch the numbers quickly, and I can shoot you some info as my farm is open right now (doing video editing for a lawyer... yuck). You mentioned you had to tweak some of the animation, that implies there are some thats ready to go now.

You also haven’t mentioned your position on the bartering approach.

 

To all...

Like Daniel, I also want to be able to help anyone in need, golden rule kind of thing.... (I always ask my self, what's the RIGHT thing to do in this situation)

 

David

[ddustin]

OK, I'll bite.

 

My Cell-Phone film--once I find time to tweak some of the animation--is about five and a half minutes. DV rez at 24 fps, 16 pass for the motion blur, but no special passes needed, and no special effects except for one volumetric effect in one scene. Each scene is a separate choreography, total of about ten or so, probably. All the post effects (film grain, B&W) are done with QT Pro, so no need to consider that.

 

If it were to get accepted at a film festival (which I would describe as "possible but unlikely"), it would be a SERIOUS rush job--like, as fast as you can go.

Zach,

 

Check my math..

 

5.5 minutes of animation at 24 fps = 7920 frames.

 

I guessed, based on your description, that my tractors (render machines) would take about 8 - 10 minutes per frame for 16 passes.

 

With dedicating 5 machines to the task 24/7 it will take about 9 days to render.

I can augment that with the remaining machines in the evenings, to reduce that time by about 1/4.

 

But either way I come up with over 1000 hrs of rendertime.

At the low end of the suggested formula (50 cents/hr), that's over $500 to render this out. Not including a setup fee.

 

The busnessman in me says charge what you can get (and my electricity bills are pretty high), but the good guy in me says.. what can you afford... (or trade)?

 

Still (if my math is right), 1000 hours is 1000 hours.

Daniel, feel free to chime in here anytime.

 

Email me at ddustin@dustinproductions.com so we can kick it around.

We're both on the East Coast, so we're on the same time.

 

The farm is open right now ( hope that doesn't sound like a sales pitch).

 

David

[zandoriastudios]

David,

I'm open to the "barter" approach But I don't have anything to render right now.

[dimos]

Ok,

 

I haven't read this post for a while so I re-read the entire thing and here I go.....

 

In some cases, maybe some of us "farmers" could also lower the price if the client agrees to include a "rendered by ____" thing at the beginning and/or end of their video. Basically giving us advertising.

 

I would totally do this. Especially if it lowered the price. I think it's only fair.

 

But how about some words from "Flog," Dimos, or anyone else that needs a farm to render? Describe your projects (length, resolution, FPS, passes, how many lights, detail, etc.) and we can make "virtual bids" (but not at all representing actual quotes) to see how reasonable they seem for either commercial or hobbyist application.

 

At the moment I can't really say exactly when I plan to use any rendering services, just that I am in the process of getting myself to the place where I would need these services. Like Vern said I really like having the option but don't need it right now.

 

Something that we should definitely do is collectively write a "Preparing your project for NetRender" guide that points out NetRender's oddities (like particles with multipass motion blur, reflections, light flares, etc.), workarounds (if there are any), things to check in the rendered frames (like color blotches), how to compile the project and it's relevant files, and how to reduce render times and thus render cost.

 

A render farm submission form would also be a good idea.

 

This would be more than a good idea. At least it will help explain the basic needs, demands and/or wishes of all concerned parties, I guess. I like this idea a lot.

 

As far as bartering goes, well for any personal projects I'd be happy to see what I can do (can't make any promises), but for commercial work I can't see this as being done due to copyrights and so on.

 

Just my 2.43349 cents CAD (equivalent to 2 cents USD, and yes I had to look that up)

 

Dimos

[D.Joseph Design]

From what I remember of your setup you have 16 AMD Pc's and 3 or 4 Mac's.

You can use this on nights and weekends. That number may have grown.

 

Yes, it's grown. I have 8 almost-24/7-dedicated AMD 64s (they're training PCs), something like 16 AMD ~2800s, and 12 Pentium 4 2.0~3.0 GHz. I haven't setup A:M 12 yet, so I don't even know if I can use our 10-or-so G5s. And so far, I have not seen any problems going across CPUs, only pool entrance issues with some scenes (I can explain this if you want).

 

So what are others thinking about the estimates so far? Too high? "Too low"?

[ddustin]

 

So what are others thinking about the estimates so far? Too high? "Too low"?

Oh Oh.... silence

[luckbat]

D. Joseph quoted me $250-$500 for a 400-hour render. Coupled with a 2/3-day turnaround, that seems reasonable to me. My personal preference would be to pay less money for a longer turnaround (as I'm under no deadlines for this project), but given my other alternatives, the estimate strikes me as perfectly reasonable.

 

The low-end 50-cent-per-render-minute figure, I wouldn't even think twice about. A thousand hours is over 40 days of continuous rendering. The ability to avoid that seems well worth $500, especially if there's a film festival in the balance.

[ddustin]

OK,

First thing I do is make sure the file structure follows some simple (very simple) protocols:

 

Use one directory to hold everything, that directory should have subdirectories under it for:

Models

Images

Materials

Actions

 

(You can name the Directories whatever you want, the approach above was suggested on the forum, and I adopted it).

 

 

This approach allows me to drop a folder from anyone into the directory I use on my render server, and have it work with out issue.

 

What you don't want is your project with files from all over your computer.

Yes you can "imbed all", but I've seen it work and not work.

 

Go through your project and remove any images you no longer need, like rotoscopes etc.

 

Materials: I copy the material from say the CD using explorer into the materials directory before I add it to the project.

 

There are more I'm sure I'll remember as the coffe kicks in.

 

I have had a lot of problems using AM Enhanced and Dark Tree. They give my slaves fits.

 

David

[ddustin]

More thoughts on requirments,

 

Detailed instructions as to what the client wants:

Choreography name

Camera Name

Frame range for the choreography.

Final Render quality

Number of passes

Shadows on/of

Reflections on/off

Particles/hair on/off

 

Determine how often the client would like to see a rendered frame. Many times I compress the frames into a .mov or .mpg file so the client can see how the animation flows in real time, you'd be surprised how many times, I've been told to "stop the presses".

 

David

[ZachBG]

$500 seems eminently reasonable. That doesn't mean I have it to spend...

 

I wish you had offered these services when I was frantically attempting to render Soap Opera at full-rez. It took a month and a half for Jeff Lee and I to do it all... and I only made the deadline for the fest I was entering by ONE DAY...

[Mr. Jaqe]

Garrr, I think it's a great idea! I may not be using the service in a few, eh... some years, but still, I would love to have it as an opportunity!

[ddustin]

$500 seems eminently reasonable. That doesn't mean I have it to spend...

 

I wish you had offered these services when I was frantically attempting to render Soap Opera at full-rez. It took a month and a half for Jeff Lee and I to do it all... and I only made the deadline for the fest I was entering by ONE DAY...

Zach,

 

What can you afford (you can email the details)?

 

Do you have anything to barter?

 

A combination perhaps? Surely a tallented young man like you has models or other talents he can offer.

 

Sorry I wasn't available at the time of your Soap Opera days.

 

I guess someone could get real creative and set up a paypal payment plan...

Oh.... P.P.P.

 

The farm is likely to be available for the next 4 or 5 days, then it will be crunching lawyer stuff, off and on so....

 

David

[D.Joseph Design]

I'm at Creation Mega Conference in Lynchburg, Virginia, right now (free evening sessions if anyone wants to meet me), so I can't test anything on my farm or upgrade it for about a week.

[ddustin]

There seems to have been recent interest in "farming" some rendering projects so I thought it would be good to refresh this tread.

 

Hope all is well with everyone concerned!!.

 

David

[kuep]

Is there anything that cant be rendered out on the render farm. Particles, ect.

[ddustin]

Particles can be rendered, in fact most of my own projects have particles.

 

Some times there are issues, and hair has a few known problems as well (jitter).

 

I'm still running 11.1i for stability.

There are plenty of reported issues with V12, that I don't have time to work around (no offence to the Hash crew, who's working hard to perfect it).

 

David

[D.Joseph Design]

Hash has already notified me that they fixed one of the major particle problems in NR 12.0. But I haven't had time to test it lately.