arnold

[pixelmolkerei]

Hi

im wondering about arnold:

do i have to buy additional batchrender licenses for each workstation to be able to batch render?

we have 5 Workstations with maya

and 7 renderslaves in the network

that would end in 13150 euros additional costs???

or do i understand something wrong?

Thank you for clarification

thorsten

[pixelmolkerei]

Hi

im wondering about arnold:

do i have to buy additional batchrender licenses for each workstation to be able to batch render?

we have 5 Workstations with maya

and 7 renderslaves in the network

that would end in 13150 euros additional costs???

or do i understand something wrong?

Thank you for clarification

thorsten

[Christoph_Schaedl]

thats it, yes... 

but i would contact solidangle... 

or take a look for other render engines...

[Christoph_Schaedl]

thats it, yes... 

but i would contact solidangle... 

or take a look for other render engines...

[tl]

When you say contact SolidAngle you mean Autodesk right?

Many a MentalRay user is going to be royally furious at this cash grab. I'm one of them.

[tl]

When you say contact SolidAngle you mean Autodesk right?

Many a MentalRay user is going to be royally furious at this cash grab. I'm one of them.

[Christoph_Schaedl]

no... Solid is still doing the support for Arnold...

and i would wait for mental ray... they are cooking something...

[Christoph_Schaedl]

no... Solid is still doing the support for Arnold...

and i would wait for mental ray... they are cooking something...

[tl]

Yeah I signed up to the Nvidia Beta.

Personally I'm really annoyed MR has been removed from Maya 2017 and replaced without a distributed default renderer.

My only option is to not upgrade if I want to render on all my machines. I don't think that makes a great motivation to remain on maintenance.

[tl]

Yeah I signed up to the Nvidia Beta.

Personally I'm really annoyed MR has been removed from Maya 2017 and replaced without a distributed default renderer.

My only option is to not upgrade if I want to render on all my machines. I don't think that makes a great motivation to remain on maintenance.

[slimboJoe]

Keep in mind that a first release is usually not a good idea to use in production.  Best practice is to stay where you're at until a few service packs come down the line.  Things may change with the Arnold batch render situation by then.  Who knows...

[slimboJoe]

Keep in mind that a first release is usually not a good idea to use in production.  Best practice is to stay where you're at until a few service packs come down the line.  Things may change with the Arnold batch render situation by then.  Who knows...

[dgorsman]

Exactly.  And given its very recent release it shouldn't be put into production without a few weeks worth of internal testing.  Plus, there is no mandatory/must-do upgrade with new releases - if it doesn't suit your needs, then keep using what you got.  Sometimes it just makes sense to skip a version or two since the benefits wouldn't outweigh the work needed to upgrade.  I've been there many times, and with software much more expensive than Maya.

Also a good idea to give Autodesk a prod with a good business case for requirements like batch rendering (not "It should be free and NOW since everyone wants it"; a recognition of the time and manpower needed helps).  I'll bet a significant body part that something *is* cooking, its just that this is the first production release with Arnold and they don't want to be juggling too many problems all at once.

We've had a few folks from nVidia poke their heads into the forums before... any chance we can get some of the recently acquired SolidEdge folks to do the same if the users promise to keep it respectful?

[dgorsman]

Exactly.  And given its very recent release it shouldn't be put into production without a few weeks worth of internal testing.  Plus, there is no mandatory/must-do upgrade with new releases - if it doesn't suit your needs, then keep using what you got.  Sometimes it just makes sense to skip a version or two since the benefits wouldn't outweigh the work needed to upgrade.  I've been there many times, and with software much more expensive than Maya.

Also a good idea to give Autodesk a prod with a good business case for requirements like batch rendering (not "It should be free and NOW since everyone wants it"; a recognition of the time and manpower needed helps).  I'll bet a significant body part that something *is* cooking, its just that this is the first production release with Arnold and they don't want to be juggling too many problems all at once.

We've had a few folks from nVidia poke their heads into the forums before... any chance we can get some of the recently acquired SolidEdge folks to do the same if the users promise to keep it respectful?

[dougj7]

I wish AD wouldn't have ditched mental ray. It seems like Nvidia is finally getting serious now with mental ray development. We shall see how this move plays out. I wonder if I can uninstall Arnold since I have no plans on using it.

[dougj7]

I wish AD wouldn't have ditched mental ray. It seems like Nvidia is finally getting serious now with mental ray development. We shall see how this move plays out. I wonder if I can uninstall Arnold since I have no plans on using it.

[slimboJoe]

You don't even have to install it to begin with.  But there is no MR 2017 plugin, so you will have no renderer except the built in Maya renderer.

http://help.autodesk.com/view/MAYAUL/2017/ENU//?guid=GUID-AD1E74F3-471A-4B5D-8FB0-9E4EC6EC5252

And its not like you CANNOT use MR.  MR is just like any other 3rd party renderer.

[slimboJoe]

You don't even have to install it to begin with.  But there is no MR 2017 plugin, so you will have no renderer except the built in Maya renderer.

http://help.autodesk.com/view/MAYAUL/2017/ENU//?guid=GUID-AD1E74F3-471A-4B5D-8FB0-9E4EC6EC5252

And its not like you CANNOT use MR.  MR is just like any other 3rd party renderer.

[Anonymous]

To be clear:

I am really, really upset!

I do not understand, why there was no hint from AD, that MR will not included in Maya 2017.

I do not understand, why there was no period of time they gave us before MR was ejected

I have paid my annual subscription (two times) for a few weeks. Now I get a 3D-Animation-Package with rudimentary render options (no background rendering) and will be charge again if I only want a normal working setup.

To options:

1) Good by Arnold, welcome Vray (it's less expensive)

2) Good by Maya at all (hence! But they charged my for a few weeks for a whole year) I came from Wavefront Advanced Visualizer. Followed them to TDI, to Alias, to Maya. But this move from AD is really annoying... Maybe C4D is worth a look.

mickna

[Anonymous]

To be clear:

I am really, really upset!

I do not understand, why there was no hint from AD, that MR will not included in Maya 2017.

I do not understand, why there was no period of time they gave us before MR was ejected

I have paid my annual subscription (two times) for a few weeks. Now I get a 3D-Animation-Package with rudimentary render options (no background rendering) and will be charge again if I only want a normal working setup.

To options:

1) Good by Arnold, welcome Vray (it's less expensive)

2) Good by Maya at all (hence! But they charged my for a few weeks for a whole year) I came from Wavefront Advanced Visualizer. Followed them to TDI, to Alias, to Maya. But this move from AD is really annoying... Maybe C4D is worth a look.

mickna

[tl]

Imagine how sick I feel. Last summer I bought a new Maya licence and 3 year maintenance subscription only to have them bait and switch me to this.

If I knew this was what they would pull I would have stuck with Maya 2014.

Without mentalray there is NO production rendering without additional costs.

I'm never buying a single licence for Arnold. Autodesk basically think they will slurp the banknotes right out of our pockets. What kind of fool would I be to line their pockets further by buying Arnold from them.

[tl]

Imagine how sick I feel. Last summer I bought a new Maya licence and 3 year maintenance subscription only to have them bait and switch me to this.

If I knew this was what they would pull I would have stuck with Maya 2014.

Without mentalray there is NO production rendering without additional costs.

I'm never buying a single licence for Arnold. Autodesk basically think they will slurp the banknotes right out of our pockets. What kind of fool would I be to line their pockets further by buying Arnold from them.

[slimboJoe]

Mental Ray was never part of Maya.  It was a free plugin, 3rd party renderer from a major graphics card company.  Most of the other 3rd party renderers are from companies who's only product is a renderer.  We were all kind of foolish for depending on a renderer that only got updated when new versions of Maya came out.  That should have been a warning to us.  In 2015, when MR was suddenly "distanced" from Maya, was another warning sign.

MR became useless to me in 2016 when I failed to fully deliver on a job due to:

1.  Bug in MR Satellite 2016 Ext 1 that refused to render first frame of any animation

2.  MR Satellite 2016 became unstable and repeatedly failed during this project

3.  Color Correction (linear workflow) does NOT work on MR Satellite.  Only option is a Render Service if you are doing film work.

And, MR is not gone.  Just removed from being included with Maya.  My bet says nVidia will provide the mayatomr plugin at little to no cost.

And if you are doing production rendering, than you would be wise to not move to Maya 2017 until it is stable and working.  Nothing in 2017 is a must have over what 2016.5 offers.

Hang in there.  I have a string of failed attempts to move away from Maya because of issues like this. Still here.  C4D is the way to go, though.  Incredible package.  Let's hope AD doesn't but Maxon...(RIP softimage)...

[slimboJoe]

Mental Ray was never part of Maya.  It was a free plugin, 3rd party renderer from a major graphics card company.  Most of the other 3rd party renderers are from companies who's only product is a renderer.  We were all kind of foolish for depending on a renderer that only got updated when new versions of Maya came out.  That should have been a warning to us.  In 2015, when MR was suddenly "distanced" from Maya, was another warning sign.

MR became useless to me in 2016 when I failed to fully deliver on a job due to:

1.  Bug in MR Satellite 2016 Ext 1 that refused to render first frame of any animation

2.  MR Satellite 2016 became unstable and repeatedly failed during this project

3.  Color Correction (linear workflow) does NOT work on MR Satellite.  Only option is a Render Service if you are doing film work.

And, MR is not gone.  Just removed from being included with Maya.  My bet says nVidia will provide the mayatomr plugin at little to no cost.

And if you are doing production rendering, than you would be wise to not move to Maya 2017 until it is stable and working.  Nothing in 2017 is a must have over what 2016.5 offers.

Hang in there.  I have a string of failed attempts to move away from Maya because of issues like this. Still here.  C4D is the way to go, though.  Incredible package.  Let's hope AD doesn't but Maxon...(RIP softimage)...

[mickna2]

@slimboJoe:

All is true.

However, MR was part of the package with no additional (visible) costs. No it is replaced with a foreground renderer. This point makes me angry. Not to mention that the Maya software renderer ist just a joke for most production cases. Also that there was no statement that MR will be excluded, nor a period of time to switch. 

[mickna2]

@slimboJoe:

All is true.

However, MR was part of the package with no additional (visible) costs. No it is replaced with a foreground renderer. This point makes me angry. Not to mention that the Maya software renderer ist just a joke for most production cases. Also that there was no statement that MR will be excluded, nor a period of time to switch. 

[tl]

You are making a distinction which ignores the fact that Autodesk made (oh and incidentally still DO make.. this screenshot is current) a big deal out of Mental Ray being a feature of Maya.

So much so that they chart it against Maya LT. When they lift that feature out AFTER customers paid for it. We have every right to call them on it.

[tl]

You are making a distinction which ignores the fact that Autodesk made (oh and incidentally still DO make.. this screenshot is current) a big deal out of Mental Ray being a feature of Maya.

So much so that they chart it against Maya LT. When they lift that feature out AFTER customers paid for it. We have every right to call them on it.

[tl]

Not to mention the fairly blatant:

"Nice renderer you have there. It would be a shame if someone would break it and replace it with one for only $6450."

[tl]

Not to mention the fairly blatant:

"Nice renderer you have there. It would be a shame if someone would break it and replace it with one for only $6450."

[Anifex09]

I have been using Maya with Arnold for 2 and half years now.  The difference is night and day.  I started out like many using mental ray as my primary render engine.  I would spend more time trying to set up a scene to just render than on the project itself.  Mental ray would also cause Maya to randomly crash.  I didn't realize it was due to Mental ray until I switched to Arnold.  I have now used Arnold on 54 projects over the past 2 and half years and I can say that it is a game changer.  Updates are provided at least once a month. You can use the IPR renderer without having to worry about crashing Maya or stacking ram.  Arnold can render just about anything you throw at it.  Some projects I worked on contained everything from fur, fluid volumes, particles, instances, 6k displacement maps, massive geo cache sims, and scenes with over 800 million faces.  Arnold has allowed me to focus more on the project - no more final gather or photon maps - no more strange red and black boxes showing up on frames - no more maya crashing once you hit render.  I also want to note that if you buy a seat to Arnold you can use it for Cinema 4D - Maya 2014-2017 - Houdini - Softimage - Katana - and 3dsmax - all with just one license.  The work that has gone into Maya 2017 is also worth looking at.  Updates to the Graph editor to make it faster to edit and navigate complex key frames - new none destructive time graph - xgen has a real hair and fur system that uses a comprehensive layering system rather than over populating the attribute window - also mash has been given a layering system to allow the user to easily toggle on and off nodes, add and edit nodes within the Mash network once again eliminating the over populated tabs in the attribute editor - BUSS for bifrost to create sims over a body of water.  This is a significant update,  I agree I wouldn't move to 2017 until its API has been adopted by third parties but it has many more features than Maya 2016 ext 2.

[Anifex09]

I have been using Maya with Arnold for 2 and half years now.  The difference is night and day.  I started out like many using mental ray as my primary render engine.  I would spend more time trying to set up a scene to just render than on the project itself.  Mental ray would also cause Maya to randomly crash.  I didn't realize it was due to Mental ray until I switched to Arnold.  I have now used Arnold on 54 projects over the past 2 and half years and I can say that it is a game changer.  Updates are provided at least once a month. You can use the IPR renderer without having to worry about crashing Maya or stacking ram.  Arnold can render just about anything you throw at it.  Some projects I worked on contained everything from fur, fluid volumes, particles, instances, 6k displacement maps, massive geo cache sims, and scenes with over 800 million faces.  Arnold has allowed me to focus more on the project - no more final gather or photon maps - no more strange red and black boxes showing up on frames - no more maya crashing once you hit render.  I also want to note that if you buy a seat to Arnold you can use it for Cinema 4D - Maya 2014-2017 - Houdini - Softimage - Katana - and 3dsmax - all with just one license.  The work that has gone into Maya 2017 is also worth looking at.  Updates to the Graph editor to make it faster to edit and navigate complex key frames - new none destructive time graph - xgen has a real hair and fur system that uses a comprehensive layering system rather than over populating the attribute window - also mash has been given a layering system to allow the user to easily toggle on and off nodes, add and edit nodes within the Mash network once again eliminating the over populated tabs in the attribute editor - BUSS for bifrost to create sims over a body of water.  This is a significant update,  I agree I wouldn't move to 2017 until its API has been adopted by third parties but it has many more features than Maya 2016 ext 2.

[slimboJoe]

Maya LT does not support ANY rendering, actually.  LT is for modeling and animation asset creation.

I'm surprised we have not seen any comments from AD or nVidia rep's here.  We're just speculating and wasting time.  We need official werd.

[slimboJoe]

Maya LT does not support ANY rendering, actually.  LT is for modeling and animation asset creation.

I'm surprised we have not seen any comments from AD or nVidia rep's here.  We're just speculating and wasting time.  We need official werd.

[tl]

Hi slimboJoe. Thanks. I'm well aware of the differences because Autodesk promoted Mentalray in that rendering solution.

You are missing my point.  But I give up. You're quite happy. Good for you.

We are not happy and feel short-changed.

[tl]

Hi slimboJoe. Thanks. I'm well aware of the differences because Autodesk promoted Mentalray in that rendering solution.

You are missing my point.  But I give up. You're quite happy. Good for you.

We are not happy and feel short-changed.

[slimboJoe]

I get your point, that AD seems to "feature" MR.  I just don't think it's a feature, especially listed as it is.  What else are they going to put in the render column? 

"Includes Maya's world-renowned built-in no-name Renderer!"

"Includes ability to render!"

It's just listed, not featured.

Maya is the only package without a modern built-in renderer.  We've been had when it comes to rendering all these years.  AD made moves to acquire a renderer that they can OWN and develop directly.

I feel short-changed everytime I use Maya, to tell you the truth.  But now I feel like Maya is marching forward instead of oozing forward.

I agree, the whole move seems a bit ODD and we should expect some werds from some rep.  AD does odd stuff all the time, but so does just about every big company.  Just be glad you were not a SoftImage user.  The MR issue is a mild inconvenience compared to that.

[slimboJoe]

I get your point, that AD seems to "feature" MR.  I just don't think it's a feature, especially listed as it is.  What else are they going to put in the render column? 

"Includes Maya's world-renowned built-in no-name Renderer!"

"Includes ability to render!"

It's just listed, not featured.

Maya is the only package without a modern built-in renderer.  We've been had when it comes to rendering all these years.  AD made moves to acquire a renderer that they can OWN and develop directly.

I feel short-changed everytime I use Maya, to tell you the truth.  But now I feel like Maya is marching forward instead of oozing forward.

I agree, the whole move seems a bit ODD and we should expect some werds from some rep.  AD does odd stuff all the time, but so does just about every big company.  Just be glad you were not a SoftImage user.  The MR issue is a mild inconvenience compared to that.

[tl]

"listed, not featured"

Literally in a column headlined "features". You can't split semantic hairs on that.

http://www.autodesk.co.uk/products/maya/compare/compare-products

I'm not sure you grasp what I'm saying at all. Or if perhaps you just enjoy contradicting people online.

[tl]

"listed, not featured"

Literally in a column headlined "features". You can't split semantic hairs on that.

http://www.autodesk.co.uk/products/maya/compare/compare-products

I'm not sure you grasp what I'm saying at all. Or if perhaps you just enjoy contradicting people online.