XSI Network Rendering Guide

• 1 XSI Network Rendering Guide
  • 1.1 Submitting XSI render jobs to Deadline
    • 1.1.1 Step 1: Launch the Submission Script
    • 1.1.2 Step 2: Set Your Submission Options
    • 1.1.3 Step 3: Submit Your Job

Submitting XSI render jobs to Deadline

XSI jobs can be submitted from within XSI or from the Deadline Monitor.

Step 1: Launch the Submission Script

Select the Render toolbar on the left and click Render -> Submit To Deadline....

Step 2: Set Your Submission Options

The general Deadline options are:

• Job Name: The name of your job (if left blank, it will default to "Untitled").
• Comment: A simple description of your job (can be left blank).
• Department: Your department (can be left blank).
• Pool: The pool that your job is submitted to.
• Group: The group that your job is submitted to.
• Priority: Your job's priority (0 = lowest, 100 = highest).
• Machine Limit: The maximum number of machines that can render your job at one time (specify 0 for no limit).
• Task Timeout: The number of minutes a slave has to render a task for this job before it requeues it (specify 0 for no limit).
• Enable Task Timeout: Whether or not to use the timeout given.
• Limit Groups: The limit groups that your job requires.
• Job Dependencies: Jobs that your job is dependent on.
• Submit As Suspended: Submit your job in the suspended state.
• Delete Job When Complete: If this is checked the job will be deleted when it successfully completes.

The XSI specific options are:

• Frame List: The list of frames which to rendered.
• Group Size: The number of frames per task.
• Workgroup: Specify the workgroup that XSI should use during rendering. Leave blank to ignore.
• Force Build: Force 32 bit or 64 bit rendering.
• Submit XSI Scene File: The XSI scene file will be submitted with the job. If your XSI scene is stored in a project folder on the network, it is recommended that you leave this box unchecked.
• Use XSI Batch Plugin: This will force deadline to use a modified version of the XSI plug-in which keeps XSI and the scene loaded in memory between tasks.

Selecting passes to render:

• Select which passes you would like to render. A separate job is submitted for each pass. If no passes are selected, then the current pass is submitted. Note that if you are using FxTree Rendering, the passes are ignored.

Setting up a tile rendering job:

• Enable tile rendering to split up a frame into multiple tiles that are rendered individualy. A separate job is submitted for each tile. Note that if you are using FxTree Rendering, the tile rendering settings are ignored.

Setting up an FxTree rendering job:

• Enable FxTree rendering to render a specific FxTree output node, which can be selected from the FxTree Output dropdown box. You can also set the frame offset for the output files. Some things to note are:
  • The frame range to be rendered is pulled from the Frame List setting under the Submission Options tab.
  • If you are rendering to a movie file, be sure to set the Group Size to the number of frames in your animation.

Step 3: Submit Your Job

Click the OK button to submit the job to Deadline.

Notes:

• XSI gives the option to specify file paths as being relative to the current directory or absolute. Deadline requires that all file paths be absolute.
• When specifying the image output, make sure to include the extension (.pic, .tga, etc) at the end so that you can view the individual rendered images from the task list in the Deadline Monitor.