Update 7/29/2019: Omar's new scene is ready to render and already underway on SheepIt. If you're part of the CG Cookie Render Monsters team, we'd appreciate you launching the SheepIt app on your computer to contribute. NOTE: Make sure on your SheepIt account "Options" you enable Render my team's projects first. Thanks!
Update 7/18/2019: Omar is polishing new scenes.
Update 7/3/2019: Omar has 2 new files ready for rendering. Let's do dis.
Update 7/1/2019: We have finished rendering two of Omar's reel projects. Way to go community. Omar still has several to prep for rendering. I'm going to unpin this thread and re-pin once it's ready to render again.
Update 6/17/2019: Omar has updated his shared project folder with new scenes to render. It was accidentally uploaded as a new folder so if you've already synced the previous folder, you can delete that one (if it's still there) and you'll have to sync this new one. From now on we know how to avoid this so no more re-syncing.
The time to render is now!
Update 6/16/2019: We've finished Omar's first 2 scenes! Way to go People 👏👏 Thanks to everyone for contributing. Now we're waiting for Omar to setup and upload his next scene.
@theluthier Kent after comparing the original Cycles renders and Element 3D real time ones, I think you are right, rendering it out of Cycles is totally worth going the extra mile for. Although you and Lampel said it was great, that it's 95% there, for a second I saw a twinkle in your eyes saying "C'mon dude, you know it, I know it... there is no spoon." And then the twinkle continued "No one eats an Oreo and doesn't go all the way to the stuffing in the middle, the cookie part is just enough". I see what you mean twinkle.
I didn't want to bother people though, but I guess if I'm going to try this there's no way around that. I don't know how to use Drop Box, I've never used it before. Should I get an account? I hope it's enough space. I remember you kinda set things up in a similar way in the Rendering & Finishing A Blender Animation course. I should re-watch that. I have never done things through the internet so this should be a learning experience.
I, Kent Trammell, am commandeering Omar's original post! [evil laugh] I'm the one that encouraged Omar to reach out to the community for helping him render his demo reel. My computer just sits collecting dust most nights and I'm happy to lend some rendering power to this project while I'm asleep. I suspect that there are a number of CGC community members willing to do the same 🙏
If you want to help out, please follow the instructions below!
The status of the project will be stated and updated at the end of the thread title in brackets. When it says "READY TO RENDER" that means a project has been submitted to SheepIt for rendering. If it says anything else, the project isn't ready for rendering yet.
The status of the project will be stated and updated at the end of the thread title in brackets. When it says "READY TO RENDER" that means it's ready to sync the project folder and start rendering. If it says anything else, the project isn't ready for rendering yet.
STEP 1 -- Sync Omar's project folder to your Google Drive.
If you have a gmail account, you have 15 GB of free Google Drive space. Just click the link and when you're redirected to the Google Drive website, right click on the "Demo Reel Files" folder and choose Add to My Drive.
If you're on Mac or Windows, use the official Google Drive app (personal version) to sync your Google Drive to your computer's file system.
Render_Scenes_1_Packed.blend
If you're on Linux like me, there is no official app. I've had some success with Open Drive but it seems to have stopped syncing on my system. I'm currently using Insync and it's working beautifully. It's $30 after the 15 day trial period, which I will likely pay.
STEP 2 -- Open one of the render-ready .blends with Blender 2.8
After the project folder has finished syncing *entirely* to your computer, launch Blender 2.8 and open Demo Reel Files > Blend Packed Files > Render_2.8-Scene_1_Packed.blend. Then follow Omar's instructions in the file for CPU or GPU rendering, whichever your machine is best equipped.
Enable viewport rendering to double check the scenes look fine (no pink from missing textures). I've tested these files myself and they should be ready to render without problems.
STEP 3 -- Render the Animation
The files should all be setup properly so anyone that opens them doesn't have to do anything but click the Render button.
That should be all you need to do to contribute rendering to Omar's project! Note that these scenes are heavy and can take an hour or more per frame, even on a high end machine, which is why Omar needs our help.
When the rendering is all done (or you need to stop and regain your own GoogleDrive space), simply navigate to the Google Drive website, right click on the folder and choose "Remove".
is anybody else having issues with sheep-it at the moment? , I am getting error after error over the last 24 hours with the odd successful render in between. But what is odd is that almost every error is of a different nature.
Also , If I move the sheep-it client to any location outside of my downloads folder , and try to open it , it says that I am running an outdated version and have to download the latest client , but If I move it back to the downloads folder again , it opens up fine....
Here are some of the errors I've been getting today (there have been others that I haven't screenshotted yet)
I also just had one about a "project not existing" , SHEEP-IT IS ACTING VERY STRANGE.....
**UPDATE** - A brand new error :
AAAAaaaandd another one :
starting to feel like I'm collecting pokemon cards now , only in the form of errors. Im getting quite a collection .....
The best part is , I am actually getting successful renders and points between these errors. It is so unpredictable.
frikkr I haven't had any errors in a long while, but it is an enigma the way that thing works. Any time something weird happens, I would normally restart my computer or change the settings to allow more ram or to use only the CPU and stuff like that and it would get resolved.
Maybe in your case Sheepit is freaking out to see someone have 4 video cards and doesn't know what to do with so much awesomeness.
dostovel It's weird Omar , because I have been running 4 instances of the client , one for each card for the past week , right through the night without a single issue , but then it was filling up my main windows drive really quickly because it doesn't delete project cache when a project is done for some reason , so I changed the directory to a different drive and it has been temperamental ever since.....
frikkr I can tell you've been really active, you jumped through the ranks immensely quick, you are 6th already. I'm going to start working on the demo reel again, now that the course is over. I hope Sheepit chills out by the time a have a new scene ready to render, your Super Metal Matt is going to be really helpful for that.
Thanks for being part of the CG Cookie Render Monster Team.
dostovel Happy to help Omar . But it is a bit annoying running all four GPU's throughout the night and waking up to find it has had error after error and hardly done any rendering.... I hope it gets sorted too. I can't see how it could be an issue my end as it will still successfully render projects from time to time. For example I have left it running all day and have just returned home to find that two of four GPU's have accumulated 10000 points each. But the other two are stuck on errors and the two successful ones should have had 3 or 4 times that amount meaning they have been erroring too from time to time. Really annoying.
frikkr The fault is surely at Sheepit, they have to do some serious coding and probably they are short of man power or something, it is free after all. I'll surely donate, so far it has proven to be a great tool.
dostovel yeah , it's understandable.
I have re-downloaded sheep-it and left it at the default cache folder and it is running much smoother. It just doesn't seem to like changes it seems.
How do I update Sheepit? There's no "update" button in the program, and I can't find anywhere where I can download it on the website.
williamatics is it telling you that you are running an outdated version of the client?
That was an issue I had whenever I moved the client from my download folder to my desktop. It seems that it does not like being moved. If you are having this issue too, then just re download the client and leave it in the folder it was downloaded to and it will work again. I ended up just creating a shortcut to the client on my desktop. Must just be a stupid bug of sorts.
Poor Sheepit, it's probably three or four guys that have to code all that stuff. Even with its bugs it's actually pretty cool.
frikkr That message does occur, but it is still in my downloads folder. Also, I don't know where to download it.
Hi Matthew,
Who is the owner of the CG Cookie Render Monsters Team, I have been waiting to be accepted on to the team for a few days now?
Rendering for others at the moment.
Kent be our mighty captain, Neil. We currently don't know his whereabouts, the whole gang has gone their separate ways until we're called upon again.
What in the hell happened in the forum? this is so confusing now.
yeah dostovel , i'ts all gone a bit backwards since they updated it , but apparently there is a global setting in your prefs that will revert it back to the old way somehow. It is very tricky now to locate new posts especially in long threads that have been going a while.
