Performance Increase - Best Bang for the Buck?

[cdiesel]

Fred,
I'm not sure what the budget is for your machine, but if you can afford it, I'd upgrade to a new machine with a SAS drive array. It's not cheap, but it's well worth it, especially if you're seeing half hour rendering times!
I don't do any 3d stuff, but I've seen HUGE increases in performance with my SAS machine. A decent video card with onboard processor and at least 512mb ram will help also. A Core 2 Duo should be sufficient, as most programs aren't written to take advantage of anything more than a single core. I'm not sure of your exact application, tho. Pro Signs & Graphics also uses a SAS machine, and can probably speak more about its value.

 

[Techman]

I don't do any 3d stuff, but I've seen HUGE increases in performance with my SAS machine

3D rendering is software driven,, drive arrays will not speed up rendering.. Only efficient software and lots of fast ram to that the rendering engine can swap out more frams faster

 

[Techman]

Since my purpose is to produce artwork for DVD collections, it would seem to me that if I cut the render time by half then i could bring twice as much work to market in the same amount of time ... which makes it worth it. But that's why I'm asking.

You are rendering the DVD??
That is compiling all your art work onto a DVD? And that is taking 30 minutes?

 

[Fred Weiss]

You are rendering the DVD??
That is compiling all your art work onto a DVD? And that is taking 30 minutes?

No I said DVD collections. Which is to say a quantity of original images or artwork published on a CD or DVD and normally accompanied by a nicely printed user guide.

The thread is about creating and rendering textured seamless tiles at high resolution using an application named Filter Forge. Although we burn and label our CD's and DVD's in house, this thread has nothing to do with that particular process.

My concerns are how best to get the fastest speeds of redrawing when editing in Filter Forge and how to get the fastest speeds when physically rendering the high resolution image out of Filter Forge as a saved file.

Once I have completed x number of files, they are then put together into a collection and will be published on DVD media making it a product that is ready to sell to collection buyers such as sign companies and graphic designers.

 

[eforer]

Rendering is CPU intensive. Ram doesn't make much of a difference. Lots of ram allows you to keep the textures cached, thats along with some other tertiary gains. CPU performance is paramount for rendering. In my pre-sign/printing life doing commercial illustration and art direction and my business did a lot 3d computer graphics and compositing. If your using a serious 3D app (Maya, XSI, 3DS Max, Cinema 4D, Lightwave etc.), you need to be running a work station video card supported by your software. I prefer Nvidia based stuff. As far as real time performance goes, thats largely a function of your video card. Getting out of your old system into something that supports PCI express will help alot with your real time performance as well because the choke point for the video card is freed up a lot. Huge improvement from AGP.

Also, spending close to $400.00 on 4gb of ancient ram is ludicrous. Smack whoever gave you that price. I suggest the system I posted in the other PC thread, and just build it your self. Its easy.

If your software supports some form of distributed rendering and you are constantly crunching out high res renders, a render farm may be for you. Back whwn 1ghz was fast, my business had a unix cluster of 12 machines with 1ghz CPUs for distributed rendering. We didn't need heat in the winter with all those things cranking.

Also, having a better understanding of your renderer will improve your render times. Being able to make judgment calls on things like depth map shadows etc., ray depth, etc. etc. can save you loads of time. Compositing elements rendered separately can also allow for clever shortcuts which will save you tons of render time as well. Rendering a whole project out at once is usually a recipe for slow render and an un-spectacular result.

 

[Sign-Man Signs]

Fred,

www.visioncomputers.com

Customize it for under a grand with two monitors.

 

[mark in tx]

Fred, it might be worth your time to track down and talk with someone at Pixar. I'd bet they know quite a bit about efficient rendering.

 

[dclet]

Get the newer machine.
Like I said render times do not change much, and filter forge will be much more "enjoyable", the lag will disapear....

Genetica ver 2.0 Pro -
3000 x 3000 full res, no anti-aliasing, 4 nodes - 5 minutes to render.

I'll give the filter forge demo a shot.

 

[bullcrew]

Fred, it might be worth your time to track down and talk with someone at Pixar. I'd bet they know quite a bit about efficient rendering.

Bob Allen at sigh warehouse!! Give him a call he knows someone who has a license with pixar for there graphics and rendering.

 

[eforer]

Do you mean Renderman? Renderman when I was doing this stuff cost 10 grand and for a long time only did depth map shadows to give that "pixar" look. Also, are you just using a seamless texture tool? Thats not a 3D program, it just helps you create textures along with diffusion maps, spec maps etc. A 3rd party renderer is not going to integrate with that as your not doing anything with geometry. So nix the workstation card and any thought of a render farm as I doubt those apps support distributed rendering.

Be careful throwing around a term like 3D, I didn't read the previous posts carefully enough, but I assumed you were talking about something like Maya, XSI, 3DS max, Lightwave, Cinema 4D etc.

 

[dclet]

but I assumed you were talking about something like Maya, XSI, 3DS max, Lightwave, Cinema 4D etc.

heh me too....hence the reply and I believe the "new" system would be the best option....still...I'd go nvidia either way

 

[Fred Weiss]

Do you mean Renderman? Renderman when I was doing this stuff cost 10 grand and for a long time only did depth map shadows to give that "pixar" look. Also, are you just using a seamless texture tool? Thats not a 3D program, it just helps you create textures along with diffusion maps, spec maps etc. A 3rd party renderer is not going to integrate with that as your not doing anything with geometry. So nix the workstation card and any thought of a render farm as I doubt those apps support distributed rendering.

Be careful throwing around a term like 3D, I didn't read the previous posts carefully enough, but I assumed you were talking about something like Maya, XSI, 3DS max, Lightwave, Cinema 4D etc.

Sorry for any confusion. Yes the renderings coming out of Filter Forge are using various components such as mapped images, noise, lighting, patterns, and various control devices and the generation of seamless tiles. It does not compare to the complexity and capability of the various 3D applications but it is still part of that medium and the rendering times for large images are still significant.

 

[eforer]

Yes, but from what I saw of the app, there is no geometry so its not a 3D app, and thus the rendering work flows are completely different. Much of what has been suggested will be of no benefit in light of the fact that this is not a 3D app. You can cheese out on a cheap video card with no penalty for example. All said and done, I still think the new system is the way to go.

 

[dclet]

whoa so i downloaded the trial of Filter Forge
Filter Forge is a pig....working with it is really slow....I do not think you'll get around that with what you posted Fred.

But.... it renders ALOT faster, the same size tile 3000 x 3000
rendered in just a little over a minute. It also produces a much larger file. 63mb compared to 20mb with genetica.

It's a nice plug and works with CorelPHOTOPAINT and CorelDRAW x3 also.
I tried both...corel and photoshop, same results. It's faster in stand alone mode

 

[Fred Weiss]

Well I've pretty much decided on the new machine. I'll report back to this thread after it's built and tested with comparative times.

63 MB sounds awfully large. What are the details as to the file type saved, color mode and depth? I'm doing 3600 x 3600, RGB 8 bit depth, and saving as JPG at Maximum Quality and averaging 3 to 4 MB per file.

Both the redraw and the rendering are dramatically effected by the antialias sampling settings.

 

[bullcrew]

Well I've pretty much decided on the new machine. I'll report back to this thread after it's built and tested with comparative times.

63 MB sounds awfully large. What are the details as to the file type saved, color mode and depth? I'm doing 3600 x 3600, RGB 8 bit depth, and saving as JPG at Maximum Quality and averaging 3 to 4 MB per file.

Both the redraw and the rendering are dramatically effected by the antialias sampling settings.

Look forward to seeing what you built.

 

[dclet]

3000 x 3000

.tiff - lzw 16bit - 64mb
.tiff - lzw 8 bit - 30mb

anti aliasing -off

.jpg came in at 13 mb. Same settings Quality 100%

To be honest Fred, I wouldn't buy 'em in .jpg format regardless of res.

Just something to think about when your collection does go
public....

 

[Fred Weiss]

3000 x 3000

.tiff - lzw 16bit - 64mb
.tiff - lzw 8 bit - 30mb

anti aliasing -off

.jpg came in at 13 mb. Same settings Quality 100%

To be honest Fred, I wouldn't buy 'em in .jpg format regardless of res.

Just something to think about when your collection does go
public....

Is that because you prefer CMYK or you prefer lossless compression? Aurora's Monster Wrap collection is all JPG and it works beautifully. Those files are 4800 x 4800 and average about 13 MB. There are a number of issues with mastering in CMYK ... not the least of which is file size and reduced color gamut.

 

[dclet]

Is that because you prefer CMYK or you prefer lossless compression

I do prefer Cmyk. Compression should be avoided if possible.... I was just experimenting with FF.

cmyk or rgb, it's the quality of the image. a tiff will hold much more in terms of color info then a .jpg ...hence better end product with enlargement or reduction. jpg's only go so far.

We all know what compressed .jpgs look like. .tiffs are far superior in that respect...

and you're right Aurora's stuff is quit nice...even those at times
I convert, it just gives me a better feel for final output...

yes rgb has a larger color gamut, ( though not much ) and with a .jpg you're kinda throwing that away.

 

[Sabre]

I'm kinda late coming into the thread, but I would have voted the new machine. There may have been some small hardware changes I would have recommended but nothing that would make or break your experience with your new rig. Best of luck with your testing.