I have been told that the 5 mental ray® for Maya Batch licenses that are included with the network version acn only be used through Backburner and are not available for use from third part render managers.

Can someone confirm this please?

Regards,

Richard

I hope that is NOT the case. I talked to Autodesk last month about upgrading to the network licence for that purpose and they did NOT mention that stipulation. Where did you hear this nasty rumor?

Tell me about it…

I was told by our local Autodesk agent that it needed to be done from Backburner and have posted here to get a definitive confirmation of this.

If indeed this is not the case, can someone point me at instructions for setting this up?

Currently I have a render node setup with the network licence setup, but is not checking out a licence when batch renders are submitted to it.

Is Backburner required to be installed even if not being used?

Regards,

Richard

I was happy as a bell when I discoverd that Mental Ray was rendering just fine without any additional steps after installing Maya 2010 on our renderfarm, using Deadline.  Now 30 days after the installation Mental Ray is no longer working.  My suspicions are that a 30 day grace period to license Maya 2010 have ended on the farm, and Maya Software render is now the only option. The new 2010 Maya Mental Ray features are very confusing and seemed not to be covered very well.  Will it only work with Backburner? How does a renderfarm check out a license from the license over the network?  Maybe Frantic Film knows (Deadline)

Why can’t the licensing be like Max, where it is simple and just works?

Robert-

We were told that the 5 licenses are only available with a floating license.
You guys have a floating license or is it attached to a dongle/network adapter?

I wouldn’t think so, from the official Maya 2010 brochure:

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Augmented Rendering Power

With five additional mental ray for Maya batch rendering nodes, each Maya seat now enables artists to use other networked computers to render their sequences faster. The Backburner network render queue manager is included to help those with smaller rendering pipelines manage the process; larger facilities can integrate the additional mental ray for Maya nodes with their existing render management software.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

So I think that’s pretty clear that Backburner isn’t necessary...but then again it wouldn’t be the first time Marketing and Engineering had differing takes on reality. ;-)

What I want is a document detailing HOW you are supposed to “integrate the additional mental ray for Maya nodes with their existing render management software”.  That’s sorely missing.

Are we supposed to invoke mayabatch.exe, render.exe, or what?

Are we supposed to invoke it just once one one machine and give it the range of frames to render, along with a list of nodes to use (and if we do not does it use maya.rayhosts?) If so how do we control the breakdown of frame “chunks”?

Are we supposed to invoke it on many nodes, and the license manager is smart enough to see that the same shot is being rendered in different sequences on different nodes, an therefore count against the 5 instead of the 1?

I can’t find *any* documentation on this…

Ryan