Using The 3Delight Submit Script

Index

Installing The 3delight Script

    Before using the 3delight script, you should first install it by making a copy of the script on your file server, so that this copy is accessible by all the machines on your network. This is usually done by your sysadmin, or the person who set up the rush software.

  1. Install the script on the file server.

    2. This should have already been set up by your sysadmin, or the person who installed the rush software:

  2. Modify the script to set up 3delight for your environment.

    3. This script will be executed not only by the user to bring up the submit-3delight GUI, but it will also be executed on all the render machines to run the renders.

    To ensure the renders run with the proper environment, you'll need to modify these lines at the top of the script: 

    ##############################################################
### 3DELIGHT SPECIFIC VARIABLES -- CUSTOMIZE AS NECESSARY  ###
### See 3delight's documentation for more info.            ###
##############################################################
if ( $G::iswindows )
{
    ## WINDOWS
    ##     Normally leave this commented out; 3Delight install sets these by default.
    ##     Just restart rushd after installing 3Delight for Rush to pickup the environment changes.
    ##
    # $ENV{DELIGHT} = "C:/Program Files/3Delight";
    # $ENV{PATH}    = "$ENV{DELIGHT}/bin/;$ENV{PATH}";
}
elsif ( $G::ismac )
{
    ## OSX
    ##    Change as needed.
    ##
    $ENV{DELIGHT} = "/Applications/Graphics/3Delight-6.5.53/";
    LoadEnvFromCsh("$ENV{DELIGHT}/.3delight_csh");	# load 3delight's csh settings
}
elsif ( $G::islinux )
{
    ## LINUX
    ##    Change path to the .3delight_csh file as needed.
    ##
    LoadEnvFromCsh("/usr/local/3delight-6.5.0/.3delight_csh");
}

  3. Make a desktop shortcut to the submit script.

    4. Be sure the shortcut points to a copy on a file server, and not to local files in c:\rush\examples (windows) or /usr/local/rush/examples (unix).

  4. Invoke the submit script.

    5. Should be as simple as clicking on your desktop shortcut.

    If you prefer using a terminal window, be sure to run the script with an absolute UNC path, eg: 

    	    perl //server/jobs/rushscripts/perl/submit-3delight.pl
    If you don't run it with an absolute path, the frames will fail because rush didn't have the absolute path to the submit script.

  5. Verify the interface comes up.

    6. The interface should pop up. If it doesn't, verify (unix) the first line in the script's path points to the correct location of your perl binary, or (windows) the '.pl' extension is configured to correctly invoke perl.

    Click the help button (buttons with '?') for any field you want to know more about.

    When the GUI pops up, note there are various 'Advanced Options' available if you scroll the window down.

Using Submit 3delight

    It is assumed you are able to bring up the submit script from a desktop shortcut (which you can make by following these instructions for Mac OSX, Windows, or Linux)

  1. Enter the absolute path to a 3delight .rib file.

    2. For the "Rib Path:" prompt, you can either type the pathname, or navigate to your .rib file directory using the Browse button. If it is your first time submitting, you may have to manually type in the //server/volume name in the browser in order to get a directory listing that you can then navigate through.

    Avoid using mapped drive letters (z:/yada/yada) your project, to avoid problems with drive maps, eg. when people log out, drive maps disappear.

    Use '%04d' in the "Rib Path" you specify if your rib filenames use 4 digit zero-padded frame numbers (eg. "foo.0012.rib"), or use '%d' if there is no zero-padding on the filenames (eg. "foo.12.rib").

  2. Enter the frame range to render.

    3. This is the range of frames you want to render; normally two values separated by a dash, eg. '1-100'.

    You can also specify individual frames, multiple ranges, or cobinations of both, eg. '1 10 20-30 400-900', which would render frames 1, 10, 20 through 30, and 400 through 900.

  3. Enter the cpus to use.

    4. In our case, lets use any 5 available cpus at the lowest priority: 

      
	    +any=5@1

  4. 3Delight Command Line Options.

    5. You can optionally specify 3delight command line options by clicking on the '3delight' tab (at the top of the submit form), and type in command line flags.

    To see all of 3delight's command line options, view their online documenation, or invoke 3delight's command line help, eg. 'renderdl -help'.

    If there are any fields in the submit form you want to know more about, click the help button (buttons with '?') for more info.

  5. Hit 'Submit'.

    6. This should submit your job, and a window indicating the jobid should pop up, followed by an irush interface with the jobid already set to the new job.

    The next time you bring up the submit form, it will have all the values set from the last execution. Note that you can then save this as a form so you can easily recall it later.

    For more info on the irush interface, see the irush tutorial.

  6. Monitor the job.

    7. Hit 'Frames' in irush to watch the progress of your job.
    If some frames are running, or got done already, click on some, and hit 'Logs' to see the output of the perl commands you entered.

  7. Dump the job when you're done.

    8. When you're finished with the job, hit 'Dump' in irush.