Distribute rendering over multiple CPUs?

I recall reading something about network rendering with some version of FCP, but a search of "network render" on Apple.com only turns up info for Shake and some Pro stories.

 

xgrid? Can FCP use xgrid? I've always wondered about that... and why they wouldn't. I guess you're supposed to be able to do everything in realtime now.

I can't wait until they get the video cards doing all the rendering, hella fast...

 

Apple's Qmaster software...it comes with FCP, Shake, and other pro software. It is used for distributing render tasks over a Mac OS X network. I've never gotten it to actually work, but i don't think adding my 12" pb will effect my render times enough to make up for the effort. If anyone knows how to do it and it is simple, then I would be down to hear it...

 

Ditto. Not sure if adding a 1.67 pb to a dual 2 G5 would make a noticable difference, but it would be interesting to try...

 

Don't know about iMove or FCP, but I do distributed rendering using Cinema4D between several machines at home, including previously to my roommate's PC (she has an iBook now ). I use my old 400 MHz G4 PowerMac as the render server and frame wrangler, and it can even distribute rendering over the internet. You can also apparently distribute After Effects rendering, though I've never tried it.

 

I wish someone could clear all this up. I had posted about setting up a small render farm before but people said xgrid or xraid serve something. I suppose it was a myth that if you use ethernet cables to link ur computers that would work.

 

Yes you can do this but I don't think you can with Apple software. If you weant to make use of t a "render farm" I think you either have to move up to the more expensive suites or use a free one like Cinelerra.

You can do it is a crude way manually. You just start a task that will take a long time on one computer and walk away and work on a second computer. But I'm sure youwere asking about _automatically_ splitting a task.

 

Currently Not Supported

This is the third or forth time someone has asked this question, and like you guys are saying, people keep throwing out "xgrid" but no one really gives a solid answer.

Well the answer is NO, you cannot currently network render in iMovie or Final Cut, as neither one are a multi-thread application. That is strait out of a Sr. Systems Engineer from Apple Enterprises mouth.

What I find funny is that people keep claiming they have done it or have seen it done when its not possible. Xgrid only works with multi-thread applications. Yes, you can network render in other pro apps like Compressor, but not Final Cut.

I hope that helps...Maybe it is something we'll seen in the next version...

 

DVD Studio Pro 4 offers distributed encoding.

I'd bet a few bucks that this will be added to FCP 6. I'm starting to believe that rumor of a huge upgrade in FCP 6. Apple had to go in and tweak a bunch of stuff to get the Pro apps to run on Intel so they probably did other major new features like this...

Or they took the conservative approach and just ported over what is already there

I'm thinking we may see this distributed encoding or Xgrid type stuff in consumer apps by iLife '08.

 

You'd figure that FCP, of all apps, would be multithreaded...

 

Did anyone ever figure this out?

Did anyone ever figure this out? Boy, it sure would be nice to distribute that render across the machines in the house. Maybe it's too data intensive to be practical . . .

 

The answer is still no. Maybe it will come in FCP 8.


Lethal

 

Yes, you can do it, but No thanks!

FCP does not do anything with Video conversion - it is uses AIC for editing. You will need to export your movie to self contained quicktime movie (.MOV) and then use it as a source for a "Compressor" (part of FCP or Logic Studio). "Compressor" could use a QMaster (comes with QMaster node installer) you can use to distribute encoding jobs. Although QMaster has a node installer - it would not deliver Compressor to the macs without FCP. So it is easier just install FCP or Compressor on every node you want to use for encoding.

I managed to arrange a distributed H264 and AC-3 encoding with "Compressor" a few years ago. Apple has a guide on "how to". Just to give you something to estimate - it took about 20hours for 2 iMacs and MacBookPro to render 720p60 ~12Mbs (you have to use 60fps as some older compressor versions will not double rate implicitly when 30fps specifiedi in video profile) 20mins movie (1440 AIC). The key for success it to create a drive mapping compatible for every node. Keeping the source on the Network share (another Mac, PC or NAS) will let you set up the rendering job correctly (so all macs will reference the source file correctly). Before you start it, make sure you mount network drive on all nodes (macs). "Compressor" will split source video into 4 chunks and set every node to process chunks simultaneously. Set Job to "Do not copy source" mode as encoding is very slow and network share will handle I/O sufficiently. There is also some guide published, just keep "Googling" and include "Compressor" in the search. Because it is too slow I never did any HD encoding, untill i7 came alone. Maybe latest "Compressor" is better, otherwise it was a complete drag. 1080P was not even feasible. Quality was questionable too.


With new Windows 7 64-bit i7 rig (overcloked to 3.4GHz) - I could encode this video with 2xtimes better quality (6Mbs) with MeGUI/x264 in about 5 minutes. With the best quality ~ 30mins. At the rate of 12Mbs MeGUI/x264 will get you stunning HD quality videos. One thing for sure, Windows 7 has some real beef when it comes to HD H264 or VC-1 decoding right out of the box. Hard to believe it, but it is true. No 3rd party codecs could even compare to efficiency of the built-in ones.

Note: I always use 2-pass encoding and 1Gb network.

Good luck...