Mastering LW ScreamerNet

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There are a few key differences between the basic network setup (which you should review before proceeding) and the advanced network setup that follows. Rather than running all the ScreamerNet instances from the host Mac (which may become unstable for more than four nodes, especially in some versions of Jaguar), we will install separate sets of everything ScreamerNet needs, on each remote rendering Mac, including a separate set of config files. We will then make a content directory available that all ScreamerNet nodes may share, without using administrator access to the host, which would pose a potential security risk. We will finally use a third party network controller to manage all the ScreamerNet nodes, such as Jonathan Baker’s robust ScreamerNet Controller for OS X or Bruce Rayne’s excellent RenderFarm Commander. Adding either of these network controllers to your LightWave toolbox will give you a very robust Mac OS X network render farm that should be able to handle anything you can throw at it. This advanced setup is not intended to be the quickest or easiest way to network render with ScreamerNet. It’s intended to show you how to really master ScreamerNet to set up and manage a robust production level render farm on the Mac.

• Setting up the Mac OS X Network for Rendering
  • Sharing the Host Machine on the Network
  • Sharing the Content Folder with SharePoints
  • Mounting the Content Folder from the Render Machines
• Step-by-step LWSN PPC Mac OS X Advanced Network Rendering Example
  • Creating a New set of PPC Config Files for ScreamerNet
  • Setting up the Host PPC Config File
  • Setting up thePPC Config Files on the First Remote Render Mac
  • Setting up LWSN PPC and the cmdLine Files on the First Remote Mac
  • Setting up LWSN PPC on the Remaining Render Nodes
  • Setting up the Scenes for LWSN PPC Batch/Network Rendering
  • Launching the LWSN PPC Nodes on the Rendering Machines
  • Rendering the Network Batch with ScreamerNet Controller PPC.
  • Rendering the Network Batch with RenderFarm Commander PPC.
• Step-by-step ScreamerNet UB Mac OS X Advanced Network Rendering Example

Setting up the Mac OS X Network for Rendering

In order to perform network rendering, you’ll obviously need a functioning network. This tutorial assumes that you have at least a basic peer-to-peer Mac OS X network already up and running which allows you to connect from one Mac to another to share files. You don’t need Mac OS X Server, any version of Mac OS X is capable of peer-to-peer networking for up to ten Macs. To network render with more than ten Macs you can use Mac OS X Server instead. If you don’t already have a physical network, you’ll first need to set one up. You can find information about setting up a Mac OS X network with this Google search.

This tutorial was written using Mac OS X.4.10 running on a 100 Base-T Ethernet network and LightWave 9.3. Other versions of Mac OS X and/or LightWave may be slightly different, but the basic concepts will remain the same...

Sharing the Host Machine on the Network

The first step in setting up your network rendering is to make sure the host machine, which contains your LightWave applications, third party render controller and Content Directory, is available on the network for the other remote rendering machines to log into.

Simply follow these steps to verify that your host machine is available:

1. Launch System Preferences from the Apple menu or the Dock.
2. Click the Sharing icon under Internet & Network.
3. Click the Services tab.
4. Select Personal File Sharing and click the Start button, if it’s not already on.
   
5. If you’ll be using any PC render nodes in your render farm, you should also activate Windows Sharing.
6. Click the Firewall tab and click Start if the firewall was not already on. This helps secure your Mac.
   
7. In some cases, such as if you’re running any older Mac OS 9 systems as render nodes (with LWSN 7.5), it may also be necessary to activate AppleTalk.
   1. Click the Network icon at the top or under Internet & Network.
   2. Select Built-in Ethernet on the Show: pop-up menu.
   3. Click the AppleTalk tab.
   4. Turn on the Make AppleTalk Active checkmark.

Sharing the Content Folder with SharePoints

In order to successfully render scenes with ScreamerNet, it’s critical that you understand and use the Content Directory properly. For more information see Mastering LightWave’s Content Directory.

When rendering scenes over the network, there is an added twist. Not only do all the render nodes need to have access to and be able to locate the shared content folder, they may need to locate it with two different paths to maintain a secure network. This is especially the case when you are running ScreamerNet instances on remote machines as well as on the host machine at the same time, or if you are using a mixture of Macintosh and PC machines.

Typically the path to locate a folder on the host machine locally will be different than the path used to access it remotely, unless the remote user is logging into the host machine using the host machine’s administrator user. This however gives the remote machine full, unrestricted access to the host machine, which is not very secure. We’ll be using a third party render controller that will seamlessly handle multiple paths to the content directory, based upon where it’s being accessed from.

Another potential problem with the shared content directory is that in a production environment a large deal of space is needed to hold all the content and rendered frames. This often means that the content folder needs to be located on a hard drive other than the host machine’s internal system drive. On Mac OS X however, the only user that can typically access and mount an external drive, is the host machine’s administrator. To solve this problem, we’ll be using the free Mac OS X utility SharePoints, by HornWare, to publish our content directory from an external drive. If you do use this utility frequently, a small donation to the author would be appreciated and encouraged.

The following steps will walk you through the process of sharing the content folder with SharePoints.

1. Move your properly structured content folder (for the example below use the sample Content folder that came with LightWave 9) to wherever you wish it to reside for sharing. In our case it’s at the top level of one of our external drives.
   
2. Rename this folder NetContent. You can call it anything you wish, but I’ve found that using a generic name like NetContent and leaving it in the same place makes the most sense. This way I can have the entire render farm always accessing this same folder as the content directory. Then when I wish to render a scene on the farm, I simply move all the scene’s contents into this NetContent folder (and move older stuff out if I wish). This way, its always accessible to the network, all the ScreamerNet config files will know where to find it and I don’t have to keep messing with the config files or SharePoints once everything is set up.
3. Create a new folder named Commands inside the NetContent folder. This will be the command directory for the network controller to communicate with the render nodes.
4. Create another new folder inside the NetContent folder. Name this new folder Renders. This will serve as the render destination for all the remote render nodes.
5. Download the latest version of SharePoints and verify that it’s compatible with the version of Mac OS X that you are currently running.
6. Install it by copying the SharePoints.prefPane file into your home folder’s Library/PreferencePanes folder. Create the PreferencePanes folder in your Library folder if it doesn’t already exist. Installing it this way will only make it available to you, not other users that may log into the same Mac. To make the control panel available to all users instead, you could place it in the top level /Library/PreferencePanes folder instead of the Library folder in your home directory.
7. Creating a new share point with the NetContent folder.
   1. Open the System Preferences panel and click the SharePoints icon at the bottom.
      
   2. Type NetContent into the Share Name field. This is the path the remote render machines will ultimately use to access the content folder on the network.
   3. Set the Group to staff.
   4. Set the Owner & Group both to r/w, but leave Everyone set to none.
   5. Use the Browse button to select the NetContent folder.
   6. Set AppleFileServer(AFS) Sharing to Shared (+).
   7. If you will be using any PC render nodes, also set the Windows(SMB) Sharing to Shared (+).
   8. Click the Create New Share button.
8. Creating a new File Sharing only user that can log into this machine from each remote Mac for rendering.
   1. Click the Users & "Public" Shares button.
      
   2. If any of the current users are selected, deselect them by command-clicking on the selected user in the user list to the left. This will clear out the text fields to the right.
   3. Type NetRender in the Full Name field.
   4. Type netrender in the Short Name field.
   5. Change the Group to Staff. This user’s group must be set to the same group that you gave read/write access to when you created the share point NetContent.
   6. Click the Get Next UID button to generate a unique UID number for this user.
   7. Leave Public Directory Shared? set to No.
   8. Click the Add New User button.
   9. When asked to confirm adding a new File Sharing only user, click Yes.
   10. Then provide your administrator password when asked.
   11. Then SharePoints will ask for a new password for this user. Enter a password twice, and write it down somewhere so you don’t forget it.
9. Setting the file permissions for the NetContent folder. Unless your content is on an external disk that has Ignore ownership on this volume activated, then you’ll need to verify that the NetRender user will have read/write access to the NetContent folder and all its contents. You’ll need to do this any time you add or change content inside the NetContent folder. All the render nodes need read/write access to this content or the network render will fail.
   1. Select the NetContent folder in the Finder and select File->Get Info.
      
   2. Set Group to staff.
   3. Set Owner Access & Group Access to Read & Write.
   4. Set Others to No Access.
   5. Click the Apply to enclosed items… button.
   6. Then verify that the change flowed down through all the files by selecting a file inside the NetContent folder and verifying that the permissions are set correctly for that file, using File->Get Info. Depending on where you got the content, you may not be able to change all the permissions this way. In that case use the following commands in the terminal. Substituting the name of your external hard drive or path to NetContent and your username. You’ll need to be logged in as an administrator and also supply your administrator’s password when you run the sudo command.
      cd /Volumes/WorkHD
sudo chown -R ownerusername:staff NetContent
sudo chmod -R 770 NetContent

Mounting the Content Folder from the Render Machines

Once the NetContent share point is set up. It’s quite easy to mount it from each remote Mac. Simply follow these steps on each remote rendering machine:

1. In any Finder window, click the Network icon.
2. Locate and select the host machine on the network, it may show up directly or you may need to open a subgroup depending upon how your network is configured.
3. Once the host machine is selected, click the Connect button.
   
4. When the log-in screen appears click the Registered User button. Guest access won’t work in this instance since you wouldn’t have sufficient read/write privileges.
5. Enter the username NetRender and the password you created on the host machine using SharePoints. Click the Connect button when ready.
6. You’ll now get a dialog box showing all available home directories as well as any share points on the host computer. Select the NetContent share point. Click OK and the NetContent share point will be mounted on the desktop of the remote Mac.

Step-by-step LWSN PPC Mac OS X Advanced Network Rendering Example

Creating a New set of PPC Config Files for ScreamerNet

This step-by-step example is for LWSN PPC. For LightWave 9.3 ScreamerNet UB see: Step-by-step ScreamerNet UB Mac OS X Advanced Network Rendering Example

Before setting up the individual remote rendering machines, we’ll first set up a new SNConfigs folder with a master set of LWSN PPC config files independent of your normal LightWave config files. This way you can change your LightWave configs, without affecting the render farm and vice versa. This new config set may then be modified for each remote rendering machine.

For more detailed information see Managing LightWave’s All Important Config Files.

1. Inside the Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3 folder, on the host Mac (the one that will run the controller that will control the remote render Macs), create a new folder named SNConfigs.
   
2. Duplicate the LightWave cmdLine file as a backup. It’s typically installed as: Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:Programs:LightWave cmdLine
3. Open the LightWave cmdLine file in TextEdit.
4. Edit the LightWave cmdLine contents to redirect LightWave to the new SNConfigs folder. Edit it to read as follows:
   -0 -c"HostHD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs"
   Change HostHD to the name of your Mac’s main hard drive. See Utilizing LightWave’s Mac Command Line Parameters for more information.
5. Save the LightWave cmdLine file making sure that no ".txt" extension gets added to the file name, or LightWave will fail to recognize it.

Setting up the Host PPC Config File

We’ll now verify the LWSN PPC specific settings in the new config file.

For more information see Managing LightWave’s All Important Config Files.

1. On the host Mac launch Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:Layout.
2. Open Render->Options->Render Globals and set the Segment Memory Limit to 32.
   See Default Segment Memory for more information.
   
3. Click yes when asked if this should be the new default setting, or it won’t be saved.
4. Click the Render tab and set Multithreading to 1 Thread. We want each node to only use one thread each. See Multithreading for more information.
   
5. Quit LightWave to save the config file.
6. You may now switch your LightWave cmdLine file back to what it was before, using the duplicate backup cmdLine file you made. This way LightWave itself will use its own original set of configs, independent of these new SNConfigs. Just keep in mind that if you subsequently add plug-ins or otherwise change your normal LightWave configs, you’ll also need to update your SNConfigs if you wish the render farm to also use the new plug-ins or other changes.

Setting up the PPC Config Files on the First Remote Render Mac

See Managing LightWave’s All Important Config Files for more information.

1. On the first remote rendering Mac, create a new Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3 folder.
2. Copy the following folders from the host Mac’s LightWave 3D 9.3 folder to the remote Mac’s new LightWave 3D 9.3 folder.
   • Plugins
   • Programs
   • SNConfigs
3. Open the Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs:LightWave Extensions 9 Prefs file on the remote rendering Mac in TextEdit
4. Select the name of your host Mac's hard drive in the first { Entry as seen below.
   
5. Copy the hard drive name to the clipboard.
6. Select Edit->Find->Find… from the menu.
7. Paste the name of the host hard drive into the Find: field.
8. Type or copy/paste the name of this remote rendering Mac’s hard drive into the Replace with: field, and click Replace All. This should replace over 600 or so references.

9. Save the LightWave Extensions 9 Prefs file making sure that TextEdit doesn’t add a ".txt" extension to the file name, or LWSN won’t recognize it.

Setting up LWSN PPC and the cmdLine Files on the First Remote Mac

For more information see Utilizing LightWave’s Mac Command Line Parameters.

1. Open the directory Render01HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:Programs and locate the LWSN application.
2. Make two copies (assuming you’re on a dual core or dual processor Power Macintosh) of LWSN and name them LWSN-01 and LWSN-02, with no file extension.
   
3. Make one copy of the file LWSN cmdLine and name it LWSN-01 cmdLine, with no file extension.
4. Edit the LWSN-01 cmdLine file’s contents to read as follows, all on one line:
   -2 -c"Render01HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"NetContent" ":Commands:job1" ":Commands:ack1"
Note: you need to specify the path to the config directory on the remote render machine. Don’t forget to replace Render01HD with the actual name of your remote render machine’s hard drive. We’ll be using a remote content directory path, NetContent, which we will share with SharePoints. We’ll also be using a command directory, Commands, inside this content directory.
5. Save the cmdLine file, making sure no file extension is added to the filename.
6. Duplicate the LWSN-01 cmdLine file and name it LWSN-02 cmdLine.
7. Edit the LWSN-02 cmdLine file’s contents by changing the job and ack number to match the file name’s number, as follows:
   
   -2 -c"Render01HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"NetContent" ":Commands:job2" ":Commands:ack2"
8. Save the cmdLine file, making sure no file extension is added to the filename.

Setting up LWSN PPC on the Remaining Render Nodes

Now perform the following steps to set up each additional render node.

1. Copy the Render01HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3 folder from the first remote render node, to each of the others.
2. Open the Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs:LightWave Extensions 9 Prefs file on each remote rendering node in TextEdit
3. Find and Replace all the instances of Render01HD with the corresponding name of each of the remaining remote render nodes.
4. Save the LightWave Extensions 9 Prefs file on each of the remaining remote render nodes, making sure that TextEdit doesn’t add a ".txt" extension to the file name.
5. In the Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:Programs folder on each of the remaining remote render nodes, locate the files LWSN-01, LWSN-01 cmdLine, LWSN-02 and LWSN-02 cmdLine.
6. Change the numbers in these file names with the next available sequential numbers on each of the remaining remote render nodes. For instance. If the next available nodes are also dual processor Macs, you would change all the names from "01" and "02" to "03" and "04". Then the next Mac would get "05" and "06", etc...
7. Edit all the LWSN-## cmdLine file’s contents by changing the hard drive name and changing the job and ack number to match the file number in the corresponding file name, as follows:
   
   On the second remote rendering machine:
   LWSN-03 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render02HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"NetContent" ":Commands:job3" ":Commands:ack3"

LWSN-04 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render02HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"NetContent" ":Commands:job4" ":Commands:ack4"
   
   
   On the third remote rendering machine:
   LWSN-05 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render03HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"NetContent" ":Commands:job5" ":Commands:ack5"

LWSN-06 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render03HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"NetContent" ":Commands:job6" ":Commands:ack6"
   
   
8. If you also wish to render on the host machine, and if it’s also a dual processor Mac, duplicate the LWSN and LWSN cmdLine files twice and name them LWSN-07, LWSN-07 cmdLine, LWSN-08 and LWSN-08 cmdLine.
9. Edit all the host machine’s LWSN-## cmdLine file’s contents by changing the hard drive name and changing the job and ack number to match the file number in the corresponding file name. Just like on the remote nodes. The major difference is that we will also edit the content directory path to use a full local path, since these LWSN instances will access the content folder locally, rather than over the network. In this example the content folder is located on an external drive, named WorkHD, attached to the host Mac. If yours is located elsewhere, use the full path to its location in your setup.
   
   On the host machine:
   LWSN-07 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"HostHD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"WorkHD:NetContent" ":Commands:job7" ":Commands:ack7"

LWSN-08 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"HostHD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"WorkHD:NetContent" ":Commands:job8" ":Commands:ack8"
   

Setting up the Scenes for LWSN PPC Batch/Network Rendering

The main difference between setting up the scenes here for advanced network rendering, rather than the previous example in basic network rendering, is that we need to copy (or move) all the content into the network accessible NetContent share point. If you have not already set up your NetContent folder with SharePoints, see Sharing the Content Folder with SharePoints above. For this example you need your sample LightWave 9 Content folder to be renamed NetContent and shared with SharePoints.

For more information see Successful Scene File Preparation for ScreamerNet.

NOTE: As of LW9.3, Mac UB output paths saved in a scene file are not compatible with LWSN 9.3 PPC. This means you must set the output path using LightWave 9.3 PPC rather than Layout 9.3 UB.

1. Launch Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:Layout.
2. Use Edit->Set Content Directory to set the content directory to the NetContent folder.
3. Use File->Load->Load Scene... to load: ":Scenes:Cel_Shade:Drunk_Zombie.lws"
   1. Open Render->Options->Render Globals.
   2. Set the following render range fields:
      • Render First Frame: 100
      • Render Last Frame: 200
      • Render Frame Step: 10
   3. Click the Output tab.
   4. Click the RGB Files button.
      
   5. Type Drunk_Zombie in the Save As: field.
   6. Navigate to the top level of the Content Directory, LW9Content.
   7. Navigate to the Renders folder if it already exists, otherwise create a New Folder in the top level of the Content Directory named Renders.
   8. Create a New Folder named Drunk_Zombie_Renders.
   9. Click the Save button to dismiss the dialog and accept the changes.
   10. Set the RGB Type pop-up menu to LW_TGA24(.tga)
   11. The RGB readout should now read Drunk_Zombie0001.tga, ...
   12. Save the scene.
4. Use File->Load->Load Scene... to load: ":Scenes:Expressions:BigWheel.lws"
   1. Open Render->Options->Render Globals
   2. Set the following render range fields:
      • Render First Frame: 30
      • Render Last Frame: 60
      • Render Frame Step: 2
   3. Click the Output tab.
   4. Click the RGB Files button.
   5. Type BigWheel in the Save As: field.
   6. Navigate to the Renders folder inside the Content Directory.
   7. Create a New Folder named BigWheelRenders.
   8. Click the Save button to dismiss the dialog and accept the changes.
   9. Set the RGB Type pop-up menu to LW_TGA24(.tga)
   10. The RGB readout should now read BigWheel0001.tga, ...
   11. Save the scene.
5. Quit LightWave.

Launching the LWSN PPC Nodes on the Rendering Machines

Perform the following steps on each of the remote rendering Macs.

For additional information review Sharing the Content Folder with SharePoints& Mounting the Content Folder from the Render Machines.

1. On each of the remote Macs, in any Finder window, click the Network icon.
   
2. Log into the host Mac with the username and password of the NetRender user you created on the host machine using SharePoints. Click the Connect button when ready.
3. Mount the NetContent share point, which will then appear on the desktop.
4. Open the Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:Programs folder, on the remote rendering machine, not on the host Mac.
5. Launch the next two available LWSN-0# nodes, one at a time, on each dual processor remote machine as follows.
   • Remote Render Machine 01: LWSN-01 & LWSN-02
   • Remote Render Machine 02: LWSN-03 & LWSN-04
   • Remote Render Machine 03: LWSN-05 & LWSN-06
6. Now go to the dual processor host Mac and launch the next two available LWSN-0# nodes, one at a time, as follows.
   • Host Machine: LWSN-07 & LWSN-08
7. Note that each LWSN instance will repeatedly write Can't access job file to the window. This is normal, until the render controller is started, which creates the job files.
8. Any of these remote Macs may also be located on the Internet, if the host Mac has a static IP address. In such cases, simply use Mac OS X’s Go->Connect to Server on the remote Mac and type in the host Mac’s IP address. Mount the NetContent folder and proceed as if it were just another render node, following the previous steps.

Rendering the Network Batch with ScreamerNet Controller PPC

Since the network render controller that is built in LightWave is not really flexible enough for use in a production environment, we’ll turn to Jonathan Baker’s robust ScreamerNet Controller for OS X which has the following benefits:

• Allows scenes to be added or deleted from the render queue at any time.
• Allows the queue to be reordered at any time.
• Handles remote and local paths so that you can use SharePoints.
• Saves the queue so it may resume in the event of a crash or power outage.
• Scans for completed frames when adding scenes so that you can resume a crashed scene or stop and continue a render at another time.
• Jonathan Baker is extremely responsive to the users and quickly fixes any bugs.

ScreamerNet Controller for OS X is easy to setup and use. Just follow these simple steps:

1. Download the latest version of ScreamerNet Controller.
2. Drag it to your Applications folder.
3. Launch it.
4. Select the menu ScreamerNet Controller for OS X -> Network Options…
   
5. Next to "For Mac network nodes, the following path is mounted:" click the Set Path button.
6. Navigate to the NetContent folder.
7. Type NetContent: into the corresponding text field, and hit OK.
8. Next select the menu CPUs -> Set Max CPUs… and enter the number of LWSN instances you are running. In this case 8. You’ll then see 8 CPUs listed in the top window pane.
   
9. Select the menu CPUs -> Set Command Directory… and navigate to the Commands folder inside the NetContent folder. Now each of the CPUs should initialize and finally change to a status of Ready. If they don’t, then your setup is incorrect. Both ScreamerNet Controller and all the LWSN instances must be pointed to the same command directory. They all must also have read/write access to that directory. They communicate with each other by reading and writing files to this common shared directory.
10. Now go down the CPU list and double-click on each one to open the CPU options.
11. Turn on the Use Remote Mounting Path (Mac Only) option for all the remote nodes that are not running on the host machine. Leave this option OFF for the LWSN instances that are running on the host machine. While you are doing this, you may also give each instance a name that makes it easier for you to keep track of which machine is running which LWSN instance.
12. Now select the menu Scenes -> Add Scene…, locate and load the first scene: ":Scenes:Cel_Shade:Drunk_Zombie.lws"
13. Verify the settings for frame range and output options on the resulting panel.
14. Do the same for ":Scenes:Expressions:BigWheel.lws"
15. And ScreamerNet Controller will have the network render your scenes...
    
16. As each frame is rendered, it appears in the appropriate NetContent:Renders folder.
17. When done, CPUs -> Select All Active CPUs. Then CPUs -> Remove CPUs. This will quit all the running LWSN instances. Then Quit ScreamerNet Controller and un-mount NetContent from each of the remote nodes.

Rendering the Network Batch with RenderFarm Commander PPC

Another strong contender in the field of third party LightWave network render controllers is Bruce Rayne’s excellent RenderFarm Commander which has the following benefits:

• Can split single frames across many render nodes.
• Can show image previews of completed frames.
• Can assemble QuickTime animations.
• Can help auto setup the render farm.
• Has a lower license cost per node than ScreamerNet Controller.
• Bruce Rayne is extremely responsive to the users, quickly fixes any bugs and is constantly adding exciting new features.

With a few minor adjustments to our set up we can use RenderFarm Commander to render our samples instead. RenderFarm Commander can only allow non-administrator access to the content directory through the Public folder. You must use the same folder as both the Content Directory and the Command Directory. You also need to have your render destination located inside the Images folder. So we need to make the following adjustments to our set up.

1. Move the NetContent folder into the HostHD:Users:HostUserName:Public folder on the host Mac and set its permissions to Group: staff, Owner & Group Access: Read & Write, Others: No Access and click the Apply to enclosed items… button
   
2. Move the Renders folder into the Images folder inside the NetContent folder.
3. Change the path to the NetContent folder and the path to the job and ack files in all of the remote Mac’s cmdLine files as follows:
   
   On the first remote machine:
   LWSN-01 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render01HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"HostUserName:NetContent" ":job1" ":ack1"

LWSN-02 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render01HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"HostUserName:NetContent"":job2" ":ack2"
   
   
   On the second remote machine:
   LWSN-03 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render02HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"HostUserName:NetContent" ":job3" ":ack3"

LWSN-04 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render02HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"HostUserName:NetContent" ":job4" ":ack4"
   
   
   On the third remote machine:
   LWSN-05 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render03HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"HostUserName:NetContent" ":job5" ":ack5"

LWSN-06 cmdLine contents:
   -2 -c"Render03HD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"HostUserName:NetContent" ":job6" ":ack6"
   
   And back on the host machine:
   LWSN-07 cmdLine contents on the host machine:
   -2 -c"HostHD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"HostHD:Users:HostUserName:Public:NetContent" ":job7" ":ack7"

LWSN-08 cmdLine contents still on the host machine:
   -2 -c"HostHD:Applications:NewTek:LightWave 3D 9.3:SNConfigs" -d"HostHD:Users:HostUserName:Public:NetContent" ":job8" ":ack8"
   
4. Mount the HostUsername:NetContent folder on each of the remote Macs.
5. Launch all the LWSN instances on the host and remote machines.
6. Download the latest version of RenderFarm Commander (tutorial written for v 2.2.6).
7. Drag it to your Applications folder.
8. Launch it.
9. Select RenderFarm Commander -> Preferences and turn on the Public checkbox.
10. Switch to Prefs 2 and turn on the LightWave Version 8 checkbox.
11. Select Setup -> Command Directory and navigate to the NetContent folder that you moved to your public folder. Even though this is asking for the Command Directory, RenderFarm Commander uses the same directory for your Content Directory and your Command Directory.
12. On the main window, near the bottom, set the Max Nodes to 8. You should now see all eight nodes being initialized and reporting Ready in the Node list.
13. Select node 7 and turn on the Local checkmark at the bottom of the window.
14. Repeat this for node 8. These are the two nodes we’re running on the host Mac.
15. Now select File -> Add Scene, navigate to and select ":Scenes:Cel_Shade:Drunk_Zombie.lws"
16. Select Drunk_Zombie in the Scene list and click the Advanced button. Select the Change button next to Save Location. Navigate into the NetContent:Images:Renders:Drunk_Zombie_Renders folder.
17. Do the same for ":Scenes:Expressions:BigWheel.lws". Load it and change its Save Location.
18. Now select File -> Go All and your scenes should be rendered and the frames placed in their corresponding folders in the NetContent:Images:Renders folder.

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DreamLight Interactive Releases New ScreamerNet UB Launcher

DLI_SNUB-Launcher™ is an XCode Aqua GUI front end to interactively configure and launch multiple LightWave 9.3-10 ScreamerNet UB instances for standalone, batch and network rendering. Download your copy today!

Created by the author of Mastering LightWave ScreamerNet Rendering for Mac OS X, Michael Scaramozzino - LightWave 3D Artist Profile.

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