I'm not sure if this can work or if someone has suggested it before, but
here's my idea:

This is for scenes that take days to render. Is it possible to break a scene
up into separate parts to be rendered? My idea is that those who want to
help with large renders get together and work out a way to do this. Then
anyone who has a large render to be done sends the file to the leader of the
group who converts it for each participant. Each one then renders his part
separately and then sends it back to the leader who pastes it together
again. Each participant would have to submit their machines specifications
so that the Gigahertzes will get larger areas and the Pentium 1's smaller
areas to render.

Or else something like a network render over the internet..

Just a thought...

Nekar Xenos

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Nekar Xenos <vir### [at] iconcoza> wrote:
: Is it possible to break a scene up into separate parts to be rendered?

  Yes. Read the documentation on command line options for details.

  (I have made a shell-script for myself that distributes the rendering into
several computers here using this exact technique; it puts the computers to
render small parts of the image and after they have finished it joins the
parts into one image. The speed increase is considerable; with 8 computers
it's about 5-7 times faster than with one.)

-- 
char*i="b[7FK@`3NB6>B:b3O6>:B:b3O6><`3:;8:6f733:>::b?7B>:>^B>C73;S1";
main(_,c,m){for(m=32;c=*i++-49;c&m?puts(""):m)for(_=(
c/4)&7;putchar(m),_--?m:(_=(1<<(c&3))-1,(m^=3)&3););}    /*- Warp -*/

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Warp wrote:
> 
>   Yes. Read the documentation on command line options for details.
> 
>   (I have made a shell-script for myself that distributes the rendering into
> several computers here using this exact technique; it puts the computers to
> render small parts of the image and after they have finished it joins the
> parts into one image. The speed increase is considerable; with 8 computers
> it's about 5-7 times faster than with one.)
> 

But don't forget to mention that this does not work well with radiosity.  

Furthermore there is also PVMPov:

http://www.luga.de/~flierl/pvmpov/
http://www.wozzeck.net/images/pmp/

Christoph

-- 
Christoph Hormann <chr### [at] gmxde>
IsoWood include, radiosity tutorial, TransSkin and other 
things on: http://www.schunter.etc.tu-bs.de/~chris/

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Christoph Hormann <chr### [at] gmxde> wrote:
: But don't forget to mention that this does not work well with radiosity.  

  It's also useless if your parsing time is longer than your render time :)

-- 
char*i="b[7FK@`3NB6>B:b3O6>:B:b3O6><`3:;8:6f733:>::b?7B>:>^B>C73;S1";
main(_,c,m){for(m=32;c=*i++-49;c&m?puts(""):m)for(_=(
c/4)&7;putchar(m),_--?m:(_=(1<<(c&3))-1,(m^=3)&3););}    /*- Warp -*/

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"Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
news:3aa65e6f@news.povray.org...
> Christoph Hormann <chr### [at] gmxde> wrote:
> : But don't forget to mention that this does not work well with radiosity.
>
>   It's also useless if your parsing time is longer than your render time
:)
>

? but if the parse time takes place in parallel then there is still a gain.

Single machine
Parse time = 60 mins
Render time = 30 mins
Total time = 90 mins

2 machines
Parse time = 60 mins
Render time 15 mins
Total time = 75 mins

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In article <3aa66341$1@news.povray.org> , "Tom Melly" 
<tom### [at] tomandlucouk> wrote:

> ? but if the parse time takes place in parallel then there is still a gain.

The relative gain approaches zero with long parse times and shorter
render times.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
: The relative gain approaches zero with long parse times and shorter
: render times.

  And this only if only one computer makes the parsing.
  If you distribute the rendering to several computers "by brute force", that
is, by just starting povray in several computers and render parts of the
image (as I do in my script), then each computer has to parse the scene.

-- 
char*i="b[7FK@`3NB6>B:b3O6>:B:b3O6><`3:;8:6f733:>::b?7B>:>^B>C73;S1";
main(_,c,m){for(m=32;c=*i++-49;c&m?puts(""):m)for(_=(
c/4)&7;putchar(m),_--?m:(_=(1<<(c&3))-1,(m^=3)&3););}    /*- Warp -*/

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"Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
news:3aa7400a@news.povray.org...
> Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> : The relative gain approaches zero with long parse times and shorter
> : render times.
>
>   And this only if only one computer makes the parsing.
>   If you distribute the rendering to several computers "by brute force",
that
> is, by just starting povray in several computers and render parts of the
> image (as I do in my script), then each computer has to parse the scene.
>

Yes, but as long as each pc is parsing the scene at the same time, the parse
time doesn't get any longer, the render time just gets shorter.

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"Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:
> Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> : The relative gain approaches zero with long parse times and shorter
> : render times.
>
>   And this only if only one computer makes the parsing.
>   If you distribute the rendering to several computers "by brute force",
that
> is, by just starting povray in several computers and render parts of the
> image (as I do in my script), then each computer has to parse the scene.
How do you think 'bout sharing this script ?
Would you post it ?

> --
> char*i="b[7FK@`3NB6>B:b3O6>:B:b3O6><`3:;8:6f733:>::b?7B>:>^B>C73;S1";
> main(_,c,m){for(m=32;c=*i++-49;c&m?puts(""):m)for(_=(
> c/4)&7;putchar(m),_--?m:(_=(1<<(c&3))-1,(m^=3)&3););}    /*- Warp -*/


--
background{rgb 1}camera{location<1,5,-2>look_at 0}#macro m(a,b,i)#local
d=(b-a)/
8;#local
e=vcross(d,y);#if(i)m(a-e,a+e+2*d,i-1)m(a+e,a+2*d-e,i-1)m(a+3*d-e,a+e+3
*d,i-1)m(a+3*d-e,a+5*d-e,i-1)m(a+6*d-e,a+e+6*d,i-1)m(a+8*d-e,a+e+8*d,i-1)#el
se
cylinder{a,b,vlength(d)/3 pigment{rgb 0}}#end#end m(-4*x,2*x,4) // Jan
Walzer

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Jan Walzer <jan### [at] lzernet> wrote:
: How do you think 'bout sharing this script ?
: Would you post it ?

  I have posted it in povray.unix some time ago. Try searching there.

-- 
char*i="b[7FK@`3NB6>B:b3O6>:B:b3O6><`3:;8:6f733:>::b?7B>:>^B>C73;S1";
main(_,c,m){for(m=32;c=*i++-49;c&m?puts(""):m)for(_=(
c/4)&7;putchar(m),_--?m:(_=(1<<(c&3))-1,(m^=3)&3););}    /*- Warp -*/

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