Hi, I’ve just downloaded the 30 day demo of Deadline. Also, I’m thinking of switching to XSI and thought Deadline would be a perfect add on, where I too switch.
I’m having a problem where it seems that I’m missing the pass tab in the “submit to deadline” window in XSI. This is also preventing me from seding the job, getting an obvious error about missing passes.
“ERROR : Object required: ‘pass’ - [line 0 in C:\Graphics\Softimage\XSI_5.11\Application\Plugins\SubmitXSIToDeadline.vbs]
'ERROR : 2006-SubmitToDeadline - Unexpected failure.
SubmitToDeadline”
Also, if I may, I have a small question you could help me with on a related matter.
Since I’m unfamilliar with XSI, I’m not too clear on how rendering licenses work. Am I correct to assume that XSI only allows me to render in distributed rendering out of the box, but if I instead want to have each machine to render seperatly (hence deadline) I will need to buy render licenses for each machine ? Or does deadline actually use the satelite licences ?
Thanks a lot,
Francois
Hi Francois,
Try applying the XSI patch found here and see if you still get that error when you try to submit a job (it’s the second from the top).
http://software.franticfilms.com/index.aspx?page=deadline/supportdownloads
If you still get the error, I’ll take a look at the problem when I get in the office on Monday and will put another patch on the website once it’s fixed.
For network rendering, I believe you have to have render licenses for each machine, although I think others have configured satellite rendering through Deadline. It might be best to ask the XSI guys about their licensing, because they will know more about it than us. 
Cheers,
- Ryan
Thanks Ryan,
well it would seem the patch didn’t help, as the test scene I was using was still reacting the same way. (Scene from the tutorials XSI makes available)
But I’ve noticed that it works just fine when starting from a blank scene. I also know now that it’s normal to not have a pass tab if only one is present.
Further testing with a scene with 3 passes revealed another problem, failing to select which pass to render leads to the same exact error I was having previously. (It’s clearly stated in the script that if one doesn’t choose a pass, the current one would be used)
This kinda leads me to believe that the error with the first scene was simply one where the script would see that there was only one pass (hence not having a tab) but would fail to select it when sending the job.
As for the license question, thanks, you were correct. I had asked here because when I had asked my reseller all I got was that we should meet. lol So I imagined someone here would know and could just tell me. 
After further reading on the forum XSIbase I realised that out of the box, XSI as Zero license for frame rendering. Only allowing distributed rendering on a limited amount of machines. Kinda makes 3ds Max a lot more appealing. hehe (current software I know)
Thanks again for your quick answer. Though I have to admit, I won’t be doing further testing with Deadline.
Thanks for the details, I’m sure it won’t be too difficult to figure out what the problem is with the submission dialog.
We do offer great support for 3dsmax (it’s our primary 3D software here at Frantic Films), but I can understand that Backburner is a little cheaper, being free and all.
Anyway, thanks for taking the time to do the evaluation, and we appreciate the feedback.
Take care,
- Ryan