I am currently running the trial license of Deadline and we are experiencing very long Maya render times in comparison to a local render of the same file.



Using the exact same settings a file rending at ten minutes locally is rendering up to 1 hour or longer using Deadline.



Is there a limitation due to the trial license or has this problem been encountered before and a patch been created for it? (Similar to the Deadline patch for half frame rendering in Maya)



Also, is there a way to set up multiple threads on Deadline? Can this be causing the slow down?

One thing you can try is ensuring that RenderToNetworkDrive in the Maya Plugin Settings is set to False. You can do this in the Monitor in Super User Mode by selecting Tools -> Configure Plugins, then select the Maya plugin from the list on the left.



This forces Maya to render the frame locally, then copy it to the final destination after. This has been known to improve rendering speeds.



Another thing you can do is try running the same command line that Deadline is using from a command prompt. This will determine if Deadline is causing the render to be slow, or if it is an issue with the Maya command line renderer.



The Slave will output the render executable and command line arguments it is using during the render. Make sure to use the same arguments that Deadline is using, and make sure you’re pointing to the correct location of the Maya file. Let us know how the render time compares to Deadline’s.



Depending on the Maya renderer you are using, you can specify the number of CPUs you want to use for rendering. This is an option in the integrated Maya submission dialog (where you submit a job from within Maya).



Hope this helps!



Cheers,

• Ryan
  

Wow, thanks. The RenderToNetworkDrive=False seems to have totally fixed the problem. Deadline is now rendering at the same speed as a local render.



Thanks again.