And while the artists were having fun…
Posted in Production by Ton
Last week the artists were mostly on the other side of the institute, the presentation/workshop room. That enabled Campbell, Brecht and me to break open the floor, remove all the old network cables, and create a 1 gig network with a dedicated cable for every workstation to the central switch, connected to the server. About 300 meters of cables was being added!
This fast network allows us to set up a flexible working environment, having all user accounts and home directories residing on the server, being nfs/samba linked to the local workstations. That way people can switch computers and still get the complete personally configured working environment.
Same concept is in use for other server-side directories, which are being linked to the workstations for binaries and random project files. And lastly we’ll get svn running for the main Peach project database.
The server is being backupped every day to another disk, and that goes once a week to a firewire drive which gets locked safely.
Currently we have six workstations, as being delivered by Maqina last week. Each system got Ubuntu installed, and has two Eizo monitors now even; a 24 inch widescreen, and a 20 inch regular screen. This gives our animators a whopping 3520×1200 pixel desktop. Quite large enough for the time being I’d think! In one or two weeks Maqina will bring us an additional two, entirely sponsored systems. These will be the real power beasts having 8 cores and more memory you can reasonably dream of!
Right now, monday, is the first ‘normal’ day at the institute. See the images! Seven people concentrated at their desks. Sacha is making the breakdown, Enrico is storyboarding, Campbell is coding some Blender goodies, Brecht works on the micropolygon render, Nathan is teaching William the latest rigging tricks, and Andy desperately tries to get his work for the conference ready in time.
And me? I am going now to the office in the back, repairing the floor and painting walls!
Laters,
-Ton-
October 8th, 2007 at 1:30 pm
… real CG-romantic… much fun guys!
can´t wait for the first renderings and stuff…
October 8th, 2007 at 1:30 pm
Always me at first ?!?!? Anyway, the studio looks absolutely stunning!!! The sad thing is that as an OS project you have better resources than the studio I’m now (but the project here is great too!) :D
Keep going guys!
Gian
October 8th, 2007 at 2:45 pm
The Institute it looking quite nice. I wish I had more space to work. AnyWhoo have fun!
October 8th, 2007 at 3:00 pm
Looking very nice gentlemen. Even as an Apple fan, it’s good to see the studio go down the fully-open route for the OS’ and software.
October 8th, 2007 at 4:14 pm
Looks like you are really getting going. But maybe you should fire the guy hanging the poster upside down… ;-)
Keep up the good work!
October 8th, 2007 at 4:34 pm
whats up with the opensource poster, with a bad topology speachless ear, hanged upside down?
but.. very nice looking green wall there.. in the back.
.b
October 8th, 2007 at 6:35 pm
With those network speeds, it would sound plausable to have everyone plugged into a VERSE server, give collaborative 3D authoring a quick go, and maybe give some feedback on any good / bad aspects of everyone working on the one scene at the one time :)
October 8th, 2007 at 7:41 pm
Did I read it clearly? Micropoligon rendering ? Excelent!!!
October 8th, 2007 at 8:51 pm
go peach team! go micropolys! go ton’s dastardly plan to take over the world!
October 9th, 2007 at 12:28 am
#1 how come sacha and the old man get leapord skin chairs?
#2 how do you plan on converting the power converter booster to the flux capasitor? and how many gig ram faces did you flush through the fanny pack box face?
October 9th, 2007 at 12:38 am
#3 is it me or does sacha’s haircut get worse every week?
October 9th, 2007 at 12:48 am
Looks like it’s coming along nicely. The institute looks homely, the Peach team seems to be an interesting mixture (as the “Elephants Dream Team” was, too) and you’ve got hot hardware.
Can’t wait to meet you at the Conference. Hey Sago, let’s see what you’ve got hanging from your nose this time :-).
Cheers
Thorsten
October 9th, 2007 at 2:06 am
Dudes! That reports are awesome, please keep it up! You are giving the felling about whats going on inside… Just love the details about your routine ( painting walls, the videogame corner build movie etc) Somehow it is like being there in Amsterdam with you.
All the best! Don’t forget to eat and sleep and don’t forget your coats when going outside.
:P
October 9th, 2007 at 2:20 am
I’m glad you’ve let Cam do some coding Ton – I’m sure he was going through serious withdrawal. And he just loves network administration so much!
October 9th, 2007 at 3:15 am
Wow looks awesome. Once again i wish i was there =D so clean and organized compared to my room *stares wistfully at my desk covered with papers and books etc*
Btw what is a Micropolygon render i tried looking it up but can’t really find anything saying what it is
October 9th, 2007 at 3:37 am
How small is a Micro-polygon?
October 9th, 2007 at 3:41 am
Raffy…About the size of your…
October 9th, 2007 at 4:10 am
@cubedude04 & Raffy
When I asked this a few monthes ago here is the answer I got:
“You do know the displacement modifier in Blender I assume. And I think you also know that to get fine results you have to crank up subdivision to more than 4 often. Not very nice at all when you have MANY objects with it.
Micropolygon rendering, coming from REYES is a way to render very fine details.
The point behind is that a polygon is SMALLER than a screen pixel which explains the amazing fine details you can get. In REYES depending on you displacement material the polygon mesh is being heavily tesselated ON THE FLY which is why you can render those details very fast.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reyes_rendering
October 9th, 2007 at 5:43 am
I’ve heard that micro-polygon rendering can also really help with fur and hair rendering.
October 9th, 2007 at 10:27 am
@super W,
#1 me and the old man use them to get into character. We are professionals.
#2 by connecting a matrix decoder to the hyper network-scan system & 2300 gig ram faces (2000 during the weekend).
#3 it’s you.
—
@Thoro, the inside of my nose awaits you.
October 9th, 2007 at 4:28 pm
@Ton: we really need some benchmark with that beast of a machine!!!
October 9th, 2007 at 8:29 pm
Ton, the studio is looking great. You definitely have to do another video walk through when the studio remodel is finished. Keep up the great work!! You guys are awesome!!
October 9th, 2007 at 10:34 pm
Wow, it’s coming along quite nicely! Great pictures, and those sure are some nice, big screens you’ve got!
October 10th, 2007 at 9:44 am
Hey guys, what a cool project. And that just around the corner! Here at Addikt we’re going to follow your developments.
Good luck the comming months!
October 10th, 2007 at 10:33 pm
@Jurriaan: Hey, I like Addikt’s website and showreel.
@Sago: Nooooooooooooooo…
October 15th, 2007 at 4:27 pm
Hi all! I’m fnially all caught up with the Peach news today after being weeks away. The new place looks AWESOME and I’m really very happy for you guys. Now you’ve got me curious as to what a micropolygon render is… And I’m sure a bunch of goodies will find their way into Blender if fancy named things like that are already buzzing about.
Great luck!