What happened to Render Manager?

I'm in the process of upgrading from 7 to 8, and I can't find the render manager application. In 7, you could launch it on a render node by right-clicking the node's icon in the activity tray and selecting "render manager". I don't get this option in 8. I also don't have the preferences tab on render nodes as mentioned in the manual.

I can launch it from inside the studio application, but it only runs as long as studio is running. I'm looking for the version that runs outside studio.

Also, the manual mentions a stand-alone manager application, like we had in the Eyeon days, but I can't locate in any of the subfolders.

I've also noticed missing Render Manager on nodes.

Running 8.2 and I do see the preferences menu on the node though. Which version are you running?

I worded that poorly. Apologies. I do have a preferences dialog on the nodes, but it doesn't contain the "network" tab mentioned in the manual, where you are supposed to be able to select "make this machine a render master".

I'm running 8.2 build 2 on Windows 10.

I've never used it but is it part of the Fusion Render Node installer (which is a separate msi bundled with Fusion Studio)?

The render node installer is the one I'm using for the render nodes. If the manager is there, I can't find it.

Apologies for the bump. I'd really like to resolve this issue. We attempted to move to V8 due to a scripting bug in V7 that seems to have been fixed in V8. Our render farm is now in a half-V7/half-V8 state and the compositors are getting agitated at me.

Hey Black Magic... where is the V8 standalone render manager?

This is only a user support forum. You should contact Blackmagic support directly.

Thanks. I've done that, and so far, I've received no response. I CAN'T be the only person using fusion studio with a render farm. I must be overlooking something. How are other folks dealing with this?

Hey Brad,

Network rendering has been one of the really big reasons I didn't move up to v8. I can't comment on getting it work, but I can say I've stayed on 7.7.1 because of network rendering. If you get it sorted, would love to hear a reply on here as it'll be worth trying on v8 if it's working.
Good Luck.

Thanks. I've done that, and so far, I've received no response. I CAN'T be the only person using fusion studio with a render farm. I must be overlooking something. How are other folks dealing with this?

We had the same problem, even more serios (rendernodes without gpu wouldnt render at all), got no support from BM and then finally did the reasonable thing:

switching to the black and yellow (black and red nowadays).

After using F6.4 for almost 5 years, the switch to 7/8 finally broke the camels back for us.
It is very frustrating to see that BM is not really adressing the core needs of its professional users in a timely manner.

How long did we have to wait to get floating licenses back?
Then they came but only if you bought 10+ licenses. There is no evident reasoning behind this.

Then the 8 release broke most renderfarms.

Looking back now- we had a good run with Fusion while we stayed on 6.4, the BM Versions brought nothing but trouble.

Now that thats over we see the good in the new comp-package.
Top-Notch Support, great Artist availability, great scalability.

I'm hoping that BM gets their act together, my lic-dongles are lying dormant in the drawer until then.

Well, network rendering in 8.2 works...we're using it everyday. But we're also managing through an external render manager ( Royal Render), not Fusions built in manager. So I'm not quite sure how to help out, or if I can be of any help.

Even In the past, when not using Royal Render, I only ever brought up Fusion's render manager from within Fusion running, and not as a stand alone.

Interesting, will take a fresh look at Fusion 8.2 ourselves here.

We ditched Fusion Studio 8.x as it completely failed to work with any non-gpu enabled hardware (such as dedicated render power).

[Steve Roberts]

The Render Manager is built into Fusion Studio, a standalone Render Manager does not currently ship with Fusion Studio. Due to the porting to 3 different OSes many features have to be redeveloped a different way and it is on the request list.

Fusion Studio ships with Unlimited Render Nodes, and a simplified licensing system to allow multi OS access and redundant license server setups.

Render Nodes can also be controlled by 3rd party Render Managers like Deadline etc.

Thanks for the response. It's good to know that a standalone render manager is on the list and why it was removed.

I've reverted our farm back to v7 while we decide to wait for the new stand-alone manager or move to a 3rd party manager. I remember making Fusion work with Backburner a long time ago. I remember it being problematic, but I don't remember why. Maybe it's time to take a look at that again.

maybe you can give afansy a try. its a free rendermanager with buildin support of fusion

Thanks. Free is a great feature. I'll look into it.

Hi, curious to see if anyone got Afanasy up and running with Fusion. We are thinking of using it.

I downloaded afansy, but got sidetracked before setting it up. The team is still mostly on Fusion7 for now. I'm also curious if anyone else is using it.

I All,

I am also in search for the standalone Render Manager, as I don't want to loose a license just for the Render Manager. Using a workstation as Render Manager turns out to be a really bad idea, as we regularly loose renderings unfinished when a user accidentially exits the program or experience a crash (yes, that can happen).

The Fusion 9 manual clearly states as follows on page 512:

The standalone Render Manager is available at www.blackmagicdesign.com/support or in a folder on the original Fusion installation disk. To run the manager, simply copy the rendermanager application and FusionScript.dll into a directory and run rendermanager.

There was no installation disk, only a SD card. I can see the SD card in disk manager, but I am unable to detect any valid volume on it. I do have disk recovery software like R-TT Studio on my machine, which can read ANY disk (EXT2/3/4, ReFS, NTFS, FAT, FAT16, FAT32, ExFAT, HFS, HFS+, UDF, RAIDs, ...) without issues. But the SD card: No.

On the website I see only the Fusion installers and the standalone Render Manager is neither mentioned "standalone" as an individual installer, nor is it part of the installation of a "normal" Fusion (as it has been in the Eyeon days).

Can someone send me a link to this, its urgently needed.

I don't want any third party Render Managers, as I want to use Fusion clustering etc. functionality.

Cheers,
Axel

Magna Mana Production
Bildbearbeitung GmbH
Frankfurt am Main
Germany

Hi,

on the tray icon of the FuRenderNode, there is no "RenderManager" .
Did i need a extra dongle for fusion studio, to have the manager on a PC, to setup it only for the manager ?