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These features are supported by the RenderMan for Maya “Pro” plugin in RenderMan Studio and are not available with the regular RenderMan for Maya plugin.

Introduction

Spooling RIB

Exporting RIB

Command Line RIB Options

More Information

Introduction

Perhaps the biggest difference in RenderMan for Maya “Pro” in RenderMan Studio is the addition of support for RIB, bringing together the simplicity of the RfM workflow with the flexibility and power of a RIB-based pipeline. In addition to basic ribgen (fully archived for efficiency, by the way), there is support for RIB boxes using per-node MEL commands (including Ri commands via MEL), “lazy” ribgen, and dynamic RIB archives, users can manually export RIB archives, and there is a new RIB option for Maya command line renders, Render -r rib, which opens still more options for distributed renders. Not to mention, RIB can be generated for selected geometry, for a given render layer, for an implicit passs of a given camera or light, for an explicit pass, or for a class of passes. How cool is that?

Spooling RIB

Spooling RIB is just about the easiest thing you can do. When you've selected RenderMan as your renderer in Maya, the Batch Render options menu offers you a simple interface with Alfred, the work distribution software included with RenderMan Studio. Once you select “Alfred Spool” you can do immediate, deferred, or remote RIB generation and select netrender (with immediate ribgen) or prman (with deferred or remote ribgen) via Alfred and RenderMan Pro Server. You can also choose remote or local Maya Batch renders via RenderMan for Maya.

Exporting RIB

If spooling RIB is “just about” the easiest thing you can do, exporting RIB pretty much is the easiest thing you can do. It's all handled simply through Maya's Export function, and you can export RIB archives of your entire scene or any given selection.

To export your RIB archive:

1. Go to File -> Export All/Selection… and click on the Options button.
2. Select “RIB Archive” from the dropdown list. You will be presented with File Type Specific Options to choose from, as seen in the image below…

   

   Choose your options wisely. Note that you can choose to export (or not) lights and shaders, mutliple or single frames, and you can apply gzip compression to your RIB archive (quite handy indeed).

3. Click the Export button. Make sure you browse to a convenient location to use to save your exported RIB archives.

In addition, you also generate RIB via a simple MEL command: rman genrib. Boom! RIB generated.

Command Line RIB Options

Outside of the Maya UI, you still have a world of options for generating RIB from your Maya scene files. Using Maya's Render command via a command prompt or terminal window. Users familiar with using Render via the command line will recognize the “-r” option — it is used to select a particular renderer, such as the Maya software renderer (-r sw), or RenderMan (-r rman). Now you can render directly to RIB using the -r rib option:

	Render -r rib scene.ma
	

Here is a list of additional options supported with -r rib:

• All purpose flags:

  -setAttr string string

  This flag can be used to set any of the global attributes listed in RenderMan_for_Maya.ini. It takes a name value pair. Attribute values which have multiple data elements should be surrounded by quotes. The flag can be used multiple times. Example:

  Render -r rman -setAttr ShadingRate 5 -setAttr PixelSamples "3 3" -setAttr motionBlur 1 -setAttr Format:resolution "320 240" filename

  -setPref string string

  This flag can be used to set any of the preferences listed in RenderMan_for_Maya.ini. It takes a name value pair. Attribute values that have multiple data elements should be surrounded by quotes. The flag can be used multiple times. For example:

  Render -r rman -setPref BatchCompileMode zealous filename

• General purpose flags:

  -rd path

  Directory in which to store image files

  -fnc string

  File Name Convention:

  name, name.ext, name.#.ext, name.ext.# name.#, name#.ext, name_#.ext

  As a shortcut, numbers 1, 2, … can be used.

  -im filename

  Image file output name

  -of string

  File format of output images: Alias, Cineon, MayaIFF, OpenEXR, SGI8, SGI16, SoftImage, Targa, Tiff8, Tiff16, Tiff32, Iceman

• Frame numbering options:

  -s float

  Starting frame for a sequence

  -e float

  End frame for a sequence

  -b float

  By frame/step for a sequence

  -pad int

  Number of digits in the frame number included in the output image file name

  -rfs int

  The initial (renumbered) frame number for the first frame when rendering

  -rfb int

  The step by which frames are renumbered (used in conjunction with -rfs).

• Camera options:

  -cam name

  The name of the camera from which you are rendering

  -rgb boolean

  Enable/disable RGB output

  -alpha boolean

  Enable/disable Alpha output

  -depth boolean

  Enable/disable Depth output

  -iip

  Disable all image planes before rendering

  -res int int

  Specify the resolution (X Y) of the rendered image

  -crop float float float float

  Specify a crop window for the rendered image

• Render Layers:

  -rl boolean|name(s)

  Render each listed layer separately

• MEL callbacks:

  -pre string

  MEL code executed before each frame

  -post string

  MEL code executed after each frame

  • MEL callbacks for Maya 7.0

    -preRender string

    MEL code executed before rendering

    -postRender string

    MEL code executed after rendering

    -preLayer string

    MEL code executed before each render layer

    -postLayer string

    MEL code executed after each render layer

    -preFrame string

    MEL code executed before each frame

    -postFrame string

    MEL code executed after each frame

• Bake Options:

  -bake int

  • 0: Don't bake, but do regular rendering
  • 1: Bake texture maps
  • 2: Bake texture maps and do regular rendering

  -bakeChannels string

  Comma delimited list of one or more channels: _ambient,_diffuse,_diffuse_noshadow, _incandescence,_indirect,_indirectdiffuse, _irradiance,_occlusion,_reflection,_refraction, _shadow,_specular,_subsurface,_surfacecolor, _translucence

  -bakeResolution int int

  Set X Y resolution of baked maps

  -bakeCamera string

  Camera to use while baking

  -bakeFileFormat string

  File format of output images: Alias, Cineon, It, MayaIFF, OpenEXR, SGI8, SGI16, SoftImage, Targa, Tiff8, Tiff16, Tiff32

  -bakeFileDepth string

  Depth of output images: byte, short, float

• Spool Options:

  -spool string

  	"mayabatch local"
  	"mayabatch remote"
  	"immediate rib, local render"
  	"deferred rib, remote render"
  	"remote rib, remote render"

  -alfredui

  Launch Alfred with its User Interface

  -chunkSize

  -chunkSize sets the “Frames Per Server.” This option is only applicable when used in conjunction with the -spool option.

• Other:

  -rep boolean

  Do not replace the rendered image if it already exists

  -n int

  Number of processors to use. 0 indicates use all available.

  -compile boolean

  Forces compilation of all shaders, even if they already exist.

---

• Remember to place a space between option flags and their arguments.
• Any boolean flag will take the following values as TRUE: on, yes, true, or 1.
• Any boolean flag will take the following values as FALSE: off, no, false, or 0.

---

Additionally, a complete list of the options can also be seen by running the Render -r rman -h command.

More Information

For more information about RIB in general, it's not a bad idea to check out the RenderMan Interface documentation in the RenderMan Manual.

For more information about spooling renders via Alfred, please consult the Alfred documentation.

For a tutorial on some simple RIB archiving, check out the Dynamic Read Archives tutorial.

And for more information about Ri commands via MEL, see the Ri for MEL documentation.

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