I gotta wonder how much of the work is really done on the gpu most of stuff such as generating caustics has been shown in the past to be done quicker on a cpu then a gpu. Also espically I gotta wonder how slow this would run on a Quadro 700 since I believe it is a NV35 based chip and it wouldn't have float frame buffers or float flitering.
Nvidia getting into render appliances.
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Well, it's more complex that that. Larry wrote BMRT at GMU as his thesis. It was written before he joined Pixar in '95. (BMRT released to public in 94) BMRT was a raytracer, not a scanline renderer like PRMan. Larry joined Pixar and integrated many innovative features of BMRT into PRMan. Like many smart people, Larry decided to start his own company, so he quit to form ExLuna. Entropy was a commercialized version of BMRT with a big chunk optimized and rewritten and supporting many of PRMan's features.
The trade secret stuff is BS. Entropy scored big with Attack of the Clones, Returner, The Core, Stuart Little 2, and a few other big customers. That's the reason Pixar got pissed. Their monopoly on high quality RM compliant renderers was being challenged. First, unless they could prove that Larry stole source code and used that in BMRT or that he violated a patent, they'd have nothing on them, HENCE: Trade Secret.
Fact is, there is nothing you can do if someone sees an idea or implementation you have and recreates it themselves without using any media stolen from you, or anything that is not-patented. Trade Secret law isn't even federal, it's a state-by-state law. NDAs and non-compete agreements don't help either. The courts have continually shot down them down when they tried to make "human memory" of a meeting or a piece of information the main factor. Unless you steal disks, tapes, or paper out of your office containing the info, you can usually win.
Second, I view it as harassment, since it's a matter of deep pockets. I could theoretically be sued by any of my previous employers for something innocuous as a Hashtable used in a certain way. Pixar couldn't win against ExLuna, so they tried to go after ExLuna employees personally with the trade secret suit. I don't blame Larry, since fighting Pixar could have meant financial ruin for him, even if he won.
A company the size of Pixar, if it had anything real to protect, would have filed defensive patents and would not have relied on trade secret law. That tells me the case against ExLuna was simply based on the fact that a) they worked at Pixar b) they cloned PRMan features in BMRT and successfully took some of Pixar's PRMan customers and c) Pixar alleges they cloned these techniques only by knowing how PRMan implemented them.
Yes, but why did Pixar order OLD VERSION of BMRT to be injuncted as well. BMRT versions before Larry joined Pixar were still usable to the academic community for teaching. It makes no sense.
Larry made one fatal mistake: He should have open-sourced BMRT years ago. It would have f*cked Pixar and there's no way they could legally stop an open-source BMRT. He could have still made money doing customized versions and support on Entropy, but BMRT would be unrevokable.
Yes, I don't like Pixar. They make good movies, but they make Microsoft look like Linus Torvalds when it comes to their software.
No, of course I'm not advocating piracy.Sage said:surely you're not advocating piracy? I don't know about this one but that little remark would get you instantly banned on some CG forums....RussSchultz said:Hrm. That's what gnutella is all about.
It would be nuts to run any legitimate business on pirated software.
Let us not forget who owns Pixar and the PRman cash cow... Steve Jobs. Same man who bought Shake and removed it from the Win platform, and I'm sure the Linux port won't live long either.
By the way, my pal was working at Frantic Films in those days, they were one of the biggest Entropy house with some 50+ licences. They weren't happy...
At least they've lowered the price of PRman since that lawsuit (although Mental Ray's success in the VFX market had a role too, the Matrix sequels relied on it for many important scenes like all with digital doubles).
By the way, my pal was working at Frantic Films in those days, they were one of the biggest Entropy house with some 50+ licences. They weren't happy...
At least they've lowered the price of PRman since that lawsuit (although Mental Ray's success in the VFX market had a role too, the Matrix sequels relied on it for many important scenes like all with digital doubles).
So NVIDIA had been planning to support entropy in exactly this way for a while? Only now they have ripped out Renderman support and changed the API, hitched up the price and tied it to their hardware ... will Pixar be satisfied with this? (Or maybe this design of Gelato was basically laid out in the settlement?)
Actually, I was refering to the non-realtime hardware rendering option that first became available in Maya 5, but it's always good to see improved realtime rendering as well. I don't even use Maya as I like Max's interface better, but Alias definitely seems to be ahead of Discreet with respect to hardware rendering support. I haven't messed with Max 6 yet though.Goragoth said:
Hopefully Mental Ray will take advantage of non-Quadro hardware as well. Mental Ray is also being distributed with 3ds max and Viz I believe.Goragoth said:
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