Welcome to MoonRay!

[randypacker]

Welcome to the MoonRay Forum!

We’re using this forum to discuss all things MoonRay. Please feel free to:

• Ask any questions you’re wondering about.
• Discuss any problems building or running MoonRay
• Share ideas
• Showcase work done with MoonRay
• Engage with the community

We’re looking forward to getting to know everyone better!

Note: As this is our initial public release, we do expect to hear of issues as people try MoonRay in far more diverse environments than we use. We’ll try and help as best we can, and appreciate your patience as we work to launch open-source MoonRay, and continue to deliver on our commitments to our shows. We anticipate the expertise in this forum along with your contributions will be a valuable help to the new MoonRay community.

[snick-m]

I've never worked with any renderer on such a low level before (source code level) but am interested to bring OpenMoonRay to Blender. How should I go about starting on that?

[matthewlow-dwa]

Hi @snick-m , thanks for your interest! We've been following the Hydra Blender integration work, and once that stabilizes and deploys, we hope to enable our hdMoonray Hydra Render Delegate for Blender

[MakramDaou]

Good to know! Active work is currently being done by AMD on the USD Hydra render engine https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/pulls/104712

[luxaritas]

Probably worth noting that there is a blender plugin before the built-in support is added: https://github.com/GPUOpen-LibrariesAndSDKs/BlenderUSDHydraAddon

[luxaritas]

NB: Materials still presumably present an issue with that addon. USDPreviewSurface is used by default, but it does allow for MaterialX nodes to be created. Would be interesting to see Moonray interop with MaterialX

[BrianHanke]

Congrats on the release! I'm interested in getting a Windows build working. Looking forward to following discussions on that topic and helping where I can.

[rujialiu]

I'm also interested in building native Windows executables, though currently I've only built it with Docker (Windows Hyper-V instead of WSL2). Need to play around it for more time before trying to build it natively (I'm planning to build it with VS2022).

[DoragoDoggo]

I would love to be kept updated on that! I've only ever done a little bit in C++ and Python, and I wouldn't really call myself a programmer, so I'm basically relying on this community to help me get this stuff working!

[874604650]

is there for houdini version? Please Make more presets so that we can understand this renderer as soon as possible

[randypacker]

I'm not sure what you mean by a houdini version. Can you provide more details? We're eager to help!

[SomeAB]

most people are on windows.. as some production tools like unreal engine don't work well on linux. Plus most people in CG don't necessarily have knowledge of compiling software from source.. or don't have time to do it

Please provide a add-on format version of pre-compiled moonray .. like octane or renderman does .. and blender community can take out moonray for a spin... if you know what I mean

[randypacker]

Hi,

Understood and thank you! We love the idea to support other operating systems like Windows as well as pre-compiled software, yet unlike Octane and Renderman and others, we are not commercial, rather entirely open-source and internally we support our productions and the current Linux environment they run within, and do our best to broaden horizons beyond that. Nonetheless, we fully support efforts to expand MoonRay to other environments, and will help out where we can; we hope the source code provides a good basis for the community to dig into MoonRay and help bring it beyond what we've started here today.

[xXTR0YXx]

Hello Everyone! Thanks for the brave move to go open-source with your inhouse renderer. Due to the lack of coding knowledge I have to rely on others to come up with a windows integration. But I am sure, that once there is a windows-build the whole project will really gain track. Can't wait to run some tests and even use it in production one day.

[fhernandezKt88]

I will try to build MoonRay for MacOS (full build including Ui).

[macetraveler]

I'd love that

[nicholasmpetro]

Thank you so much for going open source! Excited to see the progress with getting this running inside of Blender. I am most interested in getting a Windows build up and running, but I work inside of Linux as well :) Is it okay if i cover any future announcements and pertinent information on my YouTube channel?

[kjeffery]

Hi @nicholasmpetro ! We are excited to have you share MoonRay developments! I would love a link when you do! We ask that you inform your viewers that you do not represent DreamWorks Animation or its parent or affiliated companies.

[nicholasmpetro]

Of course! Appreciate it :)

[MikelSotomonte]

Super exciting stuff! While trying to build Moonray I ran into a problem, after running cmake --preset container-release `` ...

`CMake Error at moonray/CMakeLists.txt:8 (add_subdirectory):
The source directory

/openmoonray/moonray/moonray_dcc_plugins

does not contain a CMakeLists.txt file.

CMake Error at moonray/CMakeLists.txt:9 (add_subdirectory):
The source directory

/openmoonray/moonray/moonshine

does not contain a CMakeLists.txt file.

CMake Error at moonray/CMakeLists.txt:10 (add_subdirectory):
The source directory

/openmoonray/moonray/moonshine_usd

does not contain a CMakeLists.txt file. `... the error kept going with similar lines but different directories.

This is the Cmake error log file: `Performing C SOURCE FILE Test CMAKE_HAVE_LIBC_PTHREAD failed with the following output:
Change Dir: /build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp

Run Build Command(s):/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/gmake -f Makefile cmTC_4128c/fast && /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/gmake -f CMakeFiles/cmTC_4128c.dir/build.make CMakeFiles/cmTC_4128c.dir/build
gmake[1]: Entering directory '/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp'
Building C object CMakeFiles/cmTC_4128c.dir/src.c.o
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/cc -DCMAKE_HAVE_LIBC_PTHREAD -o CMakeFiles/cmTC_4128c.dir/src.c.o -c /build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp/src.c
Linking C executable cmTC_4128c
/installs/cmake-3.23.1-linux-x86_64/bin/cmake -E cmake_link_script CMakeFiles/cmTC_4128c.dir/link.txt --verbose=1
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/cc CMakeFiles/cmTC_4128c.dir/src.c.o -o cmTC_4128c
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: CMakeFiles/cmTC_4128c.dir/src.c.o: in function main': src.c:(.text+0x2d): undefined reference to pthread_create'
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: src.c:(.text+0x39): undefined reference to pthread_detach' /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: src.c:(.text+0x45): undefined reference to pthread_cancel'
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: src.c:(.text+0x56): undefined reference to pthread_join' /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: src.c:(.text+0x6a): undefined reference to pthread_atfork'
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
gmake[1]: *** [CMakeFiles/cmTC_4128c.dir/build.make:99: cmTC_4128c] Error 1
gmake[1]: Leaving directory '/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp'
gmake: *** [Makefile:127: cmTC_4128c/fast] Error 2

Source file was:
#include <pthread.h>

static void* test_func(void* data)
{
return data;
}

int main(void)
{
pthread_t thread;
pthread_create(&thread, NULL, test_func, NULL);
pthread_detach(thread);
pthread_cancel(thread);
pthread_join(thread, NULL);
pthread_atfork(NULL, NULL, NULL);
pthread_exit(NULL);

return 0;
}

Determining if the function pthread_create exists in the pthreads failed with the following output:
Change Dir: /build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp

Run Build Command(s):/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/gmake -f Makefile cmTC_aee0b/fast && /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/gmake -f CMakeFiles/cmTC_aee0b.dir/build.make CMakeFiles/cmTC_aee0b.dir/build
gmake[1]: Entering directory '/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp'
Building C object CMakeFiles/cmTC_aee0b.dir/CheckFunctionExists.c.o
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/cc -DCHECK_FUNCTION_EXISTS=pthread_create -o CMakeFiles/cmTC_aee0b.dir/CheckFunctionExists.c.o -c /installs/cmake-3.23.1-linux-x86_64/share/cmake-3.23/Modules/CheckFunctionE
xists.c
Linking C executable cmTC_aee0b
/installs/cmake-3.23.1-linux-x86_64/bin/cmake -E cmake_link_script CMakeFiles/cmTC_aee0b.dir/link.txt --verbose=1
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/cc -DCHECK_FUNCTION_EXISTS=pthread_create CMakeFiles/cmTC_aee0b.dir/CheckFunctionExists.c.o -o cmTC_aee0b -lpthreads
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: cannot find -lpthreads
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
gmake[1]: *** [CMakeFiles/cmTC_aee0b.dir/build.make:99: cmTC_aee0b] Error 1
gmake[1]: Leaving directory '/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp'
gmake: *** [Makefile:127: cmTC_aee0b/fast] Error 2 `

I hope that I just made a dumb mistake, but I've been trying for a while and haven't figured it out for now. Help much appreciated!!!

[matthewlow-dwa]

The MoonRay project makes heavy use of Git submodules, where one repository (e.g. OpenMoonRay) implicitly includes source code from other repositories (e.g. moonray_dcc_plugins) within its source structure, which you can see as links/references to the other repositories on GitHub:
https://github.com/dreamworksanimation/openmoonray/tree/release/moonray

With submodules, git repositories need to be recursively initialized to pull the source from the submodules into the parent project:

git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/dreamworksanimation/openmoonray.git

https://docs.openmoonray.org/getting-started/installation/cloning-the-repo/

If you do an initial clone with --recurse-submodules (or subsequently initialize the submodules), the source from those other repositories (like /openmoonray/moonray/moonray_dcc_plugins/CMakeLists.txt) should be present.

[kjeffery]

Thanks, @matthewlow-dwa ! The existing local repository can be fixed by running git submodule update --init --checkout as well.

[MikelSotomonte]

You guys are right! The folder is empty apart from the .git file. However running the commands doesn't recursively clone more stuff for some reason... I get this error at the end of the clone:

error: invalid path 'houdini/otls/Vop::DW_MOONRAY::AttributeMap::1.hda'
fatal: Unable to checkout 'ce861215cf2c4fec77c8decdabd96755917ae742' in submodule path 'moonray/moonray_dcc_plugins'

[DoragoDoggo]

I was having this issue as well; what you need to do is download Windows Terminal, which allows you to open different shells. The default command prompt shell doesn't work with this project because apparently it has unsupported characters, so what you have to do is run the wsl --install command, which will install Ubuntu. Then, in Windows Terminal, it allows you to open another "tab," and you want to click on the little down arrow beside the + icon. Choose Ubuntu from that, then type into it git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/dreamworksanimation/openmoonray.git as instructed. You can then switch back to a command prompt or Powershell as normal. I hope this helps!

[Unchained-Malady]

I've been so excited for MoonRay's open-source release! I'm not much of a coder, myself, but I'm eager to use it if/when someone's able to make it available for Blender/Windows!

[kjeffery]

I can get behind your enthusiasm! I hope there is a Blender Hydra integration soon!

[SpideyComic15]

This is fantastic news! I've been tracking the progress of MoonRay over the last few years and am pumped to see what is to come! I can't code myself, but I am looking forward to a Blender/MacOS integration!
Thank you SO MUCH for making this open-source! You guys are awesome!

[lknknm]

I'm so happy with this release!
So, I'm currently learning C and C++ and I want to be able to contribute to the project in any way possible! I did read the CONTRIBUTING.md and I want to know where do I submit the CLA to be able to make commits. Also, I would like to know if only contributors who submitted the CLA are allowed to pull requests and create issues. Are there any issues previously open by the DreamWorks team or the issues displayed on GitHub are the only ones?
Besides that, is GitHub the only chat for developers to chat, or is there any other Discussions board on Slack or Discord?
Hope to hear from you!

[kbeason-dwa]

Please send the CLA to MoonRay@dreamworks.com.

[lknknm]

After submitting the CLA, is it allowed to make commits to fix README issues stated previously? (provided they will be analysed by dreamworks team).

[rgwilson68]

You can make a pull request to the release branch. Once you have submitted a CLA, the MoonRay team will review it and merge it in to a future release

[rujialiu]

Hello, everyone! I've just finished testing example scenes with moonray I've just built on docker (host: Windows hyper-v). I want to share my experience building it offline (i.e. no Internet connection during building process). I hope it can help someone else (e.g. behind a coporate firewall):

1. clone/download everything mentioned in CMakeList.txt and change them to SOURCE_DIR, e.g.

ExternalProject_Add(Blosc
    SOURCE_DIR /3rd/c-blosc
    #GIT_TAG a44e961498cdca2eb893fa897cd15dd007fad496 # 1.20.1
    INSTALL_DIR ${installDir}
    CMAKE_ARGS
        -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX:PATH=<INSTALL_DIR>
)

2. OpenColorIO itself needs 5 other libraries, check out OpenColorIO/share/cmake/modules and do similar things
3. OpenImageIO needs fmt and robin-map, but you don't need to change its CMakeList.txt, just clone the libraries and put them into ext/ directory

That's all I did.

BTW: Though I did not have any issue rendering the example scenes, when I increase the max_depth of glass-of-water to 32, it crashed. Can anyone please take a look? See issue #62

[gonsolo]

Some thoughts/wishes for the future:

1. A main branch would be nice instead of code drops every once in while. This way you would automatically get rid of repeated issues like
   "The Bad Guys" is listed twice in the README.md #63
   There is two the bad-guys link in readme  #60
2. Then merges could be transparently seen here.
3. A CI would also be nice.

Thanks for releasing Openmoonray as open source! :)

[xXTR0YXx]

Finally made the build work. Looking forward to render my own scenes and assets one day...
https://vimeo.com/811041110/4a129bb7d6

[HelixSeed]

Hello, thank you for releasing MoonRay as open source. I've been trying to build this on CentOS 7 for the last couple of days but have stumbled into some problems trying to compile, after copying the OptiX headers and attempting to build MoonRay using the 'cmake --preset container-release' step.

Preset CMake variables:

  CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE="Release"
  CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH="/installs"

Preset environment variables:

  BUILD_DIR="/build"
  CPPUNIT_ROOT="/installs"
  DEPS_ROOT="/installs"
  ISPC="/installs/bin/ispc"
  JSONCPP_ROOT="/installs"
  LIBCURL_ROOT="/usr/local"
  LIBUNWIND_ROOT="/usr/local"
  LOG4CPLUS_ROOT="/installs"
  LUA_DIR="/installs"
  OPENSUBDIV_ROOT="/installs"
  OPENVDB_ROOT="/installs"
  OPTIX_ROOT="/installs/optix"
  PXR_INCLUDE_DIRS="/installs/include"
  PXR_USD_LOCATION="/installs"
  RANDOM123_ROOT="/installs"
  ZLIB_ROOT="/usr/local"

-- The C compiler identification is GNU 9.3.1
-- The CXX compiler identification is GNU 9.3.1
-- Detecting C compiler ABI info
-- Detecting C compiler ABI info - done
-- Check for working C compiler: /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/cc - skipped
-- Detecting C compile features
-- Detecting C compile features - done
-- Detecting CXX compiler ABI info
-- Detecting CXX compiler ABI info - done
-- Check for working CXX compiler: /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/c++ - skipped
-- Detecting CXX compile features
-- Detecting CXX compile features - done
-- Looking for a CUDA compiler
-- Looking for a CUDA compiler - /usr/local/cuda-11.4/bin/nvcc
-- The CUDA compiler identification is NVIDIA 11.4.152
-- Detecting CUDA compiler ABI info
-- Detecting CUDA compiler ABI info - done
-- Check for working CUDA compiler: /usr/local/cuda-11.4/bin/nvcc - skipped
-- Detecting CUDA compile features
-- Detecting CUDA compile features - done
versionString is 4.10.2.0
PACKAGE_NAME is arras4_core
projectString is Arras4Core
-- Found Boost: /installs/lib/cmake/Boost-1.73.0/BoostConfig.cmake (found version "1.73.0") found components: chrono date_time filesystem program_options system 
-- Found Libuuid: /lib64/libuuid.so  
-- Found Libcurl: /lib64/libcurl.so.4  
-- Found Microhttpd: /installs/lib/libmicrohttpd.so  
-- Found JsonCpp: /installs/lib/libjsoncpp.so  
-- Found OpenSSL: /usr/lib64/libcrypto.so (found version "1.0.2k")  
-- Found Libatomic: /lib64/libatomic.so.1  
-- Found CppUnit: /installs/lib/libcppunit.so  
versionString is 4.7.0.0
PACKAGE_NAME is arras4_node
projectString is Arras4Node
-- Found Boost: /installs/lib/cmake/Boost-1.73.0/BoostConfig.cmake (found version "1.73.0") found components: chrono date_time filesystem program_options 
versionString is 5.3.4.0
PACKAGE_NAME is arras_render
projectString is ArrasRender
-- Found Boost: /installs/lib/cmake/Boost-1.73.0/BoostConfig.cmake (found version "1.73.0") found components: chrono program_options 
-- Found JPEG: /usr/lib64/libjpeg.so (found version "62") 
-- Looking for pthread.h
-- Looking for pthread.h - found
-- Performing Test CMAKE_HAVE_LIBC_PTHREAD
-- Performing Test CMAKE_HAVE_LIBC_PTHREAD - Failed
-- Looking for pthread_create in pthreads
-- Looking for pthread_create in pthreads - not found
-- Looking for pthread_create in pthread
-- Looking for pthread_create in pthread - found
-- Found Threads: TRUE  
-- Found ZLIB: /usr/lib64/libz.so (found version "1.2.7") 
-- Found ZLIB: /usr/lib64/libz.so (found suitable version "1.2.7", minimum required is "1.2.7") 
-- Found Python: /usr/include/python3.6m (found version "3.6.8") found components: Development Development.Module Development.Embed 
-- Found Boost: /installs/lib/cmake/Boost-1.73.0/BoostConfig.cmake (found version "1.73.0") found components: python 

CMake Error at moonray/hydra/CMakeLists.txt:38 (find_package):
  By not providing "Findpxr.cmake" in CMAKE_MODULE_PATH this project has
  asked CMake to find a package configuration file provided by "pxr", but
  CMake did not find one.

  Could not find a package configuration file provided by "pxr" with any of
  the following names:

    pxrConfig.cmake
    pxr-config.cmake

  Add the installation prefix of "pxr" to CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH or set "pxr_DIR"
  to a directory containing one of the above files.  If "pxr" provides a
  separate development package or SDK, be sure it has been `installed.`

This is the output of the CMakeError.log file in /build/CmakeFiles:

Change Dir: /build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp

Run Build Command(s):/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/gmake -f Makefile cmTC_5a6e7/fast && /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/gmake  -f CMakeFiles/cmTC_5a6e7.dir/build.make CMakeFiles/cmTC_5a6e7.dir/build
gmake[1]: Entering directory '/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp'
Building C object CMakeFiles/cmTC_5a6e7.dir/src.c.o
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/cc -DCMAKE_HAVE_LIBC_PTHREAD   -o CMakeFiles/cmTC_5a6e7.dir/src.c.o -c /build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp/src.c
Linking C executable cmTC_5a6e7
/installs/cmake-3.23.1-linux-x86_64/bin/cmake -E cmake_link_script CMakeFiles/cmTC_5a6e7.dir/link.txt --verbose=1
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/cc CMakeFiles/cmTC_5a6e7.dir/src.c.o -o cmTC_5a6e7 
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: CMakeFiles/cmTC_5a6e7.dir/src.c.o: in function `main':
src.c:(.text+0x2d): undefined reference to `pthread_create'
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: src.c:(.text+0x39): undefined reference to `pthread_detach'
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: src.c:(.text+0x45): undefined reference to `pthread_cancel'
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: src.c:(.text+0x56): undefined reference to `pthread_join'
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: src.c:(.text+0x6a): undefined reference to `pthread_atfork'
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
gmake[1]: *** [CMakeFiles/cmTC_5a6e7.dir/build.make:99: cmTC_5a6e7] Error 1
gmake[1]: Leaving directory '/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp'
gmake: *** [Makefile:127: cmTC_5a6e7/fast] Error 2


Source file was:
#include <pthread.h>

static void* test_func(void* data)
{
  return data;
}

int main(void)
{
  pthread_t thread;
  pthread_create(&thread, NULL, test_func, NULL);
  pthread_detach(thread);
  pthread_cancel(thread);
  pthread_join(thread, NULL);
  pthread_atfork(NULL, NULL, NULL);
  pthread_exit(NULL);

  return 0;
}

Determining if the function pthread_create exists in the pthreads failed with the following output:
Change Dir: /build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp

Run Build Command(s):/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/gmake -f Makefile cmTC_20f04/fast && /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/gmake  -f CMakeFiles/cmTC_20f04.dir/build.make CMakeFiles/cmTC_20f04.dir/build
gmake[1]: Entering directory '/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp'
Building C object CMakeFiles/cmTC_20f04.dir/CheckFunctionExists.c.o
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/cc   -DCHECK_FUNCTION_EXISTS=pthread_create -o CMakeFiles/cmTC_20f04.dir/CheckFunctionExists.c.o -c /installs/cmake-3.23.1-linux-x86_64/share/cmake-3.23/Modules/CheckFunctionExists.c
Linking C executable cmTC_20f04
/installs/cmake-3.23.1-linux-x86_64/bin/cmake -E cmake_link_script CMakeFiles/cmTC_20f04.dir/link.txt --verbose=1
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/cc  -DCHECK_FUNCTION_EXISTS=pthread_create CMakeFiles/cmTC_20f04.dir/CheckFunctionExists.c.o -o cmTC_20f04  -lpthreads 
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: cannot find -lpthreads
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
gmake[1]: *** [CMakeFiles/cmTC_20f04.dir/build.make:99: cmTC_20f04] Error 1
gmake[1]: Leaving directory '/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeTmp'
gmake: *** [Makefile:127: cmTC_20f04/fast] Error 2

I know I made a mistake somewhere, this is my second time trying to compile after restarting. I just can't figure out how to solve the issues.

[halBRY]

I got stuck at the exact same place (By not providing "Findpxr.cmake" in CMAKE_MODULE_PATH this project has....). I have yet to find a way around it. Anyone else have any luck?

[PhoenixDigitalFX]

Hey, Moonray community I have some ideas for development of OpenMoonray.
The following ideas are :
1)Integrate Real time path tracing sdk recently open sourced by Nvidia .
2) add support for MaterialX , Lama and MDL .
3) Nvidia has currently open sourced displacement micro mapping sdk which can help Moonray to render asset like nanite renders in unreal engine 5.
4) Integrate Subdivision, ptex , partio into Moonray.
5) And also integrate Sony imageworks Open shading language, Opencolour io and industry standard Aces configuration for Moonray.
Thank you

[AlexSegal]

Huge congrats guys with the first public release and thanks a ton for sharing your amazing work with the community! We are really excited to finally try Moonray!

That being said, the build scripts need some serious improvement. First, there should be an easy way to not build all dependencies from scratch. In a studio environment like ours, we already have specific versions of pretty much all the libraries, from TBB to OpenVDB pre-built and used in our plugins running under many DCCs. We would like to keep using them (as well as our gcc version) in order to avoid binary incompatibilities.

But even the basic build steps I tried to follow are not going through, even with some massaging of cmake files and/or environment variables. For example, I'm stuck on the OpenVDB building stage in CentOS 7. No matter what, it fails to link against proper TBB libs. I tried setting env variables TBB_ROOT, TBB_INCLUDEDIR, TBB_LIBRARYDIR, as well as modifying configured Tbb_tbb_LIBRARY_RELEASE and Tbb_tbbmalloc_LIBRARY_RELEASE using ccmake, but the results are always the same:

The command that fails (has no -ltbb* or libtbb* arguments for some reason):

/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/bin/c++ -O3 -DNDEBUG CMakeFiles/vdb_print.dir/openvdb_print.cc.o -o vdb_print -Wl,-rpath,/corp/projects/eng/asegal/external/moonray/build/OpenVDB-prefix/src/OpenVDB-build/openvdb/openvdb:/corp/projects/eng/asegal/external/moonray/installs/lib: ../libopenvdb.so.8.2.0 /usr/lib64/libjemalloc.so /corp/projects/eng/asegal/external/moonray/installs/lib/libblosc.so /usr/lib64/libz.so -pthread /corp/projects/eng/asegal/external/moonray/installs/lib/libboost_iostreams.so.1.73.0 /corp/projects/eng/asegal/external/moonray/installs/lib/libboost_system.so.1.73.0

/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: ../libopenvdb.so.8.2.0: undefined reference to tbb::interface7::internal::task_arena_base::internal_initialize()' /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: ../libopenvdb.so.8.2.0: undefined reference to tbb::task::self()'
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: ../libopenvdb.so.8.2.0: undefined reference to tbb::task_group_context::cancel_group_execution()' /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: ../libopenvdb.so.8.2.0: undefined reference to tbb::interface7::internal::task_arena_base::internal_attach()'
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: ../libopenvdb.so.8.2.0: undefined reference to tbb::internal::allocate_via_handler_v3(unsigned long)' /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: ../libopenvdb.so.8.2.0: undefined reference to tbb::interface7::internal::task_arena_base::internal_terminate()'
/opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: ../libopenvdb.so.8.2.0: undefined reference to tbb::spin_rw_mutex_v3::internal_try_acquire_reader()' /opt/rh/devtoolset-9/root/usr/libexec/gcc/x86_64-redhat-linux/9/ld: ../libopenvdb.so.8.2.0: undefined reference to tbb::interface7::internal::task_arena_base::internal_enqueue(tbb::task&, long) const'

Any ideas or hints are deeply appreciated!

[rgwilson68]

That should be : config file is usually pkgnameConfig.cmake, and env var pkgname_ROOT -- I didn't check which character would be processed as markup...

[AlexSegal]

Thanks a lot for your response Rob!

Unfortunately I cannot find any files that would look like boost_PATHConfig.cmake or boost_path-config.cmake in any boost folders, including the ones we've built before and also the 1.73 one downloaded and built as a moonray dependency. Do you think these files might have been deleted when I did rm -rf build/ at Step 4 in https://docs.openmoonray.org/getting-started/installation/building-moonray/building-moonray-centos-7 ?

So no matter what I tried specifying as BOOST_ROOT in CMakePresets.json, the error is always the same. Of course I can be doing something stupid, since I'm not that good at cmake, so any hints and ideas are deeply appreciated.

[rgwilson68]

It looks like it is finding the config at /corp/projects/eng/asegal/external/moonray/installs/lib/cmake/Boost-1.73.0/BoostConfig.cmake
That should mean that you don't need to set BOOST_ROOT at all : it has found boost, it is just failing to configure it properly.

Then it looks to me like it is trying to find a boost subcomponent called 'path', which is odd because I don't think such a component exists. Have you made any changes to CMakeLists.txt files within the project?

[AlexSegal]

I had to make some changes indeed, to change paths in building/CMakeLists.txt like /installs and /build to replace with the paths under my work folder. Also I had to comment some ExternalProject_Add statements for dependencies I was not able to build, like OpenVDB and USD, hoping to replace them with our pre-built versions. Because of that I had to modify the DEPENDS clauses to keep the chain. I cannot see any other changes except for those and the ones I made in CMakePresets.json.

Funny enough - you are right - I just removed the BOOST_ROOT from CMakePresets.json, and the boost error message is gone, replaced by the OpenVDB one. For this one I have to specify an explicit OPENVDB_ROOT in CMakePresets.json, or maybe there is another way to do so?

CMake Error at moonray/moonray/CMakeLists.txt:93 (find_package):
  Could not find a package configuration file provided by "OpenVDB" with any
  of the following names:

    OpenVDBConfig.cmake
    openvdb-config.cmake

  Add the installation prefix of "OpenVDB" to CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH or set
  "OpenVDB_DIR" to a directory containing one of the above files.  If
  "OpenVDB" provides a separate development package or SDK, be sure it has
  been installed.

[AlexSegal]

I'm really sorry - you were right, those were a result of my modifications of find_package statements. I tried adding PATH clauses to them. My bad!

[Pubaprizzly]

We need a tutorial on how to install moonray on windows step by step please

[kjeffery]

We need a tutorial on how to install moonray on windows step by step please

Hi! MoonRay does not currently run on Windows. The best option is to run under Docker in Windows. Some have been successful in compiling it under WSL. Both options preclude it from being accessed through Windows applications (e.g., through a Hydra interface).

If lucky, someone in the community is porting MoonRay to compile and run natively on Windows.

[mpjohn]

Hi There - I have a few questions about Moonray...

Is it possible to get Moonray to put out a REALLY low quality preview render? I've tried messing with the scene.rdla settings but it always seems to want to resolve to full quality or something very close to that

Is there a way to convert a USD file from Maya to .rdla format? If so could you please let me know how to do it?

With the noise reduction ( which seems excellent ) how do you burn that into a snapshot from moonray_gui ( or is that possible? )

Thanks!

[jlanz]

Is it possible to get Moonray to put out a REALLY low quality preview render?

There are a few things you can try to reduce the quality and get a quicker preview render.

Here are a few SceneVariables attributes that are related to quality/speed:
bsdf_samples: try reducing this to 1.
bssrdf_samples: try reducing this to 1.
light_samples: try reducing this to 1.
max_depth: try reducing this to 2.
pixel_samples: try reducing this to 1.
russion_roulette_threshold: try increasing this.
sampling_mode: try setting this to 0 (uniform)

There are at least 3 ways to change these settings:

1. Directly edit the RDLA file that you are rendering
2. Add another RDLA file (preview_qulaity.rdla) that contains overrides:

   SceneVariables {
       ["sampling_mode"] = 0,
       ["pixel_samples"] = 1,
       -- etc...
   }

   And include it on the command-line, eg: moonray -in scene.rdla -in scene.rdlb -in preview_quality.rdla ...
3. Pass the SceneVariable attribute values directly on the command-line:

   moonray -in scene.rdla -in scene.rdlb -scene_var "sampling_mode" "0" -scene_var "pixel_samples" "1"
   

---

Is there a way to convert a USD file from Maya to .rdla format?

You can use the hd_usd2rdl command-line utility.

---

how do you burn that into a snapshot from moonray_gui ( or is that possible? )
I don't believe this is supported currently, however you can run the stand-alone denoiser after the render is complete. Adding the ability to save/snapshot the denoised image would be a nice feature.

[mpjohn]

This is great information. Thanks Jlanz!

[mpjohn]

Hi All,
Quick question about grainy looking renders. I've tried the modern bedroom scene with the render settings it comes with and I'm getting grainy results - and it's really quite slow on a machine with 2 GPU's. Is denoising used as a standard maybe? It doesn't compare favourably with the usual renderers speed wise ( I'm talking about Arnold, Redshift, VRay, Renderman here ). Maybe I'm doing something wrong?
Thanks
M

[BrianHanke]

Back when I was testing MoonRay I posted some quick and dirty time comparisons. I'd say MR is on the slower side in general. Link here: BrianHanke#2

[mpjohn]

Thanks for that Brian. That's very useful. I'd love to know...in a studio setting...is denoise used in general to speed everything up? Or would it make results a bit soft looking?

[BrianHanke]

@mpjohn I don't have firsthand experience of that, but from what people tell me denoising is used a lot in studios.

[mpjohn]

I noticed the bedroom sample scene from Moonray is the same as the bedroom here in the Renderman docs...
Just out of curiosity...what's the origin?
https://rmanwiki.pixar.com/display/REN24/Denoise+Workflow

[knightcrawler25]

From: https://benedikt-bitterli.me/resources/

[mpjohn]

Ah - that's a great resource. Thanks!

[mpjohn]

Hi There,
I've just installed the latest version of Moonray for Rocky9. I'm getting an error and everything apart from the Rectangle is appearing black...

Error: RdlInstancerGeometry("/scene/objects/"): Did not find any references geometry. Please make sure the "referencess" field contains at least one source references geometry

Can anyone help me out with this? I was able to render fine with an older version before Rocky9 support.

Thanks
mp

[mpjohn]

A little more detail...
I'm able to navigate around the moonray_gui but the bedroom scene for example is all black apart from the windows which are white. So no textures or models are being picked up. Could this be a graphics card issue...I would have assumed that it would fall back on vector mode if so?