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Pixar's Render Farm

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382 points brundolf | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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mmcconnell1618 ◴[] No.25616372[source]
Can anyone comment on why Pixar uses standard CPU for processing instead of custom hardware or GPU? I'm wondering why they haven't invested in FPGA or completely custom silicon that speeds up common operations by an order of magnitude. Is each show that different that no common operations are targets for hardware optimization?
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1. lattalayta ◴[] No.25616626[source]
Pixar renders their movies with their commercially available software, Renderman. In the past they have partnered with Intel [1] and Nvidia [2] on optimizations

I'd imagine another reason is that Pixar uses off-the-shelf Digital Content Creation apps (DCCs) like Houdini and Maya in addition to their proprietary software, so while they could optimize some portions of their pipeline, it's probably better to develop for more general computing tasks. They also mention the ability to "ramp up" and "ramp down" as compute use changes over the course of a show

[1] https://devmesh.intel.com/projects/supercharging-pixar-s-ren...

[2] https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/pixar-animation-studios-l...