Learn how Amazon EC2 Spot and Thinkbox Deadline can make your VFX and CG renders explode off the screen, with minimal effort and low cost. This session focuses on rendering workloads combining Deadline (an AWS rendering pipeline management service), Thinkbox Marketplace usage-based licensing for flexible render licensing, and Spot for scalable low-cost computing. Learn how to seamlessly integrate your existing production pipeline, as well as advanced asset management, synchronization, and connections to other AWS services such as AWS storage and networking for advanced workflows, including the extension of on-premises render workflows into the cloud and all-in-cloud rendering pipelines. We also highlight a few real-world examples of customers with actual Hollywood productions.

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AWS re:INVENT
Boom for your Buck
R e n d e r i n g w i t h S p o t a n d D e a d l i n e o n A W S
C h r i s B o n d , A m a z o n W e b S e r v i c e s
J a s o n F o t t e r , F U S E F X
S E S S I O N I D M A E - 3 0 1

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WHAT IS RENDERING?

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WHO RENDERS?
Modeling Surfacing
Animation
Simulation
Lighting &
Rendering
Compositing
Scene
Assembly

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WHY A RENDERFARM?
TOTAL RENDER TIME =
((FPS * Duration) * Rendering time)
Number of Concurrent Instances
Instance Start Time +

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T y p i c a l V F X P i p e l i n e
Modelling
Rigging
Timeline
Shader
Writing
Texturing
Asset Creation
Concept art
and design
Shader
Assignment
Previz
data
Model
Assets
Look Dev
Shaders
Shaders
Shaders
Rigging Assets
Look Dev Assets
Shot Production
Scanning
Film
Tracking
Previz
Editorial
Layout Animation
Finaling
Effects
Lighting/
Rendering
Compositing DI
Production
ON-SET
Capture
Camera Metadata
LIDAR Scans
HDR Capture
Ref Photography
Dust-busting &
Scratch removal Motion
GFX
Matte
Painting
Storyboards
from client
Model
Assets
Cameras &
geometry
EDL Conformed edit
Paint &
Roto
Undistorted plates
for 3D
Clean
Scans
Clean
Plates
The Film!
Final
comps
Render passes
Lens distortion
settings
Data to
assist shoot
Scans
Scans
Rendered
effects
Effects
elements
Baked
animation
Shot
List
Baked animation

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A c t u a l V F X P i p e l i n e
Modelling
Rigging
Timeline
Shader
Writing
Texturing
Asset Creation
Concept art
and design
Shader
Assignment
Previz
data
Model
Assets
Look Dev
Shaders
Shaders
Shaders
Rigging Assets
Look Dev Assets
Shot Production
Scanning Tracking
Previz
Editorial
Layout Animation
Finaling
Effects
Lighting/
Rendering
Compositing DI
Production
ON-SET
Capture
Camera Metadata
LIDAR Scans
HDR Capture
Ref Photography
Dust-busting &
Scratch removal Motion
GFX
Matte
Painting
Storyboards
from client
Model
Assets
Cameras &
geometry
Conformed edit
Paint &
Roto
Undistorted plates
for 3D
Clean
Scans
Clean
Plates
The Film!
Final
comps
Render passes
Lens distortion
settings
Data to
assist shoot
Scans
Scans
Rendered
effects
Effects
elements
Baked
animation
Shot
List
Baked animation
EDL
Film

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RENDERFARM AGILITY
10 Days at a small studio; Blue is ‘time artists are waiting’ and Orange is ‘total compute time’
TIMEWAITING
SUBMISSIONS OVER 10 DAYS

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RENDERFARM AGILITY
ONE Day at a large studio; Blue is ‘time artists are waiting’ and Orange is ‘total compute time’
TIMEWAITING
SUBMISSIONS OVER 1 DAY

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RENDERFARM ELASTICITY
Using AWS Cloud – Orange is Instance count, Blue is render time – less than 2 hours per submission!
TIMEWAITINGINSTANCECOUNT

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MANAGING THE RENDERFARM
…Render Task N
• A customer often needs to process hundreds or thousands of render Jobs (each representing one animation
or a single large image).
• Each Job can contain hundreds or thousands of individual Tasks (representing either frames of an
animation, sub-regions of a larger image, or both).
Render Task 2
Render Task 1
…Render Task N
Render Task 2
Render Task 1
…Render Task N
Render Task 2
Render Task 1
Project
Render Job 1
…Render Job N
Render Job 2

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MANAGING THE RENDERFARM
JOBS
TASKS
NODES AWS

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CLOUD ONLY TOPOLOGY (EXAMPLE)
AWS Cloud
Assets
Deadline AWS
Render Nodes and
EBS Storage
Deadline
Repository &
Database
Appstream
and others
With DCC
(E.G. Maya)
& Deadline.

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DEADLINE HYBRID TOPOLOGY
Company/ Studio On-Prem AWS Cloud
Deadline Render
Nodes
Assets
Studio’s Asset File
Server
Deadline Database
and Repository
Deadline
AWS Portal-link
server
Deadline AWS
Render Nodes
Deadline 10 AWS
Portal infrastructure
Secure
Connection/
Direct Connect

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SPOTLIGHT ON DATA
Company/ Studio On-Prem AWS Cloud
Deadline Render
Nodes
Assets
Studio’s Asset File
Server
Deadline Database
and Repository
Deadline
AWS Portal-link
server
Deadline AWS
Render Nodes
Deadline 10 AWS
Portal infrastructure
Secure
Connection/
Direct Connect

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DEADLINE 10 ASSET CACHE
Company/ Studio On-Prem
AWS Cloud
User submits Job
Assets
Assets on
S3 are copied to
EBS volume on
each instance
Asset Server
Asset list is collected
in the Deadline job file
properties
Deadline
Cloud link server
Checks online database
to confirm if assets
are missing and
uploads to S3 as
Secure multi-part
Transfer
Deadline AWS
Render Nodes
Job starts
rendering on each
instance on linux
Deadline 10
Infrastructure
Database confirms
Transfer of all assets
(pre-cache) and is
dequeued
Secure
Connection
(SSH)

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DEADLINE 10 ASSET SAFETY NET
Company/ Studio On-PremAWS Cloud
User submits Job
Job successfully
renders without
intervention
Assets
Assets
Do not exist
On S3
Asset Server
Assets exist on-prem
presuming job can
successfully run!
Deadline
Cloud link server
Checks Asset server
and moves the
appropriate missing
file(s)
Deadline AWS
Render Nodes
What if asset
doesn’t exist on
cache or no pre-
cache was run?
Deadline 10
Infrastructure
Slave requests Asset,
does not exist, so
infrastructure goes
back to on-prem..
Secure
Connection
(SSH)

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DATA – OTHER APPROACHES
S3 as the content repository for your assets
Synchronize
• On AWS Marketplace: Aspera, Signiant, File Catalyst, Expedat
• S3 Multi-part Upload
• AWS import/export Snowball
File Systems
• EFS throughput scales linearly to the storage
• Lustre can hydrate from an S3 bucket
• Avere can be fronted to S3 or an on-premise NAS
• WekaIO, can tier and persist to S3
• Qumulo has its own replication protocol
AWS Direct Connect

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THINKBOX MARKETPLACE
Usage Based Licensing (UBL)
Per minute licensing for Applications
Default AMI’s for common tools
Ability to install your own software
Supports ‘bring your own license’ (BYOL)

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AMAZON EC2 SPOT INSTANCES
Savings up to
90% off the On
Demand Price
Turbo Boost
your Results
Spare EC2
Capacity that
AWS can reclaim

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Cloud Rendering
Jason Fotter
C h i e f T e c h n o l o g y O f f i c e r

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Introduction to FuseFX
• Award winning Visual Effects facility / 10 Awards and 16 Nominations
• Visual Effects for Television
• 300 Employees / 70+ Projects

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From 3 to 300
2008
2010
2012
2014
2015
2016
2017
LA
NYBC
FULL!
Growing
Cloud
LA
NY
BC

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Television is Changing
Number of original scripted TV series in the U.S. from 2009 to 2016
4K
Complexity
Scope

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Ghost Rider

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Expansion Comparison
Physical Server
• Limited by Power / Cooling
• 24 to 48 Hour Setup time
• Pay for idle time
• Over spec to be safe
• Hard to return
Cloud Bursting
• Unlimited capacity
• 10 min setup time
• Pay for what you use
• Flexible Machine Specs
• Automated Termination

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Cost Comparison
# of Machines @ $35K
Cloud (400) Purchase (7) Rental (80)

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What it takes to do The Tick
187 Shots (45 Full CG)
6 Weeks
104 Artists / LA + NY + BC
300,000+ Total Frames Rendered

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Usage Analysis
Hrs

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Usage Analysis
5000
Usage
Hours
5 hrs
1000
Machines
32,000
Cores
Available
Capacity
Diversified
Fleets
Solid
Workflow
On
Demand
Licensing

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Extending into Cloud
Spot Fleet
AWS
Direct
Connect
AMI
Deadline DB and Repo
Local Render Farm
Isilon X410 Cluster
m4.16xlarge with EBS Custom Sync solution for
Studio Assets

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Local Farm / Software
LA
500
NY
125
BC
115
31.5 THz of compute power

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From Not Enough to AMAZING!
“Once we got everything up and working I would say that the cloud
was an instrumental component to us being able to complete a show
with this scope of work. The fact we could scale up in hours and then
iterate every shot in the show over night was amazing.”
Chad Wanstreet, FuseFX VFX Supervisor

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Results!
“No one has ever said stop... all jets are on with regards to creativity. Though what we
envisioned creating involved challenges, we didn't ever back away.”
“We said to ourselves "let's make something amazing." We have very difficult VFX
sequences which are more challenging than anything we've ever been involved in.
However, we don't back down. In fact, we dare each other to go further.”
“The input from FuseFX has been inspiring and they haven't winced at any of our
requests. They're all in and they are creating impactful, cool and unexpectedly lavish
effects. It is a shared labor of love.”

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Final Thoughts
Any Size Workload
Render
Hours
# of
Nodes
Render
Time Time is now a variable
Efficiency
Costs
Digital Security

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The Future
Amazon
EC2
Spot
Instance
AWS
Lambda
Amazon
S3 Amazon
EFS
Amazon
Glacier
Amazon EBS
Amazon
RDS
Amazon
DynamoDB
AWS Direct
Connect
AWS
CloudFormation
Amazon
Rekognition
Amazon Machine
Learning
Amazon
AppStream 2.0*
Amazon
WorkSpaces

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THANK YOU!
Jason Fotter
C h i e f T e c h n o l o g y O f f i c e r

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Thank you!
M A E : 3 0 1