Muster

If you need to use computer-generated imagery with specific features that can blend seamlessly into your film production, game or other types of graphic applications, then perhaps it is time to consider using a render farm software solution.

Muster is an advance utility that enables you to render custom CGI that can be seamlessly integrated into movies with special effects or game development projects.

Following a quick setup, you can launch the console and log in on the dispatcher service so that you can create your rendering queue. Upon launch, you are welcomed by a sleek and stylish interface that is comprised of four different view panels, namely Instances, Hosts, Queue and Submission.

As you probably hinted, you can preview the list with the available and unavailable services from the Instance and respectively, Hosts view panels. While the Host pane includes operations that are pertinent to the physical machine – starting or stopping services – the Instances refers to single events that can be grouped under a host node.

The program enables you to set up the behaviors specific to the dispatcher service from a dedicated Settings window. You can specify the parameters it should use to differentiate between the distinct rendering instances you are launching simultaneously. Moreover, you can set the up to re-queue tasks if instances are offline and specify the maximum number of jobs that the dispatcher can run.

Depending on the complexity of the model you want to render, the application enables you to define pools that use a specific subset of instances and hosts to complete a particular job. In case you are rendering multiple projects, then you can set limits to the usage of resources that can be assigned to a particular user or job.

If you are looking for a utility that allows you make the most out of your render farm, while monitoring the resource usage and being able to recover from power offs or similar effects at the same time, then perhaps you can consider giving Muster a try.