Original Force Accelerates its Render Pipeline with PipelineFX’s Qube

files/pictures/picture-35.jpgPress Release from PipelineFX

Hong Kong, SIGGRAPH ASIA  – Dec. 12, 2011 – Rendering is always the most expensive part of any production.  That is why savvy and expanding Chinese 3D animation outsourcing company, Original Force, chose the top full service render farm management company, PipelineFX, and their software, Qube!, to organize and optimize their rapidly growing rendering pipeline.

With over 700 full-time employees, multiple sites throughout China and a renowned client base that includes Dreamworks, EA, Microsoft and THQ – Original Force has become one of the fastest growing animation outsourcing companies in China.  This growth and the high level of client expectations that come with quality clientele have made the creation of a highly efficient production pipeline an absolute necessity.  With rendering being a vital, albeit expensive part of the production puzzle, it became critical for Original Force to quickly find a rendering management solution that would create a more efficient pipeline that was also flexible enough to keep up with their tremendous growth.

For years, Original Force’s render management software had either been simple or free. It worked ok, but not great. As the complexity of their projects began to grow, Original Force found that simplistic rendering software couldn't handle the needs of their workload. On top of this, Original Force was also using a lot of different software and technology at the same time. Program such as 3ds Max, Maya, V-Ray, mental ray, and RealFlow were all part of their pipeline, and needed to be compatible with whatever solution they decided on. They found their answer in Qube!, a world class render farm management solution  designed and supported by PipelineFX – a full service rendering company.

“We decided to look at Qube! since we knew it had been around the longest, and was being used by some of best production studios in world,” said Harley Zhao, CEO at Original Force.  “We started out with a few licenses as a test; but once the results started rolling in, we could tell that we had made the right decision and implemented it across the company.  The impact was huge.  Qube! easily eclipsed our old rendering solutions, which saved us money, and gave us back a lot of time."

Another big problem Original Force faced this year was how to efficiently manage the enormity of their render farm. Their farm consisted of more than 400 HP blades, and over 3000 cores. These CPUs needed to support different teams with different needs during the production process.  If the farms were not managed efficiently, the firm would burn out a lot of money.  With Qube! in place, this problem never materialized, as  Qube! maximized Original Force’s CPU cores, memory and rendering software licenses.    This alone proved to be a huge cost savings, since extra memory means extra time and more money to a creative production studio.

“It was really important to us that PipelineFX was a full service company that could provide comprehensive support and training. I am not quite sure how big of a team they have, but anytime we needed support, they were there to help. The success of our pipeline can now be attributed to PipelineFX and Qube! We are glad we chose PipelineFX as our partner for render farm management.”
 
PipelineFX will be demonstrating Qube! at SIGGRAPH ASIA on Tuesday December 13th and Wednesday the 14th from 9:30am to 6:00pm and Thursday the 15th from 9:30am to 5:00pm. PipelineFX can be found at booth D-14.

About Original Force
Original Force is a China-based outsourcing company providing top-quality art production services to the video game, TV, and film industries. OF offers a comprehensive set of high quality and low cost outsourcing production services to clients globally. Since being established in 1999, we have been strived for excellence and worked worldwide in a variety of digital methods. Our quality services have earned us a magnificent reputation among our clients, such as EA, THQ, 2K Games, Microsoft, SEGA, Activision, Sony, Tencent, etc. Original Force just won a TV animation production contract for Dreamworks. Original Force currently has over 700 full-time staff and is one of the fastest-growing outsourcing companies in China.

About Qube!™ and Smart Farming™

Qube! is an intelligent, mature and highly scalable render management solution that can be quickly integrated into any production workflow, and is backed by world-class technical  support. Smart Farming delivers intelligence to production pipelines by providing business-critical insight into render pipelines, maximizing investment in rendering infrastructure and automating manual processes. Qube! works out of the box with all leading content creation applications and is truly cross-platform with all software components available on Windows®, Linux®, and Mac OS®X operating systems.

About PipelineFX:

As the leading provider of intelligent render farm management solutions for digital content creation, PipelineFX provides software, support, consulting and training services worldwide. Over 500 customers across film and visual effects, post production, broadcast, design, games and education include Arc Productions, BaseFX, BBC, Cinesite, Deluxe, Digital Domain, Electronic Arts, General Motors, L.M.U., Laika Studios, Lockheed Martin, Method Studios, NBC, NHK, Original Force, Pratt University, Procter & Gamble, ReelFX, RIM, Smoke & Mirrors, South Park Studios, Technicolor, and Telemundo. PipelineFX is headquartered in Los Angeles, CA, and has offices in London, Honolulu, Portland, Austin, Las Vegas, and Vancouver.