How to use Mental Ray for Maya

Below are the steps to follow to set up Mental Ray for Maya:

1. Load Maya 2017.
2. If at any point the Nvidia Professional Application Center appears, just close it.
3. Under the Maya menu, click Windows > Settings/Preferences > Plugin Manager.
4. Scroll down to ‘Mayatomr.mll’ and place a checkmark next to Loaded and Auto Load, then click Close.
5. A mental ray tab should now appear on the right shelf.
6. On the main modeling toolbar, click the ‘Display render settings’ icon (which is displayed below the UV menu item).
7. In the Render Settings window, change Render Using to ‘mental ray’ Note: Don’t enable ‘GI Next’ global illumination mode under the Quality tab when using the farm. It will crash the satellites. Only use this if rendering locally.
8. Click the Configuration tab.
9. Under the configuration tab, click ‘Open Render Resource Manager’.
10. Click the Satellite tab. You should see up to eight render nodes (satellites) named arch-render-mr1, arch-render-mr2, etc.
11. In order to use these nodes/satellites it needs to be enabled. Under the Enabled column, click each of the nodes to enable them. It will only let you enable satellites that are online and ready for use.
12. To submit a batch render, first switch the main toolbar from Modeling to Rendering.
13. Open/Load the batch render option window by clicking the small checkbox under the batch render menu.
14. Change the Verbosity Level to ‘Progress Messages’ under ‘Messages’. This will track the progress of your render in percentage. Also, verify that ‘Render on network machines’ is checked. You can also render on the local machine but the computer will become very slow as it devotes its resources to rendering.
15. Check the progress at the bottom of the Maya window. You can get a more detailed info by clicking the Script Editor button in the lower right.
16. See your completed renders inside the Images folder, which is usually located in Documents\maya\projects\[project name]\images.

Visit the Maya render farm today and register for a $50 free test credits. Test the Mental Ray for Maya plugin for free with 24/7 human support.

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