BIG DATA

Turbocharge 3D CGI & Visual Effects Rendering: Progeniq, a leader in reconfigurable computing applications, today announced the availability of RenderBoost Accelerated Engines for the CGI / VFX Animations industry, offering over 10x speedups for computationally intensive algorithms such as bkdTree Traversal, in a single low-cost accelerator that can scale up as computational requirements increase to offer computational power equivalent to over a hundred 2.4GHz CPU cores in a single 1U server. CGI Animators can now leverage on hardware acceleration of intensive algorithms via an API, and interface with their favourite renderers such as Mental Ray or PRMan as needed. This makes acceleration of time-consuming algorithms in rendering as seamless as possible and allows the RenderBoost to be easily integrated into existing workflows and shaders. “The RenderBoost Accelerated Engines have been released in response to client demand for a scalable and highly flexible rendering hardware acceleration solution, which they can integrate into their custom workflows”, said Teck Hiong Chua, Progeniq’s VP of Business Development. "Now even small animations studios can easily acquire computational power equivalent to 1000's of CPU cores, previously something that only the largest CGI and Visual Effects studios could afford." The RenderBoost uses a reconfigurable hardware processor, which can run new accelerated algorithms and optimized designs as they are released, on the same hardware. At only 2.5W electricity consumption per accelerator, the RenderBoost slashes renderfarm infrastructure acquisition and running costs, with significantly lower electricity, cooling, and space requirements than a typical CPU cluster. As part of this launch, Progeniq will be working with the first 100 clients to optimize their workflows, as well as enhance the accelerated algorithms for their use cases. The RenderBoost is available for immediate shipment. For additional information visit Progeniq’s Web site.