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2 cents per 24-core-minute means that if 960 cores are used while rendering, your charge will increase at a faster rate than if only 24 cores are used. In this instance (960 cores), 80 cents per minute instead of 2 cents per minute. This is very much like electricity usage. At a rate of 20 cents per kilowatt-hour, if you use 10,000 watts for one hour, your cost is 200 cents.
Monitoring the charge while rendering
To further explain and understand the 3Delight Cloud rendering charge, we will use this simulation of four independent renders:
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Syncing | The first render is at the “Syncing” stage. This is when the scene elements are uploaded to the cloud. There is no charge during that process. This can be quick or long depending on the speed of your internet connection and how many of your scene elements are already cached in the cloud. For the entire duration of that process, the 24-core minutes counter and number of cores are marked as “-“ and the progress bar does not start. This serves as a confirmation this is not charged. |
Parsing, Rendering | The 3rd and 4th renders illustrated renders at various stages of rendering while the number of 24-core-minutes are counted. As explained before, the rate of increase of the counter is proportional to the number of cores used. Prior to Parsing, there is a varying Starting time that can last up to 30 seconds but it is only counted as a fix 0.3 x 24-core-minute (18 secs). We are aiming to reduce this further in the future. |
Completed | The last render (shown in a subdued shade) is a completed one. As such, the 24-core minute counter has stopped. It is possible at that stage the image is still being progressively displayed on your screen. This would happen if your internet speed could not keep up with the rendering speed. In this instance, the fact the 24-minute counter has stop to increase serve to confirm that the process of image transmission is not charged. |
Recording the charge
Once a rendering is completed (successfully or not), it is deducted from the minutes balance in your account. Using the completed render in the above example, here is how it listed in the Transaction History of your online account:
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