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renderdl reads a file containing scene description commands and “executes” them. Such files are commonly called NSI files (NSI stands for Nodal Scene Interface). There are two kinds of NSI files: ASCII encoded and binary encoded. A binary NSI file is smaller than its ASCII encoded equivalent, but an ASCII NSI file has the advantage of being human readable and editable in any a text editor or word processor.

To render a file named file.nsi, just type:

...

If no file name is specified, renderdl reads scene description commands from the standard in. This feature enables piping commands directly in renderdl. For example, to enter scene description commands interactively (which is not really practical), do the following:

Code Block
renderdl
Reading (stdin)
<enter commands here>

If you wish to pipe the content of file.nsi in renderdl, type: 

Code Block
cat file.nsi | renderdl

Command Line Options

Option                              Description

-t n

Specifies the number of threads to use for the rendering. "n" can take any of the following values: 

n>0Use "n" threads
n=0

Use as many threads as there are available cores

n<0Use all but n threads


-stats

Embed statistics in rendered images. This is supported for EXR and TIFF files only. Statistics are explained in more detail in Understanding 3Delight Statistics.

-progressPrints a progress status after each rendered bucket.
-cat

Print NSI commands instead of sending them into the renderer. An example usage is converting a binary (or compressed) NSI into an human readable ASCII version:

Code Block
renderdl -cat binary.nsi.gz > ascii.nsi


-cat -binary

Outputs the NSI commands in binary format. For example:

Code Block
renderdl -cat -binary ascii.nsi > binary.nsi


-cat -gzip

Outputs the NSI file in compressed form. For example:

Code Block
renderdl -cat -gzip ascii.nsi > ascii.nsi.gz


-vPrints the current version of the renderer.
-hPrint Prints this help.

Shell Return values

The renderdl executable will return one of the following values:

Return ValueDescription
0No error.
1Bad combination of parameters. An error message will explain why.
199Option "licensing" "waitforlicense" 0 was used and no license was available
255The NSI file specified on the command line could not be read.