mantra command line render to a different version

[LaidlawFX]

Hello,

I was wondering if anybody new if there was a command line flag you could add to render mantra with a different version of Houdini. I have 11.0.747 on my computer, but I want to render with 11.0.701. I have my .hip file open to work on in a latter version in order to fix my scene, but there is another bug that causes me to not be able to render with a later version.

Thanks

-Ben

[lukeiamyourfather]

I'd probably write out an IFD sequence and then render using the command line where you can specify exactly what executable and version to use. The Mantra version selection in the Mantra output driver only selects major versions (10.0, 11.0, etc.).

http://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini11.0/rendering/commandline

If you need to do interactive renders then going back to the previous version would be a good idea, or if a bug is preventing that maybe setup a Python script that will create the IFD and start the command line render for you.

[LaidlawFX]

Rendering to the farm is ok, our wrapper will handle that. I need to bypass my interactive render in mplay for this specific shot until the programmers fix the other problem. The mantra version is inherently based on what version of houdini you open in, and I am hoping for some old school magic that can be more precise than changing the major versions with menu option, but change the build versions, too.

[lukeiamyourfather]

Rendering to the farm is ok, our wrapper will handle that. I need to bypass my interactive render in mplay for this specific shot until the programmers fix the other problem. The mantra version is inherently based on what version of houdini you open in, and I am hoping for some old school magic that can be more precise than changing the major versions with menu option, but change the build versions, too.

I don't think there is such a way in Houdini terms. There's always trickery to be had if you're on Linux though, like rename Mantra in the current build to something like mantra.old and then replace it with a symbolic link to another version of Mantra but call the link mantra. Either way you can render command line on the workstation too, it doesn't have to be on the farm to do that.

[LaidlawFX]

Ok I found what I wanted... if you have multiple versions of Houdini installed on your computer and you want to render with a different version of mantra than from current hip file than you are in, you just need to set the command line on your rop to the explicit path to that mantra.

for instance

mantra

is the command line default on the rop, and I am in 11.0.733

to render with the mantra of 11.0.701, I need to set command line in the mantra rop

/Library/Frameworks/Houdini.framework/Versions/11.0.701/Resources/bin/mantra

[symek]

That is a worst way of doing that. You are effectively mixing two environments with unpredictable results. Imagine what would happen if SESI changes single line in voplib.h in a next build.

The way you control binaries on Linux is shell variables. They were designed for that purpose. Proper environment setup allows you to work on a particular build and switch to another when you need it. Always by setting a couple exports in terminal, what is done by default by Houdini setup script.

[lukeiamyourfather]

Ok I found what I wanted... if you have multiple versions of Houdini installed on your computer and you want to render with a different version of mantra than from current hip file than you are in, you just need to set the command line on your rop to the explicit path to that mantra.

for instance

mantra

is the command line default on the rop, and I am in 11.0.733

to render with the mantra of 11.0.701, I need to set command line in the mantra rop

/Library/Frameworks/Houdini.framework/Versions/11.0.701/Resources/bin/mantra

Nice, that'll do it. I was looking at the default Houdini environment variables and didn't find one (hconfig -a), doh!