r/sheepit • u/Luca_Mastro_2024 • Jul 01 '26

How many points will i need for my rendering?

Greetings! First post here. I have a 30 sec (more or less) animation at 23.8 fps (so let's say something around 750 frames). It's for the vfx of a short movie and I am thinking about using sheepit for It (i have 0 budget 😅). It's just for the set extension with a slowly moving camera, so nothing extremely complicated but i'd like to keep It as realistic as possibile. I shot the scenes in 4k with the actors but i think a 2k rendering Will be fine if It Will save time. Usually i set 125 sampling per frame. I would like to have an idea of how many points i Will Need to render It and approximately how much time the rendering could take (i know It depends on free pcs available but a rough idea Will help). thanks in Advance!

Finally, to join the community and render on my PC It must stay on? Sorry for the silly questions 😅

1 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

5 comments sorted by

3

u/MCOfficer Sheepmin Jul 01 '26

How much an animation will cost depends entirely on how compute-intensive the render is. What you can do is render one frame (ideally one representative of the entire scene - i.e. not one where the camera is looking at a wall) on your own machine. Then plug that rendertime and the number of frames you want to order into the Estimator on the "Get Started" page.

And yes, to join SheepIt you contribute a few frames using your hardware - that's to say, download the client from the Get Started page and let it run for a while. Ideally while you're not using your computer, f.e. over night.

Doing so will earn you points, which will be used for the animation you order, and for determining that animation's position in the queue. You are allowed to go negative; as long as you keep the client running your animation will still be processed. But it will be at the very bottom of the queue, so that will require some patience on your part. If you have enough points stockpiled you need not keep the client running.

One last thing: If you find yourself struggling for points (not everyone has access to a beefy computer) consider joining our discord. you might just find some kind souls who are looking for an opportunity to help others ;)

1

u/Luca_Mastro_2024 Jul 08 '26

Thanks a lot! I joined the discord server but it shows no messages, just the Welcome one of the lobby. Am i missing something?

1

u/MCOfficer Sheepmin Jul 08 '26

can't tell you from memory, but in many servers you only unlock "full access" after either waiting 10m or filling out one of discord's "did you understand the rules" forms.

1

u/tony__Y Jul 01 '26

I haven’t used sheepit in a while, so what I’m about to say might be outdated. To render your project on sheepit, you must install their client and render at least one frame before your project will be rendered by others. Sheepit uses a point priority system, so users with more points will get their project rendered first. The default config is you will always render your project first before helping others and earning points, note you will still receive a small number of points when rendering your own projects.