For the first few shots of my project, like the animator sleeping and the Maya character jumping off a building, I decided to do the rendering entirely in Maya. I set up the lighting and environment carefully, making sure everything looked correct in the frame. I double-checked the camera angles, the character’s positioning, and how the shadows fell across the scene. Once I felt everything was ready, I hit render for the first shot.
To my surprise, it took over 13 hours to render just that one shot. I hadn’t anticipated how long each frame would take with the lighting and materials I was using. Seeing the estimated time made me panic a little—I realized that if every shot took this long, I would fall seriously behind schedule.
At first, I thought I could use the render farm to speed things up, but unfortunately, it wasn’t working when I needed it the most. I had to quickly come up with a backup plan. I ended up rendering across 4–5 different PCs in Digital Space, leaving them to run overnight. Even then, one shot that had over 500 frames took around two full days to complete.
Because of the long render times, I wasn’t able to implement all the feedback I had received for some animation shots. It was frustrating, but I had to make decisions based on time constraints. I realized I wouldn’t be able to complete the rendering, post-processing, and color grading for everything before the deadline, so I applied for a deadline extension. This allowed me to work systematically without rushing and ensured I could maintain the quality I wanted for my final shots.
Looking back, this stage taught me a lot about planning render times, testing setups, and managing resources. I learned that even if the animation and lighting are perfect, render time can completely change your workflow and schedule. It was stressful, but it was also a crucial lesson in patience and problem-solving in a real production scenario.