1 Introduction

This document briefly explains the steps to install and run Luxion KeyShot 10 application on a Virtual Machine deployed in Azure Cloud Platform and presents the performance results.

This recipe document covers the following topics: -

• Deploy & connect a required virtual machine on Azure platform.
• Install required NVIDIA drivers in virtual machine.
• Install Application on virtual machine.
• Attach license to the current application.
• Performance results of current application on azure virtual machine.
• Azure consumption.
• Summary.

2 Deploy Virtual Machine on Azure Cloud Platform

2.1 Azure Cloud Architecture for Application

The below Architecture explains the virtual machine running on an Azure Platform

2.2 Azure Virtual Machine (VM)

A VM is a virtualized instance of a computer that can perform almost all the same functions as a computer, including running applications and operating systems.

An Azure VM gives the flexibility of virtualization without having to buy and maintain the physical hardware that runs it. However, user still need to maintain the VM by performing tasks, such as configuring, patching, and installing the software that runs on it.

Things to be considered before deploying a VM,

• The names of the application resources
• The location where the resources are stored
• The size of the VM
• The operating system that the VM runs
• The configuration of the VM
• The related resources that the VM needs

There are different sizes and options for the Azure virtual machines one can use to run apps and workloads. Depending on the workload user has to choose the appropriate VM size or complete list check this https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machines/sizes/.

The performance of Luxion KeyShot 10 on Azure Platform, NC64as_T4_v3 virtual machine is deployed to analyse the hardware performance.

NCasT4_v3-series Series VMs are powered by Nvidia Tesla T4GPUs and AMD EPYC 7V12(Rome) CPUs. The “NC64as_T4_v3” VM has 4 NVIDIA Tesla T4 GPUs with 16 GB of memory each, up to 64 non-multithreaded AMD processor cores with a total memory of 440GB.

2.3 Create a Virtual Machine on Azure Platform

Sign in to Azure

Sign into the Azure portal by using https://portal.azure.com/

Free Trial subscriptionsaren't eligible for limit or quota increases. If user have aFree Trial subscription, user can upgrade to aPay-As-You-Gosubscription.

After the successful sign in or sign up, one has to upgrade the Azure subscription to Pay-As-You-Go to deploy a Virtual machine. For deployment, the user must have regional vCPU quota which can be obtained by raising a request.

The step-by-step procedure to increase the vCPU quota is given below,

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-portal/supportability/per-vm-quota-requests

The step-by-step procedure to deploy Virtual machine is given below,

1. Type virtual machines in the marketplace search.
2. Under Services, select Virtual machines.
3. In the Virtual machines page, select Create Then Virtual machine.
4. In the Basics tab, under Project details, make sure the correct subscription is selected and then choose to Create new resource group. Type Azure- PerformanceTest(user choice) for the name.

5. Under Instance details, type Azure-VM (user choice) for the Virtual machine name and choose Australia East for Region. Choose Windows 10 pro, Version 20H2-Gen2 for the Image and Standard_NC64as_T4_v3 for the Size (user choice). Leave the other defaults.

Note:

• Region must be decided based on where user is going to deploy a Virtual machine. To avoid the network latency, the region should be near to the location where the VM is to be deployed.
• Image selection is of user choice based on the application user can choose the image (Windows 10, Linux based OS and Windows Server)

6. Under Administrator account, provide a username, such as Azureuser and a password. The password must be at least 12 characters long and meet the defined complexity requirements.

7. Under Inbound port rules, choose Allow selected ports and then select RDP (3389) and HTTP (80) from the drop-down.

8. Under the Licencing click the check box

9. In Advanced tab, under the Extensions click Select an extension to install, select NVIDIA GPU Driver Extension (user choice)

10. Leave the remaining defaults and then select the Review + create button at the bottom of the page.
11. After validation runs, select the Create button at the bottom of the page.

12. After deployment is complete, select Go to resource.

2.4 Connect to virtual machine

Create a remote desktop connection to the virtual machine. These directions tell user how to connect to a VM from a Windows computer. On a Mac, user need an RDP client such as thisRemote Desktop Clientfrom the Mac App Store.

1. On the overview page for a virtual machine, select the Connect button then select RDP.

2. In the Connect with RDP page, keep the default options to connect by IP address, over port 3389, and click Download RDP file.
3. Open the downloaded RDP file and click Connect when prompted.
4. In the Windows Security window, select More choices and then Use a different account. Type the username as localhost\username, enter the password created for the virtual machine, and then click OK.
5. User may receive a certificate warning during the sign-in process. Click Yes or Continue to create the connection.

2.5 Install Nvidia Drivers

To take advantage of the GPU capabilities of Azure N-series VMs backed by NVIDIA GPUs, user must install NVIDIA GPU drivers.

In two ways user can install the drivers,

• TheNVIDIA GPU Driver Extensioninstalls appropriate NVIDIA CUDA or GRID drivers on an N-series VM. Install or manage the extension using the Azure portal (Ref 9)
• Install NVIDIA GPU drivers manually. (For the manual installation procedure follow https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machines/windows/n-series-driver-setup/)

3 Download KeyShot 10 Application on Virtual Machine:

For installing Luxion KeyShot 10 on Azure VM, user have to visit the official website https://www.KeyShot.com/ , Under ‘Resources’ tab , click on ‘download’ where one can find the latest version of KeyShot or user can click on the ‘Find Previous Versions’ link to download any specific version. The software will be downloaded and will be ready to install.

3.1 Product Install and License procedure

On Windows, the installation process will ask to consider the following

• End-User Agreement
• Install for everyone using the computer or just for the current user
• Location of the KeyShot Installation folder
• Location of the Resource folder– The resource folder contains several textures environments etc. which user can use with KeyShot. It will also be the default destination folder when unpacking .ksp files.Learn more about the Resource folder.
• Enabling access for KeyShot services in firewall settings

On Mac, KeyShotwill be installed in the applications folder and the resources folder will be located in “Application Support”.

First time when user launches KeyShot on a new machine, User will be asked if one has a license or try a free trial. If User already have bought KeyShot or have access to a Floating license, selectActivate License, otherwise one can selectGet a Trialand get a free Trial.

Here Node locked license is used, it is tied to your device and can only be active on one machine at a time. However, one can transfer the license repeatedly between up to three machines of mixed platforms. When user buys a node locked license one will receive a serial code or in some cases a .lic file.

Installing with a Serial code:

• Select the I have a Serial Code option and press Next.

• Enter/update your details and press Next.

• Enter the serial code.

• If User is online simply press Next and KeyShot will create the .lic file and install it .If User’s computer is not online, press Save request file and KeyShot will generate a request file that user need to email to license@luxion.com, to get a .lic file that user can install on that specific computer. For more details on other type of license click this link

4 Performance results of Luxion KeyShot 10 on Azure Virtual Machines

4.1 Luxion KeyShot 10 overview:

Luxion, a leading developer of advanced rendering and lighting technology and maker of KeyShot®. KeyShot 10builds on Luxion’s advancements in rendering technology introduced over the years to continue innovation in material creation, accurate lighting representation, and streamlining of the complete product visualization workflow, strengthening the foundation of visualization for designers, engineers, and 3D professionals

4.1.1 Rendering

The term rendering defines the automatic process ofgenerating digital images from three-dimensional models, by means of a special software. These images simulate project or 3D model’s photorealistic environments, materials, lights and objects.

Types of Rendering

Rendering Real Time: Real-time rendering is mainlyused in gaming and interactive graphics, where images are calculated from 3D information at a very fast pace. As a result, dedicated graphics hardware has improved the performance of real-time rendering ensuring rapid image processing.

Rendering offline: Offline rendering is a technique mainly used insituations where the need for processing speed is lower. Visual effects work where photorealism needs to be at highest standard possible. There is no unpredictability, unlike real time

4.2 Luxion KeyShot 10 on Azure Platform:

When it comes to performance parameters, rendering is one parameter which need to be carried out on visualization and design software. Often designers spend a lot of time in rendering process. With advanced capabilities like CPU & GPU rendering, KeyShot has drastically reduced the Render times over the period. To carry out these complex and heavy rendering simulations on KeyShot software, right hardware is must. Microsoft partnered with Nvidia provides the required and suitable Infrastructure and hardware on Azure cloud platform. Microsoft Azure provides the latest and fastest compute capabilities for both CPU & GPU intensive workloads.

4.3 Luxion KeyShot 10 Settings for expected performance

For the current expected performance activity, carried out offline image rendering task and calculated the render times for CPU rendering and GPU rendering. We carried out this activity with varying GPU number from the KeyShot application, and then compared the render time differences between CPU & GPU rendering.

4.3.1 Opening Luxion KeyShot 10 Model

Open the KeyShot Application and load the KeyShot Model into the application, here in this case Demo scenes are used.

After opening the KeyShot a welcome page appears in which one can find the demo scenes where user can use those models for rendering and testing.

4.3.2 Selection of CPU and GPU mode for GUI and Rendering:

In KeyShot users can toggle between CPU and GPU option for setting up the model before rendering for better performance. To access this option, one can click on CPU usage ribbon to select the no. of cores and it is denoted in terms of percentage.

Similarly to access the GPU cores, Users need to click on GPU icon in the ribbons and under GPU usage one can select the GPU cores individually.

4.3.3 Render settings

For render setting select the render option in KeyShot as shown below

Saving the Images: User can save the image rendered in the desired location or path in desktop from selecting the option under Output -> Still Image -> Folder option from Render settings tab. The image size is set here under Resolution tab by giving the pixels width and height input manually or one can use any presets options that are available under presets drop down menu.

General Settings: For CPU and GPU Rendering, Under Options Tab, you can select rendering mode as default. To select GPU or CPU rendering, select Render Engine drop down menu where user can select CPU or GPU and under CPU/GPU usage one can select no. of CPU/GPU cores. Under Quality tab select Maximum Samples and input the Sample size and Pixel filter size. Finally click on render to start the rendering process.

4.4 Luxion KeyShot 10 Performance Results on NCas_T4 VM

To Analyse the performance of KeyShot 10 ,carried out Rendering using CPU and GPU for six different models and then compared CPU/GPU render times. The aim of this rendering process is to compare the GPU Rendering performance with respect to CPU Rendering. For CPU rendering, the application is utilizing all the 64 Cores and then performed GPU rendering with varying GPU numbers 1,2,3 and 4 on the same VM. The below graphs show all the results.

Model 1 – Magnus

Resolution- H: 2000px W: 2000px

Print size- H :6.67-inch W: 6.67 inch

Relative speed up between CPU and GPU rendering.

Model 2 – Interior

Resolution- H: 2000px W: 2000px

Print size- H :6.67-inch W: 6.67 inch

Relative speed up between CPU and GPU rendering.

Model 3 – Entertainment

Resolution- H: 2000px W: 2000px

Print size- H :6.67-inch W: 6.67 inch

Relative speed up between CPU and GPU rendering.

Model 4 – Watch

Resolution- H: 3556px W: 2000px

Print size- H :11.85-inch W: 6.67 inch

Relative speed up between CPU and GPU rendering.

Model 5 – Ring

Resolution- H: 3556px W: 2000px

Print size- H :11.85 inch W: 6.67 inch

Relative speed up between CPU and GPU rendering.

Model 6 – Door

Resolution- H: 3556px W: 2000px

Print size- H :11.85-inch W: 6.67 inch

Relative speed up between CPU and GPU rendering.

5 Azure Cost

For the below cost reports, the application installation time and pre-processing time is not considered, and license cost is not included, only considered the total rendering time for all models with different sample size.

Azure cost for sample size of 256:

Azure cost for sample size of 512:

Azure cost for sample size of 1024:

6 Summary

1. KeyShot Application is successfully deployed and tested on NCas_T4_v3 series VMs on Azure Platform
2. NC64as_T4 VM, GPU rendering for sample size of 256 is 8.25 times faster on an average when compared to all test models, similarly for sample size of 512 is 9.71 times faster on an average and for sample size for 1024 it is 14.21 times faster on an average.
3. NC64as_T4 Virtual Machine is recommended for KeyShot application as it demonstrated a better performance for both CPU and GPU rendering timelines.