How To Play Out On Multiple Screens
Table of Contents
This How To will show you how to quickly set up the configuration for rendering on multiple screens with the Ventuz Runtime.
Introduction
You will learn how to configure the Render Setup and what configurations need to be done in your GPU settings.
We will cover the following topics:
- Hardware setup
- Ventuz configuration
General Hardware Setup
In order to show your content within a presentation on two screens you need to setup Mosaic (for Nvidia) or Eyefinity (for AMD) first.
For a normal consumer GPU these span modes are a different; For Nvidia, it is called Nvidia Surround.
Nvidia surround is not officialy supported in Ventuz. It may work but various errors and instability may occur. We recommend to use professional GPUs such as Nvidia Quadro.
Depending on the generation and make of GPUs, the configuration locations will differ. If you need more help for those setups visit these pages:
AMD Eyefinity.
Nvidia Surround
Nvidia Mosaic
Ventuz Configuration
After the span mode is set up according to the manufacturer's manual, we can configure the Render Setup in Ventuz.
Open the Configuration Editor and create a new configuration in the "Layout Configuration for Rendering on Multiple Outputs" category by clicking the "+" on the right side. Now you can give it a name and clicking OK. The Layout Configuration Editor will automatically open.
What you will see now is something similar to this. The size and resolution may vary depending on your setup.
Now click on the icon marked in the top left to create a new setup. Adjust the number of displays to the correct amount for each machine and LMB click create.
For this example we only have one machine. If you need to learn how to setup a multi-machine cluster, take a look at this how to.
This dialog will always override the existing setup when saving.
These screens can be freely moved and can be adjusted so they fit the arrangement of your displays.
Notice how there is always this thicker outer wall; this is the entire rendered area. This is important to know because Ventuz will always use the whole rectangle as its rendered area. For example, if things are moving from left to right and there is a lot of space between those screens, that the object moving respects the free/empty space.
The whole "rendered area" is always rendered by the GPU. Memory and performance are still allocated to this area even if it's empty.
Now save the configuration and start your presentation. For testing purposes each Ventuz installation holds a Default presentation, launchable from the start screen of the Ventuz Configuration Editor in the Live Project Management section. For a more detailed description of the render setup and its possibilities take a look here.
Conclusion
Now it should be possible for you to work with multiple displays in any arrangement. The number of displays should not make a difference. For some more in depth guides on these topics, see the links below. We also have a How To on building content for a multi screen setup available here. And join our Discord server to connect with the community and get help and feedback for your projects!