About Changing Output Folders Mid Project

Generally speaking, CORTEX expects that you will set a designated output folder once, at the beginning of the Project and this will not change.

If you need to reassign the output destination due to space limitations or other reasons, please keep the following in mind:

  • You should not change locations in the middle of a Day/Job. Please make this change at the beginning of the night.
  • If you also move the LUTs & Stills location, you may find your renders will fail because currently, moving the LUT folder [does not copy the old LUTs] (When moving LUT folder, move or copy all existing LUTs) so you will experience failed renders
  • Your existing deliverables will remain in their current location, all future deliverables will be output to the new location, so they will be split.
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I know this is an old post, but thought I’d comment and add a suggestion. We recently had some renders fail because we changed the Still Store & LUT Location. It’s not immediately clear why a render fails except for the LUT xml file could not be found.

(Side note for those who don’t know: when you import a LUT file like a .cube, Cortex takes the LUT information and rewraps it inside an XML file. Then it gives the XML file a name of 32 random characters [UUID] and puts the XML file inside the Still Store & LUTs folder. When rendering clips, it uses the LUT info in the XML file for rendering, not the original .cube file. No XML file means no render.)

But here’s the suggestion - when Cortex imports the LUT file it keeps track of where that LUT file lives (the directory is in the Directory table in the database). Would it be possible to use some logic to recreate the XML file if it is missing? Something like this:

  1. Attempt to render, see if LUT XML is available in the Still Store & LUTs folder
  2. If LUT XML is missing, look in Asset & Directory tables and find the original LUT file (like a .cube)
  3. Re-create the LUT XML file from the original LUT .cube
  4. Try to render again. If LUT wasn’t found, fail render.

Just a thought to help make rendering a little more robust.