VRED Core

VRED® Core is a flexible, customizable, and scalable VRED® product, particularly for cloud and server-based applications.

What are the Key Technical Features of VRED® Core?

What You Need to Know

CPU raytracing works out of the box on all supported hardware. For GPU raytracing and OpenGL, you need a supported graphics card and to start VRED® Core with the command line parameter -hide_gui.

Why VRED Core?

Because you can:

The launch of VRED Core marks the first step toward providing an agile and adaptable version of VRED, which can be used very flexibly as the core of modern and connected custom systems and scalable rendering applications. Made for cloud use, VRED Core targets new workflows and connects you with your data anytime, anywhere, through the Cloud and streaming.

To see it in action, check out this Porsche Taycan Realtime GPU Raytracing with VRED 2021 video.

Prerequisites

Install VRED Core on Windows, Linux, or virtualized in Docker or Hyper-V. Independent of the operating system, open the default port 8888 for the web interface for incoming traffic to fully use all features offered by VRED Core, such as the Python API, video streaming, and web apps. To enable H264 encoding for video streaming, it is necessary to download the OpenH264 codec v2.0.0 and copy the library file into either of these VRED Core binary folders: Linux64 or WIN64.

Finally, you must set ADSKFLEX_LICENSE_FILE to the license server. Visit the Autodesk Knowledge Network for more information.

How to Start

Linux

# Go to the bin folder of your VRED Core installation
cd {VRED-Cluster-Root}/bin

# Run VRED Core and pass your VPB file as the first argument
./VREDCore example.vpb

Windows

# Go to the bin folder of your VRED Core installation which is usually
cd C:\Program Files\Autodesk\VREDCore-13.1\bin\WIN64

# Run VRED Core and pass your VPB file as the first argument
VREDCore.exe example.vpb

It is also possible to just drag and drop the VPB file onto VREDCore.exe.

Streaming

The easiest way to start with streaming is to use the VRED Stream App. Open the browser at http://localhost:8888 and click Stream App to start the app. For the integration of just the stream without a user interface, use Stream H264 or Stream JPEG at http://localhost:8888 in another web application.

Python API

The web interface also offers an access point to the integrated Python API of VRED. A local firewall is recommended. Python commands can be sent to the following endpoints:

The Python command needs to be set by the query parameter value and have to be URL encoded. Here is an example to load a scene from file:

# Loads a node into the root of the scenegraph
http://localhost:8888/python?value=load%28%27example.vpb%27%29%0A

For testing of Python commands, try the Terminal app at http://localhost:8888. The Postman app is also a good way to send Python commands to VRED Core.

The second endpoint /pythoneval2 is useful for Python commands with a return value such as:

# Returns an array of all viewpoints in a scene
http://localhost:8888/pythoneval2?value=getViewpoints%28%29

Detailed Technical FAQ