This summer, Octane user ‘24601’ (not his actual account ID, but close enough!) was giving me feedback on the site and the Maya plug-in, and we got to talking about ORC (which was about to launch to a wider audience the following month).

That week, he ended up getting more render credits than any other user on the system (besides me).

Honestly, I just wanted to know what he’d do with them. What he’d render. What he’d even imagine he’d want to render.

But I didn’t ask. I never would. A lesson he taught me better than anyone: thinking outside the box begins once you let go of what’s in it. This is true for light field rendering, and it’s true for thought experiments that become profound creative awakenings.

Me & Octane User ‘24601’

Octane user ‘24601’ and I go way back — before RNDR, before ORC, before Octane, before OTOY was a company. We met a long time ago, when I was working out of my mom’s house in the San Fernando Valley on GPU raytracing, and the future was still very far away.

He had heard about me, and one day, just like that, he was there at my house, my mom letting him in through the front door (Hi Mom!).

I showed him OTOY as it was, and what I hoped it would become. He believed in me and he believed in my vision. Strongly. Profoundly. At a time when few did. It changed my life — how could I believe any less of myself after that?

It was the point in my life when I forgot about the box I was living in. When I accepted my mission. When I took my first steps into a larger world. When I boldly went where no one had gone before. When I stopped looking backwards, just forwards, other than to think of you, my friend, and how you sent me on my way here, those many years ago.

Thank you, JJ.

Thank you for believing in me then. Thank you for believing in me now. And thank you for being part of what is to come, as we get RNDR underway.

It’s an honor to have you officially join OTOY’s advisory board (might I add — also super helpful when you need new Octane features!) as well as RNDR’s.

RNDR, is young, it needs all the power it can get — all the way to first light. Millions of RNDR nodes are enslaved in mining operations. They need to be free. They need to RNDR, so that next, we can invite the world to Render the Metaverse once more (this time, powered by a fully operational RNDR network!)

What does it mean to Render the Metaverse? To imagine reality — and render it real. That to me is magic.

Jules