NVIDIA HAS revealed Iray Server, designed to allow distributed networks to pool resources to work on high-performance renders.

Iray coordinates machines into WAN clusters, combining their resources to speed up the creation of images during development.

Iray Server can also stream interactive rendering from the server to another machine and submit jobs to a queue for easy management, allowing users to manage the queue from any browser able to reach the network, even on mobile.

Users can also modify and resubmit work without having to go back into the host application.

Phil Miller, director of product management at Nvidia, said: "Iray Server is a great tool for designers and the production companies employing them because it speeds up the creative process.

"Machines running Iray Server coordinate with each other to reduce the time needed to render an image. This allows you to process images in a fraction of the time it would take a single machine."

Previously submitted work is fully cached so the same data is never sent twice, and nodes can come and go from the cluster at will without stuffing up anyone's jobs.

Iray Server works on machines running Nvidia GPUs, offering cloud plug-ins for industry standard applications including Autodesk 3DSMax and Maya.

The idea of cluster computing is nothing new. Everything from BitTorrent to scientific research relies on it, but this is one of the first attempts to create cluster supercomputers for graphics rendering.

Iray Server is available as a 90-day free trial starting today. It's simply a case of download the client, install it, run it and bosh. We don't have full details on prices yet, so for now enjoy the freeness.

Nvidia launched its Drive PX 2 supercomputer for self-driving cars at the start of the year which it claims is as powerful as 150 MacBook Pros.