have had few requests to use blender for performing background tasks

- visualizing data, rendering scenes automatically and character rendering on a server.

This example script shows how you can run blender in background mode, parse arguments from the command line to generate a simple scene and render/save it.

release/scripts/scripttemplate_background_job.py

@@ -0,0 +1,123 @@
+#!BPY
+"""
+Name: 'Background Job Example'
+Blender: 248
+Group: 'ScriptTemplate'
+Tooltip: 'Script template for automating tasks from the command line with blender'
+"""
+
+from Blender import Window
+import bpy
+
+script_data = \
+'''# This script is an example of how you can run blender from the command line (in background mode with no interface)
+# to automate tasks, in this example it creates a text object, camera and light, then renders and/or saves it.
+# This example also shows how you can parse command line options to python scripts.
+# 
+# Example usage for this test.
+#  blender -b -P $HOME/.blender/scripts/scripttemplate_background_job.py -- --text="Hello World" --render="/tmp/hello" --save="/tmp/hello.blend"
+# 
+# Notice all python args are after the '--' argument.
+
+import Blender
+import bpy
+
+def example_function(body_text, save_path, render_path):
+	
+	sce= bpy.data.scenes.active
+
+	txt_data= bpy.data.curves.new('MyText', 'Text3d')
+	
+	# Text Object
+	txt_ob = sce.objects.new(txt_data)			# add the data to the scene as an object
+	txt_data.setText(body_text)					# set the body text to the command line arg given
+	txt_data.setAlignment(Blender.Text3d.MIDDLE)# center text
+	
+	# Camera
+	cam_data= bpy.data.cameras.new('MyCam')		# create new camera data
+	cam_ob= sce.objects.new(cam_data)			# add the camera data to the scene (creating a new object)
+	sce.objects.camera= cam_ob					# set the active camera
+	cam_ob.loc= 0,0,10
+	
+	# Lamp
+	lamp_data= bpy.data.lamps.new('MyLamp')
+	lamp_ob= sce.objects.new(lamp_data)
+	lamp_ob.loc= 2,2,5
+
+	if save_path:
+		try:
+			f= open(save_path, 'w')
+			f.close()
+			ok= True
+		except:
+			print 'Cannot save to path "%s"' % save_path
+			ok= False
+		
+		if ok:
+			Blender.Save(save_path, 1)
+	
+	if render_path:
+		render= sce.render
+		render.extensions= True
+		render.renderPath = render_path
+		render.sFrame= 1
+		render.eFrame= 1
+		render.renderAnim()
+
+
+
+import sys		# to get command line args
+import optparse	# to parse options for us and print a nice help message
+
+script_name= 'background_job.py'
+
+def main():
+	
+	# get the args passed to blender after "--", all of which are ignored by blender specifically
+	# so python may receive its own arguments
+	argv= sys.argv
+
+	if '--' not in argv:
+		argv = [] # as if no args are passed
+	else:	
+		argv = argv[argv.index('--')+1: ] # get all args after "--"
+	
+	# When --help or no args are given, print this help
+	usage_text =  'Run blender in background mode with this script:\n'
+	usage_text += '  blender -b -P ' + script_name + ' -- [options]'
+			
+	parser = optparse.OptionParser(usage = usage_text)
+	
+
+	# Example background utility, add some text and renders or saves it (with options)
+	parser.add_option('-t', '--text', dest='body_text', help='This text will be used to render an image')
+
+	parser.add_option('-s', '--save', dest='save_path', help='Save the generated file to the specified path', metavar='FILE')
+	parser.add_option('-r', '--render', dest='render_path', help='Render an image to the specified path', metavar='FILE')
+
+	options, args = parser.parse_args(argv) # In this example we wont use the args
+	
+	if not argv:
+		parser.print_help()
+		return
+
+	if not hasattr(options, 'body_text'):
+		print 'Error: --text="some string" argument not given, aborting.\n'
+		parser.print_help()
+		return
+	
+	# Run the example function
+	example_function(options.body_text, options.save_path, options.render_path)
+
+	print 'batch job finished, exiting'
+
+
+if __name__ == '__main__':
+	main()
+'''
+
+new_text = bpy.data.texts.new('background_job.py')
+new_text.write(script_data)
+bpy.data.texts.active = new_text
+Window.RedrawAll()
+