Command-line Interface

Katana's launch behavior and mode of operation can be controlled by passing command-line arguments.

Global Arguments

These arguments can be passed regardless of the selected launch mode, see Launch Modes.

Argument	Description
-h, --help	Displays a list of command-line arguments.
--asset ASSETID	Loads the Katana project with the given asset ID or path.
--ocio PATH	Uses the OpenColorIO configuration file at the given path.
--profile	Runs Katana in profiling mode. See Op Cook Profiling.
--force-profile	Runs Katana in profiling mode and start profiling immediately.
--profiling-dir DIR	Sets the directory where profiling files, if any, are written.
-V, --verbose	The level of verbosity of logging informational messages. Defaults to 1. Set to 0 to suppress most informational messages.

Launch Modes

Katana normally operates in interactive (GUI) mode. Katana can be launched in a specific launch mode by using one of the following command-line arguments.

Mode Name	Argument	Description
Interactive	No flags	Runs Katana with the standard GUI.
Batch	--batch	Runs Katana without a GUI to render the output of a specific node in the Node Graph. Batch mode supports further command-line arguments, see Batch Mode for more information.
Script	--script PATH	Runs Katana without a GUI, and executes the specified Python script at the given path.
Shell	--shell	Runs Katana without a GUI, and allows Python commands to be run interactively.