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Renderworks Issue - Geometry Not Updating / Viewport Turns Black


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Guest Selin
6 hours ago, frozenwaffles said:

@Selin please come to our office if you want to see this reproduced. i can reproduce it in any serious drawing multiple times a day. its really quite easy! in fact i can do it about 20-50 times a day 🙂

Hahah I believe you 🙂 I've seen it happen on Jim's machine along with others. Though seeing it reproduced in a release build doesn't help much. I need to see what's going on in the code before it happens. We need to find out the cause, we can't fix a bug with only a result.

 

Does this happen when you have a specific plugin object in the file? Does this happen after you run Vectorworks for more than 30 mins? Did this ever happen in the first render? Is the file bigger than a certain size? What type of textures do you have in the file? The cause could be anything. So yeah what @zoomer said.

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Guest Selin
19 hours ago, zoomer said:

I will watch when working.

But I have seldom these problems with cache updating or black renders somehow.

And every time I had larger problems in the past, it wasn't that CineRender Task was

diminishing, it was more that it stayed in Activity Monitor after VW was closed or

crashed and I had to force quit CineRender or reboot macOS.

Thanks @zoomer this info is pretty helpful. I'll see how we handle CineRender taking too long or hanging.

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4 hours ago, Selin said:

Does this happen when you have a specific plugin object in the file? Does this happen after you run Vectorworks for more than 30 mins? Did this ever happen in the first render? Is the file bigger than a certain size? What type of textures do you have in the file? The cause could be anything. So yeah what @zoomer said.

 

I have a file I was working in recently where it was happening constantly.  Do you have a direct email I could send the file to, in case it's helpful?

 

I don't think the viewport ever went black on the first render after restarting, but it would often go black after I changed something and tried to render for a second time (or third or fourth). So I don't think it's related to 'time' in the program per se. Sometimes it'll be fine for hours in a single file, then suddenly go black.

 

One thing I remember working on in this particular file was my Renderworks Lights, though that's not always the case.

 

Could it have anything to do with altering something in the Design Layer while a viewport is still updating? I often continue working while a view is rendering.

Edited by Andy Broomell
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Guest Selin

@Andy Broomell that'd be really helpful, thank you! Can you please dm me the file or send it to maydin@vectorworks.net? 

 

17 hours ago, Andy Broomell said:

Could it have anything to do with altering something in the Design Layer while a viewport is still updating? I often continue working while a view is rendering.

 

Yeah, cancelling/switching to another job might be the cause. I'll try that heavily.

Thanks for your notes these are pretty useful!

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15 minutes ago, Selin said:

@Andy Broomell that'd be really helpful, thank you! Can you please dm me the file or send it to maydin@vectorworks.net? 

 

 

Yeah, cancelling/switching to another job might be the cause. I'll try that heavily.

Thanks for your notes these are pretty useful!

That fail happens to me too in that scenario but also when I stay on the viewport. So I don’t think that’s the root cause 

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@Selin  and @zoomer , thanks for your responses. @Hayden Schraishuhn manages all our communique to our local VW support team/distributor being OZcad.

we have sent files to them and this has been escalated to Nemetschek.

Apparently the only current solution is a pop up to say CineRender has crashed and that you are basically 'f$&ked' and you need to restart the program. This insight and knowledge is just amazing and will make my time so much more productive......NOT!

But in all seriousness I can understand why you need to get more insight into what causing this catastrophic failure of the program...i want you to fix this! 🙂

If it will help, what is the best way to get you the file @Selin privately?

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Guest Selin

Here's a question for y'all: do you happen to have caustics turned on when the black VP/crash happens?

I've tracked down a random CineRender crash in a RW viewport which is strictly related to caustics. I'm wondering if they are the same issue.

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5 minutes ago, Selin said:

Here's a question for y'all: do you happen to have caustics turned on when the black VP/crash happens?

I've tracked down a random CineRender crash in a RW viewport which is strictly related to caustics. I'm wondering if they are the same issue.

 

I've never turned on caustics and I have had problems with black viewports.

 

Kevin

 

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Guest Selin
9 minutes ago, Kevin McAllister said:

 

I've never turned on caustics and I have had problems with black viewports.

 

Kevin

 

Uh oh my hope did not last for long.. Thank you so much Kevin for letting me know! 

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So although this issue seems to most often arise after editing Light objects, today I'm working in a file that contains zero Light objects and it's still rendering black every 3 or 4 times.

 

It's a large file so restarting adds about 5 minutes of wasted time (it's not only closing and re-opening the file, but also the fact that it has to build the geometry cache from scratch again).

 

I have a deadline to finish a batch of renderings by the end of the day. This bug is literally eating up half of my time. I'm screwed.

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4 hours ago, Andy Broomell said:

So although this issue seems to most often arise after editing Light objects, today I'm working in a file that contains zero Light objects and it's still rendering black every 3 or 4 times.

 

It's a large file so restarting adds about 5 minutes of wasted time (it's not only closing and re-opening the file, but also the fact that it has to build the geometry cache from scratch again).

 

I have a deadline to finish a batch of renderings by the end of the day. This bug is literally eating up half of my time. I'm screwed.

I often wonder if Vectoworks senses when a deadline is imminent 🤔

 

I don’t use light objects very often but I regularly have the render black issue. I’m pretty certain it’s related to environmental lighting or Renderworks backgrounds.

 

Kevin

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On 2/11/2018 at 8:25 AM, abcdefgarin said:

Not sure if this has been solved, but I just discovered that if you use the render bitmap tool to render, and then re-render using the standard interface, it seems to reset itself. I haven't tested this work around with viewports yet, but wanted to put that out in the world. Certainly better than having to restart, which is obviously a huge timesuck.

 

 

Hi @abcdefgarin, as per your comment above, have you by chance had occasion to test whether using the Render Bitmap tool also fixes Viewports that have rendered black? 

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Hello again, I could reproduce this issue a couple of times but there are days where it just won't happen. So, investigations are going frustratingly slow. Maybe you could help us.

 

I have a few questions:

- Have you ever experienced this on Windows?

- Which version of OS you're using/experienced this the most (My thinking is Mac OS 10.13 made this more frequent at least. All of our bug reports are filed with 10.13)

- Which RW mode you're using? Could this be related to styles or does it happen in FRW too?

- Did you realize if a particular render setting triggers this? (I was thinking environmental lighting from backgrounds could be a cause somehow. Because when I turned it off, I couldn't reproduce it again. But it's not reliable so I can't be sure. I know indirect lighting and edges are not the cause.)

- Did this ever happen with a simple scene? (if so please send them to me, they're much much easier to debug)

- What was the earliest version of Vectorworks where you got this? 

 

My thinking is that, canceling a rendering and then sending another one is causing this. Lighting setting change or render option change cancels a rendering so it'd be the same thing. 

Thank you all so much for the help, we really appreciate it.

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Here's my experience with this bug -

 

9 minutes ago, Selin said:

- Have you ever experienced this on Windows?

 

I'm Mac based.

 

9 minutes ago, Selin said:

- Which version of OS you're using/experienced this the most (My thinking is Mac OS 10.13 made this more frequent at least. All of our bug reports are filed with 10.13)

 

Mac 10.13.x (currently Mac 10.13.6).

 

9 minutes ago, Selin said:

- Which RW mode you're using? Could this be related to styles or does it happen in FRW too?


Exclusively Custom Renderworks styles.

 

9 minutes ago, Selin said:

- Did you realize if a particular render setting triggers this? (I was thinking environmental lighting from backgrounds could be a cause somehow. Because when I turned it off, I couldn't reproduce it again. But it's not reliable so I can't be sure. I know indirect lighting and edges are not the cause.)

 

Often for B&W renders (Shadows and Textures only, Curved Geometry set to High, Exterior 3 Bounces + HDRWhite Background).

 

9 minutes ago, Selin said:

- Did this ever happen with a simple scene? (if so please send them to me, they're much much easier to debug)

- What was the earliest version of Vectorworks where you got this?

 

I can definitely remember it happening with a project in VW2016. It was usually trigged by trying to update multiple sheet layer viewports at the same time (usually selected from the Viewports pane of the Navigation Palette and then updated using the right click contextual menu). Hard to trigger when only updating one viewport. With the same project I tried the VW Cloud and it sent back PDFs with black viewports (its Windows I believe). I sent that file to JimW at the time.

 

It has happened in other files but I've never been able to reliably reproduce it for filing again. It has happened in files where I've built a clean Renderworks style from scratch rather than bringing one forward from an earlier project.

 

Kevin

 

 

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Thanks Kevin! My experience is also like this. I update a viewport and then update another one before waiting for the first one to finish. This seems to be the only method for me.

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3 minutes ago, Selin said:

Thanks Kevin! My experience is also like this. I update a viewport and then update another one before waiting for the first one to finish. This seems to be the only method for me.

I usually select multiple viewports and update them all at the same time. I tend to walk away so as not to disturb it. The black viewports most often happen for me if I try to do something else (eg. look at email) or if my Mac tries to do something else (Time Machine, antivirus autoupdate etc..). Mac interruptions can cause VW trouble in general so I've tried to minimize them on my system. Its the single core geometry thing that might be related to all this.

 

Kevin

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

I am using 2018 SP4 (Build 435714)(64-Bit) I am having the same issue of a Black screen after an update to a Sheet that has a viewport using Final Quality Renderworks,,,,, I am using A MAC, 3 GHz 8-Core Intel Xeon E5, 64 GB 1866 MHz DDR3, AMD FirePro D700 6144 MB Graphics Card....It is quite frustrating and time consuming to start and restart the application to correct this issue....any solution in sight?

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6 hours ago, Lawrence Gaetano said:

I am using 2018 SP4 (Build 435714)(64-Bit) I am having the same issue of a Black screen after an update to a Sheet that has a viewport using Final Quality Renderworks

Hi @Lawrence Gaetano, and welcome! 

 

I think it's important to note that there are at least two similar but distinct symptoms that can be mis-associated. This thread was started by someone experiencing [only]  Viewports going solid black once they'd rendered. If your entire drawing area is going black, or different again, your entire screen, then this is not the same issue. Clarifying your symptoms both here in this discussion and when working with Tech Support will make a difference because they are likely to have different causes and therefore different solutions. Is it your entire screen or drawing area going black temporarily, OR one or more Viewports ending up permanently solid black at the end of the rendering? 

  • If your Viewports end up black, then for the moment [as far as I know] restarting Vectorworks or failing that restarting your computer are the only reliable remedies for the moment. 
  • If your drawing area goes black while rendering is occurring then this might be in the hands of software engineers to address but the Resetting Vectorworks Preferences process might help. 
  • If it's your entire screen's going black then I'd broaden my view of potential causes. - Is your macOS up-to-date? 
Edited by Jeremy Best
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Jeremy, My issue is exactly that "Random Viewports going solid black once they'd Updated/rendered using Final Quality Renderworks"    Saving, Then closing the file, reopening and then updating the viewport 9/10 times fixes the issue, occasionally I have to restart Vectorworks.....My MAC OSX is current, 10.13.6 (17G65)....This issue has been occurring since I upgraded to 2018, I don't recall having the issues with previous version...Lawrence

 

MAC OSX 10.13.6 (17G65), 3 GHz 8-Core Intel Xeon E5

64 GB 1866 MHz DDR3, AMD FirePro D700 6144 MB

Vectorworks 2018 SP4 Build 435714 (64 Bit)

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