genocell

I've been out of the loop for a while. What are the new features to be expected in the new release? I'm up for a new subscription and I'm curious.

Okay. I'll keep that in mind. Thanks.

V13. The problem started when I upgraded to v15. I don't normally use save under projects until recently. It doesn't happen when I do a project/cho from scratch. But when I use any project with the same models it will sometimes render weird. If the problem render starts in a cho and it starts to render weird no matter what model I use and settings and camera I use in that cho the same problem render happens. Just now I rendered the same frame using netrender but when I turned SSS on it rendered okay. Also there are wierd black lines when I turned on AO and SSS like in the picture. The lines don't stay at the same exact place and with the same shape but appears at random near the same approximate place each time and at varying sizes.

Here's one: Only objects in the cho. It's random and it's hard to pin it down exactly. If I turned off other models when this happens and load a simple model it wil render the same wierd color. If it happens no matter what settings I use in the cho the same thing happens and I had to close A:M, reload the project and do a marquee render to test if it's okay. Also when I use the same project on netrender it will definitely render in wierd color most of the time.

The error that kicked me out seem to went away for some reason... But now another problem came up. It seems that the thing that I mentioned about AM rendering the frame in in weird colors is true and it appears at random. Only one out of 5 tries turned out okay. I had to make a test render beforehand. And if I use netrender each and every frame will come out like this, regardless of the settings, even with no shadows no AO: I tried it with both v15 and v16 too, doesn't matter if I saved or reload the project and files in it's respective version. And this time I'm sure it's not my fault.

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Oh I got it. They're on by default n v15 onwards. Didn't notice that because v14 didn't have that feature before. Thanks.

Now the aim at constraint for a camera in the choreography doesn't work. It does nothing when I applied the constraint. Tested with a fresh choreography and it doesn't work too. Any type of model or nulls doesn't work. Reloaded, resaved all available files and restarted the program and it doesn't work. Anyone has similar problems?

Ya found it and it's fine now. Thanks!

Errrr.... My TSM rigged model in MOST of my cho files aren't working in v15 and v16. They all work in v14 but a small percentage only works in v15 and v16. I selected my TSM2 rigged model in a cho and the control bones and the pose sliders aren't showing... Weird.... All of the mode buttons and mode related functions of the except for the choreography mode button doesn't work when I select the model. Even selecting any bones in the PWS tree of the model it's not showing. Resaved the cho file and the TSM2 rigged model in v16 and it didn't work... Anyone experienced this before?

An update. Tried the last time and solved the phantom model problems. They're stuff between the tag in the model file. These are that contains multiple duplicate cache lines. So when the models loads it puts in a choreography tree. I rechecked it again and it was my mistake if selecting the cho. Easy to make a mistake since there are may versions of chos and models. It's like half past 1 am here and hadn't have enough sleep. Resaved them all with a with a "v16". So no proeblems anymore, for now. Thank you for the help.

In A:M I just selected all the phantom folders and things that looked weird and hit delete and resaved under a new name. Never save new versions onto old filenames. Save all your old files so if something really odd happens it's easy to go back to when everything worked and compare and see what changed. Thank you for helping me out and thanks to everyone else too. I've opened the file in a script editor and there are alot of nested emptydrivers that are too confusing. I guess I just have to start over and copy paste all the keyframes of the models in the cho files since it would take less time I reckon than rummaging through codes. At least I've removed the modelshortcut parameters in the models. Nasty bug... About the v16. Anyone has any problems with weird athefacts when rendering? I had the same problem with v15 but it went away after I saved it in another copy and reloaded the project. But in v16 it didn't work. The models were all glowing in purplish green and stuff with random thick black lines. But when I reloaded the v15 version of the models they render fine. Anyone experience this?

I'd open the model up in a text editor and first I'd look for something that looks like the problem When i opened your chor the model folders had just a "drivers" folder and two constraints in them. I'd look for model tags that have that in them. What did you delete in the cho file? I've deleted a bunch of Modelshortcut tag pointing to the shoe in two of the models that I had found to be the culprit. Then I loaded it into the cho file that you fixed. But this time (after I deleted shortcuts in two models like I said above) it loads withthout the shoes' name, and it can be deleted without kicking me out. So it's a little bit of progress. Before I deleted the shortcuts it would load dozens of phantom models with the name, and it A:M would kick me out if I try to delete it. About the SSS rendering the test scene using the A:M 15 it didn't give me problems, period and it passed a few passes. But I haven't try rendering it over a thousand pixels in WxH yet and higer number of passes yet. SSS is slower than in v14, but other render options are noticeably faster.

I've got good news and a little bit of bad news. I've managed to borrow some money from my brother and sister to buy an A:M subscription. Now for the bad news. I've opened the file that you fixed and I've opened the models one by one and found the culprits. Two of them. So what do I have to do to see what's the problem with the model? I've removed the file from the cho and the problem of them duplicating didn't go away and the file is now over 1 mb.

Sorry somehow in my second reply to you I said no but didn't notice that somehow it was missing when I edited it out. I've downloaded the cho and I'll get back to you. Thank you very much.

Yes. Time to get out a text editor and find something weird. If you want to send it to me I'll look at it. It's the cho with the platform shoe used. If I somehow use the shoe for the prop in a chor that was derived from an earlier .cho it duplicates itself many times with it's model's name in the same choreoraphy level. cho with mutiple chor shoe duplicates 008.cho cho with nameless phantom models TestSword_009.cho The file has gotten bigger since I didn't remove the 'cache' instances the last time but it really didn't do anything other than getting the file size smaller. It will just be reduplicating itself again when I save the cho. If I didn't use the platform shoe and use the boots instead there will be only 'phantom models' with no name. I tried removing the multiple "cache" instances of the shoe in a script editor but nothing happened. In the cho with the nameless phantom models I see multiple empty drivers but they are nested and it goes on with overlapping nests it gets confusing. If the problem takes too muh time I'll have to setup them all over again. Takes time but I guess I have no option.

Yes.

I've thought about this before so I guess I have to try this since I've run out of options. The problem is if I want to change something that has been saved in V16 I can't. Giving away my models that I've worked so hard is a great deal to me, but I know some people well enough in here that I can trust to give my models away. It's only that this is going to take a lot of their time and resources and I don't have enough money to offer in return. But the main problem is when I want to change stuff. Getting back and forth is a big problem and that takes a lot of time. Also I live in a different timezone and don't have acces to the Internet all the time.

I have a little bit of problem with money as I have mentioned in my first post. I can't even register for this new semester for my art school because I have no money. I'm trying to find a way to separately render objects and somehow composite it together. If I can render SSS separately like AO I can see it as a solution. But I guess not. Only two of the lights render raytraced shadows one has 3 rays and and the other 4. The rest are positional rim lights with no shadows, some are only speculars. Some of them are tied to light lists of models, some are not. It's really is a minimum light setup. The rest is image based lighting. At the moment I guess I can only work with my animation, but I still need stills. And thinking that SSS makes the renders much much better... I don't know, It's like it will not be complete. This is really me but I can't show someone expecting something from my work but in the it ends up being sub par but at the same time I know it can be better.

Interesting. I'll note to self on that. I believe if you export a scaled down version of your model from the Chor that will scale everything in the exported .MDL file for you. Sorry if that suggestion is a few years too late in your case but perhaps that could help Reza. It'd be worth a shot and very easy to test the theory. (Make sure you delete the ground plane and any other extraneous models before exporting) Knowing Reza's desire for high quality I suspect its not just one but a combination of things. I wouldn't think mesh would make a big difference but it might if there are large decals and other things thrown into the mix that suck up a lot of memory. If it is a memory problem then I'll suggest shutting down any unnecessary programs while rendering (Photoshop, etc.). I see you saw the screencap. But that was just me saving the screen cap of A:M. I turned off every other softwares too. Restarted the system, turned of antivirus, firewall, internet etc. Rescaling down the model is a no-no for me. I've Smartskinned each and every possible bendable joints in the model on every possible angle, and if I rescale it in .cho or action and export it back into .mdl the offset isn't the same. I know what to do next but it will definitely still take a lot of work. Also I've smartsinned the clothing and some other long sleeve garments too in relative with the same size, so I think it's too much work on top of it.

The models are of 'actual' size. The female is like 5' 10". All of the rest is in relative proportion. Now that you mentioned it I remember doing something with the SSS and comped it out in photoshop. I wasn't excited with the result though because I've seen render marquees of the actual SSS and it much much much better. It's just that once I see something I really liked I HAD to attain it again no matter what and render it to final and not settle for something less. I tried rendering it separately with the other models turned off and SSS turned on and it doesn't take that much time at all so I'm thinking I'm missing a lot. To me SSS is like a reward for my hard work. I'll definitely look into rendering separate AO for animation. But for still I defintely want to go with the real SSS or none at all which I'm not that excited and feel less rewarded.

Thank you. The reason I ask is that if that is a true statement then it points to the duplicate phantom models as the problem. If you meant to say that an earlier chor with no duplicate problem DID HAVE the same problem, that would be different. (Hope that makes sense) Also, for the record and to rule out another variable what format are you rendering out to? TGA? How much free space do you have on your harddrive? What are the size of your decals? That was a typo. The problem I had with the multiple phantom models was just 'recently'. The problem with the renders went back first when I upgraded to v14. I have plenty of free space. 30 gigs. I've tried downsampling the decals some time ago but the same problem persist.

Okay. Don't know if this helps. It's not much because I still have some more work to do to make it to my portfolio because I don't know how they'll respond to such 'theme' so I haver to add more clothes and stuff or something like that. I'm embarrased to say this but if I can't get pass rendering the character with lesser clothes so it's less likely with more. This is just an example some of the scene with minimum number of models to test for animation and if the render can work. I still can't remove the duplicate phantom models for some reason. It has no relevance to my render problem though as a copy of an earlier cho with no duplicate problem didn't have the same render issues. Old stuff for the image contest when I just upgraded to v14. I remember i had to render 20 to 30 and only one got through and I'm stuck with which I posted for the image contest. My computer spec. I use an onboard video card so that's where some of the memory goes. I appreciate any help. Thank you.

It really sounds like it could be related to a low memory issue. I remember 14c or so gave me a similar problem, using SSS. Or it could be an internal patch + memory issue. If indeed you can render out parts of the scene separately, render them with an Alpha channel. This will make it easy to composite back together in AfterEffects. The pros do this all the time, even Pixar and such. Sorry it's been so frustrating! Thanks. Is it possible for me to render AO and/or SSS separately? I believe the last time I asked I can't remember the exact answer and it has been a long time, sorry but I remember looking into this but I came to a dead end but I can't remember exactly the details. Can you point me into the right direction? This is just a note, but I can't leave out the SSS as it makes the render 10 times better. Edit: I've played around with lower res 800x600 and this is what I get. I remember now. I'm not sure if posting such images is allowed so please notify me if it's otherwise. Thanks.

Ok I have to add somethng that may be of importance. The scene has a minimum of 9 lights in total. Each of the models is tied with a lightlist to at most 4 to 5 of these lights. Only two of them have shadows. The rest are isolated lights with different settings. Each model renders shadows and accepts shadows. AO turned on for every model. AO Setting 100%. SSS for the main model. Multipass 25. Minimum hair (for the lashes) the main character uses cookie cuts. This is the lowest setting that I use for render to file and seems to promise acceptable result except I get kicked out on the first pass mostly. Render marquee can of course go computationally more extensive than this. If I render separately with higher settings there is absolutely no problem. I just need to find a way (or ways) to compose all the shadows and AO and SSS with each othr and background together and everything will be dandy.