The always rendering Preview ...

[Tiles]

Not sure if somebody else is disturbed by that, i am. The Preview is always at rendering when i don't want it to.

I set it to Paused, load a new file, and it starts rendering. I switch to Shaders, it is paused, and the Preview starts again to render. I do this i do that, have it paused, and Preview starts to render. I can even close it, switch to another tab, whoosh, Preview is back and RENDERS, ack. I bet i can shot it, it still is alive and renders.

But i don't want that. It wastes my time. Because it takes eons until it shows anything useful. I am faster to do a final render. And it wastes my resources by rendering when i don't want to nor don't need to. It is always a mouseclick to stop what should be stopped anyways. Lots of mouseclicks over the time.

Where can i turn this baby completely forever and permanently off? I always use a Quick render to check anyways. Much faster and better.

Make it modal. Make Preview so that you can choose to start it with a button instead the current permanent rendering. This permanent rendering is not good.

[FrankB]

I don't see the problem with the permanent 3D preview... unless you got a single core system.

But you can completely close the 3D preview iff you want. There is a grey square at its top right corner with an "x", like the usual "close window" button. Click that and the preview closes, giving room to the shader network.

Frank

[Kevin F]

I set it to Paused, load a new file, and it starts rendering. Yes it will - it's a new file, what do you expect?

I switch to Shaders, it is paused, and the Preview starts again to render. -  Not on my system it doesn't

Basically within any one file, the preview render stays paused until you unpause it. I suspect you have another problem.

[Mohawk20]

(Kevin, please un-quote that would you, it's easier to read that way... )

I don't have those problems either, when I pause it stays paused until I unpause or load a new file...

[Tiles]

I set it to Paused, load a new file, and it starts rendering. Yes it will - it's a new file, what do you expect?

I expect it to do NOTHING until I want it to

I switch to Shaders, it is paused, and the Preview starts again to render. -  Not on my system it doesn't

Hmm, secret feature to turn it off? I tweak some clouds, switch to Shader, and the beast starts working ...

Basically within any one file, the preview render stays paused until you unpause it. I suspect you have another problem.

Nope. My problem is what i have told. I have problems with the Preview behaviour. Nothing else

Preview starts paused in one panel. But it is unpaused when i switch to another panel. There it renders. And it is unpaused when i load Terragen. It is unpaused when i load a new file, it is unpaused when ... It is too often unpaused without i have it really unpaused.

I don't see the problem with the permanent 3D preview... unless you got a single core system.

Dual core. It nevertheless disturbs me. Visually and performancewise.

But you can completely close the 3D preview iff you want. There is a grey square at its top right corner with an "x", like the usual "close window" button. Click that and the preview closes, giving room to the shader network.

I do this all the time. Am always at closing, or hitting the Pause button ... . That's why i ask


So in short the answer is no, there is no way to permanently turn off this nagfeature. Have i understood it right? A shame. Okay, thanks guys

[Kevin F]

The problem you have is with your system or set up. The preview stays paused unless you unpause it or load a new file.
On loading a new file the program defaults to render the preview - that is what most people would expect. You can then pause it indefinitely until you want it on again. The help I'm offering is telling you that your system is at fault.
If it's such a big deal to you simply turn it off as Frank suggested.

[rcallicotte]

I find the pause especially helpful when you using the Paint Shader.  I let it get to about 80% and the pause it.  The best way to do this is after selecting the Terrain tab at the top, since this is the fastest way to get the render back when it's live again.

[Tiles]

Don't get me wrong. Your offered help is very welcome

That it unpauses from Tab to Tab was a session problem it seems. I have rebooted. Now it stays paused. So count that one out.

Means until i click the Ode Network tab. Then it is again automatically unpaused.
And until i close one of the Previews. Then in the other tabs the Preview is again unpaused. (That one was Franks suggestion ...)
And until i open Terragen or load a new file. Then it is unpaused too.

Still lots of unnecessary clicks left. Hmm. I have simply another opinion here. Terragen is the only software that starts rendering with opening a file or even blank Terragen itself. Why? Why waste energy and power to render the blank starting scene again and again? I already know how it looks. Why does Terragen forget the Paused status at all?

[neuspadrin]

My preview stays paused until I open a new file or something, which is how I would expect it to work, seeing as new file == new render/new settings.

If you don't want the 3d preview and only the network view on startup, create a batch file that automatically does it for you (assuming windows here)

Code (runTG.bat) Select Expand


start tgd.exe -no3dpreview

save that as runTG.bat in the terragen directory (ex. C:\Program Files\Planetside Software\Terragen 2 Deep Edition (Beta)\  )

and you can create a short cut to your desktop for it, and set the icon of the desktop icon to even be the same as the normal tg icon.  And when you click it, it should start tg2 up with no 3d preview, only the network view.

I do the same thing on my laptop due to its small screen, only i reverse it, I have -nonetworkview set, so only 3d shows unless i switch over to my node view, so the 3d preview is a decent size, and i can still access nodes when i need to.


Also terragen only rerenders the scene whenever you make modifications to it, if you leave it sitting there it doesn't just keep rendering, it stops once it reaches 100%, and starts a new render only when you change settings/view. 

also it probably rerenders after node network because it was no longer displaying the 3d view, and discarded it because if you went to node view you probably made changes... /shrug.

Personally the 3dpreivew never slows me down unless i hit enable preview of a population thats huge, and I like it being there so i can have an idea of the scene/see object placement/etc.  On my core2 duo and quad both dont have a problem with slow downs. 

[Tiles]

Thanks for that hint with the bat file. Unfortunately Terragen refuses to start with the bat file. Probably i do something wrong here. I have just no idea where. I followed your advices one by one, the bat file is besides the exe, when i click it i see a dos box pop up for a small moment, but Terragen does nothing. Dosbox closes immediately. Hm. Was nevertheless worth a try

[rcallicotte]

Go to a Command prompt and run that same command line to see what your error is.

Thanks for that hint with the bat file. Unfortunately Terragen refuses to start with the bat file. Probably i do something wrong here. I have just no idea where. I followed your advices one by one, the bat file is besides the exe, when i click it i see a dos box pop up for a small moment, but Terragen does nothing. Dosbox closes immediately. Hm. Was nevertheless worth a try

[Tiles]

Have it. They've been so kind to already place a bat file in the rootfolder called tgdNo3DPreviewNoNetworkView.bat. And there i could have a look where the error was.

Error is the word Start. Works when i type the text in the bat that way, without start:

Code Select Expand


tgd.exe -no3dpreview

Great This one solves at least the not necessary rendering when starting Terragen. Thanks for that

[Tiles]

Ack, that was too early. Still no go. Also not with the already existing bat file. Hmm, would be interesting to know what i am missing here ...

[neuspadrin]

i used the word start in there, to make it so the cmd prompt that comes up also auto disappears when run.   works just great on my machine... /shrug... dos should allow for you to type start.  its a command thats in there to start it in a new window (thus technically not in the cmd window, and the cmd is allowed to close off itself). Without it mine leaves a command prompt up.

so even the existing bat file they give you doesn't start it up properly??

do you use the free version? maybe free version is limited to not accept command input?

[nixx]

Why even make a .bat file in the first place ? Why not include the -no3dpreview switch in a direct shortcut ?