AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!

Started by jimjabbo, May 05, 2009, 04:53:53 AM

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jimjabbo

I have used terragen 9-back to whatever version I started with back in 2001. I got TG2 beta and was blown away by its new self..it worked fine 4 times. End of story!..it will no longer work on my computer...no hardware has been changed...it starts..and then simply vanishes and its finished. I have un installed and re installed..it makes no difference..oh well...back to Bryce for me..any ideas?

FrankB

what are your computer specs? CPU, RAM?
What your graphics card and graphic driver version? Are the drivers current?

Regards,
Frank

kaisersuzuki

#2
I have this vanishing problem as well.  I am currently wiling to accept that it is due to over aggressive render settings (which if it is is the case is ridiculous, one should be able to choose any settings they wish and it should just result in greater render times not disappearing applications).

I have a i7 920, 6GB RAM, vista 64bit.  I am in the process of pinpointing what exactly causes this, but my suspicion is that it is any scene with water and or reflections and high render quality settings.

I should say when i say say high render settings they are not that high, AA=12, GI 3/4/8, GI surface details.

Before I get all of the responses telling me I dont need to use those settings, If we dont need them and they dont work why do they exist?

FrankB

you both should definitely consider to post your problems in the support section. I don't know how frequent the discussion forum is read by planetside, so i guess there is a certain risk that this might get overlooked here.

To me the first problem is a little bit miraculous. I have now idea which resources tg2 is trying to use on startup and why it just disappears.

If kaisersuzuki's problem occurs after a project has been loaded, then it would certainly help to post the troublesome tgd. Again, the support forum would be ideal for that.

Regards,
Frank

kaisersuzuki

Yea I will post over there.  My problem is a rendering issue.

Oshyan

We (or at least I) check all the forums quite regularly. So while this would be better in the Support section (where I have actually just moved it), it will still be seen in other areas. :)

Jimjabbo, I presume you're using the free version of TG2? Do you have the latest public version, 2.0.3.1? You get no error messages? Have there been any software or driver changes? Try navigating to the install folder for TG2 and running tgdcli.exe and see if any useful information comes up on the log that pops up.

Quote from: kaisersuzuki on May 05, 2009, 12:20:56 PM
I have this vanishing problem as well.  I am currently wiling to accept that it is due to over aggressive render settings (which if it is is the case is ridiculous, one should be able to choose any settings they wish and it should just result in greater render times not disappearing applications).

I have a i7 920, 6GB RAM, vista 64bit.  I am in the process of pinpointing what exactly causes this, but my suspicion is that it is any scene with water and or reflections and high render quality settings.

I should say when i say say high render settings they are not that high, AA=12, GI 3/4/8, GI surface details.

Before I get all of the responses telling me I dont need to use those settings, If we dont need them and they dont work why do they exist?

Kaiser, your "vanishing problem" sounds like it's completely different. If I'm reading what you've said correctly, you are able to use the application, but once you get to rendering, sometimes it will simply vanish in the rendering process. This is probably a memory issue, and before you start to mention your system specs, keep in mind that TG2 is not a 64 bit app yet. So it can use only a maximum of 4GB of RAM.

Your settings are definitely high and, depending on the scene, possibly unnecessary. Even if TG2 wasn't crashing at that level, it would still not be advised to use such settings simply for the probably unnecessary render time increase. GI above 2/2 for example is seldom necessary, as is GI Surface Details. They're provided for the times they are necessary, because different scenes have different requirements, but making the assumption that turning up all quality settings high in every scene to get "best quality" is definitely not a good idea.

That being said I would generally agree that, in normal circumstances you should be able to render with those settings just fine. The biggest pieces of the puzzle you haven't mentioned are what resolution you were trying to render at, and what elements are in the scene (how many objects, object textures, populations, heightfields, etc.). If you're using very high settings *and* rendering at high resolutions, you're more likely to run into problems.

In the future we will definitely be improving error handling, as well as moving to a 64 bit architecture that should minimize these sorts of problems. But you will nonetheless want to know how to conserve memory use and CPU cycles for greatest efficiency, and now is a great time to experiment and learn about what works best in practice. There is a lot of discussion around the forums about recommended render settings for "normal" scenes.

- Oshyan

kaisersuzuki

Thanks for the reply.  I am aware of all of the posts regarding using low quality settings.  I will wait for 64 bit and hope for the best.

jo

Hi,

Quote from: kaisersuzuki on May 06, 2009, 02:56:17 PM
I am aware of all of the posts regarding using low quality settings.

You need to differentiate between "low quality settings" and "*lower* quality settings". Osyhan wasn't saying to use low quality, he was saying to use lower quality than the very high settings you seem to be using, which would bring you down to the region of "normal". For better or worse, right now TG2 uses a "give them enough rope to hang themselves" approach where there are not hard limits on many settings. Yes you can set some settings high but it can cause you to have problems. To use TG2 efficiently you need to balance quality settings with render time and memory use. You need to find a point where quality is acceptable without pushing things too far. If you just push everything as far as it will go you'll only end up wasting time either through very long renders or through renders which fail to complete. Oshyan was recommending you look around to see the sorts of quality settings people are using in general. There are lots of great images being created and they don't *generally speaking* require the sorts of settings you were using. Of course because TG2 is very open ended there may be scenes which need higher quality settings than average to look good, but that would be for more unusual scenes.

Staving off the inevitable comments, I don't have much to do with documentation and yes it would be good to make all this a bit more straightforward in the future :-).

Regards,

Jo

neuspadrin

Yehhh tg doesn't really tell you no to anything you can put whatever setting you want...

Want 10000 AA? Go for it!! YAY (but pretty much causes an immediate crash ;) haha) So moderation and understanding what settings are required for what kind of renders are quite crucial.

rodpacker1

Just to add to the "Water as possible cause for errors" idea, I had a scene lastnight where I wanted to reuse my cloud animation from an  ocean scene  I did a while back and TG Deep 2.0.31 crashed every time as soon as I deleted the water node, which I found very strange.

cheers
rodpacker

kaisersuzuki

I guess I will chime in here again to explain was tryhing to avoid a tirate in my own behalf.

I have spent countless hours reading forum posts and have a good grasp of what is "Normal" settings.  I have come accustomed to the "you don't need that accept in extreme conditions" response and that is fine.  I actually am fine with everything I was just stating that I have this disappearing problem also.  If this is normal due to my error I can accept that as well although I storngly disagree.

One comment though is if settings such as gi surface details are only needed for rare and extreme conditions, and we have no reference as to when it is needed the difference it makes etc, than our only recourse is experimentation.  I believe my issue is a limitation with terragen in its current implementation.  I have faith it will be fixed in time.

I am just kind of bored with the reactionary responses to using higher settings.  I believe you should be able to choose any setting you wish and your punishement is simply long render times.

All that being said... I do believe my issue is related to water object.

Yes I was attempting a larger render 1600 * something.  Is that too much to ask though?  seems resonable.  Anyway I have seen these issues and questions addressed in multiple topics so no need to kick a dead horse here.

jo

Hi,

Quote from: rodpacker1 on May 06, 2009, 09:22:02 PM
Just to add to the "Water as possible cause for errors" idea, I had a scene lastnight where I wanted to reuse my cloud animation from an  ocean scene  I did a while back and TG Deep 2.0.31 crashed every time as soon as I deleted the water node, which I found very strange.

Can you please email me the project file at:

jomeder@planetside.co.uk

Regards,

Jo

PG

1600*whatever height seems fine. I render 1680x1050 frequently because that's my resolution. However using your settings you are simply pushing your computer over the limits of 32bit. If you get 32 bit 3DS Max and create a character model with 2 million polys and try to render it you'll probably get a crash of some sort. Hopefully 64bit'll be out soon enough.
Figured out how to do clicky signatures

kaisersuzuki

I have removed some extreme (and probably erroneous) displacements and am re-rendering.  At work now. If this fails too I will send you the file Jo.

Thanks

kaisersuzuki

It seems culprit may be enabling shadows in the lake object.  Is this a known issue?  I have not seen much discussion on this option.

For the record, it seems to be rendering fine now, with higher quality settings (I have to see what this baby can do), so I think this may not be the case at this point:

Quote1600*whatever height seems fine. I render 1680x1050 frequently because that's my resolution. However using your settings you are simply pushing your computer over the limits of 32bit.