material issues, SHOWSTOPPER

[adrian wyer]

We’re having problems with various materials in several scenes…..

The materials have been created on different machines, and only use out of the box nodes….

 

When they are exported in to a mat lib, they can be dragged into a new scene ok, but on inspection, all the ppgs are bricked (no tabs, numeric input sliders for blending modes etc)

 

After working with the scenes, and saving, we then get lots of crashes, and aborted loads.

 

Tried rebuilding the trees, but once the ppgs are broken, new nodes of the same type are also broken, the cache for the ppg is corrupt I guess?

 

Restarting sometimes helps, but again we are constantly running the risk of un-recoverable scenes…. Really not an option!

 

Anyone on hear shed any light, or anyone at Soft throw us the patch that was mentioned on XSIBASE?

 

Or maybe this is fixed in 2011SP2 and we can get a beta license to cover us until release date??

 

Thanks

 

a

 

Adrian Wyer
Fluid Pictures
16-18 Beak St.
London W1F 9RD
T.++44(0) 207 434 3565
F.++44(0) 207 100 1989
E. adria...@fluid-pictures.com
www.fluid-pictures.com

Fluid Pictures Limited is registered in England and Wales.
Company number:5657815
VAT number: 872 6893 71

 

[Stephen Blair]

Hi

That patch (which product support gave the customer to beta test) is for a different problem: missing connections in material render trees when you reload a scene.

I haven't seen any other cases of the problem you describe.

I've logged a service request for you and will communicate with you from there.

Thanks

Stephen Blair
Product Support Team Lead, Softimage
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Blog<http://xsisupport.wordpress.com/> | KB<http://autodesk.com/softimage-support> | Wiki<http://autodesk.com/softimage-kb>

If you would like to comment on my work, please contact my manager chris....@autodesk.com<mailto:chris....@autodesk.com>.
Autodesk Subscription<http://www.autodesk.com/subscription> The smartest way to optimize your software investment.

From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of adrian wyer
Sent: September-13-10 9:40 AM
To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: material issues, SHOWSTOPPER
Importance: High

We're having problems with various materials in several scenes.....
The materials have been created on different machines, and only use out of the box nodes....

When they are exported in to a mat lib, they can be dragged into a new scene ok, but on inspection, all the ppgs are bricked (no tabs, numeric input sliders for blending modes etc)

After working with the scenes, and saving, we then get lots of crashes, and aborted loads.

Tried rebuilding the trees, but once the ppgs are broken, new nodes of the same type are also broken, the cache for the ppg is corrupt I guess?

Restarting sometimes helps, but again we are constantly running the risk of un-recoverable scenes.... Really not an option!

Anyone on hear shed any light, or anyone at Soft throw us the patch that was mentioned on XSIBASE?

Or maybe this is fixed in 2011SP2 and we can get a beta license to cover us until release date??

Thanks

a

Adrian Wyer
Fluid Pictures
16-18 Beak St.
London W1F 9RD
T.++44(0) 207 434 3565
F.++44(0) 207 100 1989

E. adria...@fluid-pictures.com<blocked::mailto:adria...@fluid-pictures.com>
www.fluid-pictures.com<blocked::http://www.fluid-pictures.com/>

[Matt Lind]

I’ve experienced the same problem when writing custom PPG Layouts.  Even after the correction is made, no amount of refreshing the tool/workgroup/uninstall-reinstall plugin will work.  Softimage won’t acknowledge the correction until I restart the application.

 

Matt

 

 

From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of adrian wyer
Sent: Monday, September 13, 2010 6:40 AM
To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: material issues, SHOWSTOPPER
Importance: High

 

We’re having problems with various materials in several scenes…..

[adrian wyer]

Having a real problem reproing the broken ppg stuff…… import/export errors on presets is more of a worry, it would seem that the only reliable way we have found, is to export/import LIBRARIES instead….seems (for us at least) presets are presently VERY flakey!

 

a

 

Adrian Wyer
Fluid Pictures
16-18 Beak St.
London W1F 9RD
T.++44(0) 207 434 3565
F.++44(0) 207 100 1989
E. adria...@fluid-pictures.com
www.fluid-pictures.com

Fluid Pictures Limited is registered in England and Wales.
Company number:5657815
VAT number: 872 6893 71

[Orlando Esponda]

Hello  Adrian,

Have you tried creating compounds and exporting them instead? I found that way much more reliable than exporting presets from the ppg and you have the advantage that the compounds can appear in your embedded preset manager (if compound properties are filled correctly). Ive been "sharing"  presets in many scenes in that way and the problem is almost gone. Maybe it's worth a try.

Orlando.

[Sam Cuttriss]

I feel your pain.
ive done a bit too much scene rebuilding on this last show for my liking.

im still struggling to figure out what makes it repeatable.

[Votch]

I have also had this same issue with broken PPG's and I'm equally puzzled as to what causes it. I just recently switched from 2010.sp1 to 2011.sp1 and have seen all manner of weird issues pop up with materials.

Votch Levi

[John Richard Sanchez]

Yes this was killing me on my last job. I had a preset that I would import. As soon as I did and saved it I could never open the scene again. I would have to build the material tree from scratch If I wanted to use it. Cant import material presets without corrupting the scene. 2011 sp1 on 64 bit

--
John Richard Sanchez
www.johnrichardsanchez.com

[ThierryBaret]

Could it be the user directory which is corrupted?

I think I remember having a problem like this but with an older version.

 

Is it happening on simple presets?

Are they presets in which you have edited the spdl?

Do these presets have expressions in them?

Are the presets coming from a referenced Library?

Just guessing situations that could bring troubles.

 

Thierry

[Sandy Sutherland]

Call it a gut feeling Stephen - but I suspect that the hotfix might help with this - maybe wrong - but worth a try I think!!

S.

On 2010/09/14 09:45 AM, ThierryBaret wrote:

Could it be the user directory which is corrupted?

I think I remember having a problem like this but with�an older�version.

�

Is it happening on simple presets?

Are they presets in which you have edited the spdl?

Do these presets have expressions in them?

Are the presets coming from a referenced Library?

Just guessing situations that could bring troubles.

�

Thierry

�

----- Original Message -----

From: John Richard Sanchez

To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com

Sent: Tuesday, September 14, 2010 6:06 AM

Subject: Re: material issues, SHOWSTOPPER

Yes this was killing me on my last job. I had a preset that I would import. As soon as I did and saved it I could never open the scene again. I would have to build the material tree from scratch If I wanted to use it. Cant import material presets without corrupting the scene. 2011 sp1 on 64 bit

On Mon, Sep 13, 2010 at 8:11 PM, Votch <mega...@gmail.com> wrote:

I have also had this same issue with broken PPG's and I'm equally puzzled as to what causes it. I just recently switched from 2010.sp1 to 2011.sp1 and have seen all manner of weird issues pop up with materials.

Votch Levi

On Mon, Sep 13, 2010 at 9:41 AM, adrian wyer <adria...@fluid-pictures.com> wrote:

Having a real problem reproing the broken ppg stuff�� import/export errors on presets is more of a worry, it would seem that the only reliable way we have found, is to export/import LIBRARIES instead�.seems (for us at least) presets are presently VERY flakey!

�

a

�

Adrian Wyer
Fluid Pictures
16-18 Beak St.
London W1F 9RD
T.++44(0) 207 434 3565
F.++44(0) 207 100 1989
E. adria...@fluid-pictures.com
www.fluid-pictures.com

Fluid Pictures Limited is registered in England and Wales.
Company number:5657815
VAT number: 872 6893 71

---

From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Matt Lind
Sent: 13 September 2010 17:26

To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com

Subject: RE: material issues, SHOWSTOPPER

�

I�ve experienced the same problem when writing custom PPG Layouts.� Even after the correction is made, no amount of refreshing the tool/workgroup/uninstall-reinstall plugin will work.� Softimage won�t acknowledge the correction until I restart the application.

�

Matt

�

�

From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of adrian wyer
Sent: Monday, September 13, 2010 6:40 AM
To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: material issues, SHOWSTOPPER
Importance: High

�

We�re having problems with various materials in several scenes�..

The materials have been created on different machines, and only use out of the box nodes�.

�

When they are exported in to a mat lib, they can be dragged into a new scene ok, but on inspection, all the ppgs are bricked (no tabs, numeric input sliders for blending modes etc)

�

After working with the scenes, and saving, we then get lots of crashes, and aborted loads.

�

Tried rebuilding the trees, but once the ppgs are broken, new nodes of the same type are also broken, the cache for the ppg is corrupt I guess?

�

Restarting sometimes helps, but again we are constantly running the risk of un-recoverable scenes�. Really not an option!

�

Anyone on hear shed any light, or anyone at Soft throw us the patch that was mentioned on XSIBASE?

�

Or maybe this is fixed in 2011SP2 and we can get a beta license to cover us until release date??

�

Thanks

�

a

�

Adrian Wyer
Fluid Pictures
16-18 Beak St.
London W1F 9RD
T.++44(0) 207 434 3565
F.++44(0) 207 100 1989
E. adria...@fluid-pictures.com
www.fluid-pictures.com

Fluid Pictures Limited is registered in England and Wales.
Company number:5657815
VAT number: 872 6893 71

�

[adrian wyer]

Happens on several presets, not ‘simple’ but not too complex (>20 nodes, all factory nodes)

No spdl editing

No expressions

Not a referenced library

 

As noted, exported libraries are getting us around the issue for now, but in the long run, this is a fairly serious bug…..

 

a

 

Adrian Wyer
Fluid Pictures
16-18 Beak St.
London W1F 9RD
T.++44(0) 207 434 3565
F.++44(0) 207 100 1989
E. adria...@fluid-pictures.com
www.fluid-pictures.com

Fluid Pictures Limited is registered in England and Wales.
Company number:5657815
VAT number: 872 6893 71

[ThierryBaret]

Have you tried to clean the user directory.If you have a machine with a recent install or a machine on which you don't have this Material Preset problem maybe you can copy and paste the user directory.

 

Are the presets you trying to load created in the same version of XSI i.e. XSI 2011 SP1?

 

Or maybe the libraries are going to be the only option waiting for a fix.

[adrian wyer]

2011 SP1 64bit WIN7

 

Tried renaming user folder so soft created a new one (one of my list of 10 things to do when soft keeps crashing!)

 

Hoping it crops up again in a solid repro-able way….. at least then it can get fixed!

[Orlando Esponda]

Hello  Adrian,

Have you tried creating compounds and exporting them instead? I found that way much more reliable than exporting presets from the ppg and you have the advantage that the compounds can appear in your embedded preset manager (if compound properties are filled correctly). Ive been "sharing"  presets in many scenes in that way and the problem is almost gone. Maybe it's worth a try.

Orlando.

PS. Sorry if this email is repeated but I sent the previous one with another account and it looks like that account goes to gmail spam  :(

[adrian wyer]

Will give the compounds a try, thanks

 

a

 

Adrian Wyer
Fluid Pictures
16-18 Beak St.
London W1F 9RD
T.++44(0) 207 434 3565
F.++44(0) 207 100 1989
E. adria...@fluid-pictures.com
www.fluid-pictures.com

Fluid Pictures Limited is registered in England and Wales.
Company number:5657815
VAT number: 872 6893 71

[Ahmidou Lyazidi]

It's not, a user directory corruption , but a bug related to the new shader API, it seems that the shader definitions don't play nice with presets export and corrupt the scene. If you get lucky you can load the scene from the crash backup then, the shaders definition will be restored and the scene will work again, but in most case you have lost your work.

Ahmidou Lyazidi
Director | TD | CG artist

2010/9/14 ThierryBaret <baret....@neuf.fr>

[ThierryBaret]

Is it related to the use of specific nodes in the shaders or is it random?

[Chris L. Harkins]

Hey folks,

We had this problem with several jobs. My scenes would get corrupted
when I localized models (when material libraries were localized) or when
I imported material libraries. Aside from saving LOTS of iterations and
testing the scene in a new XSI instance, a consistent workaround that I
found was this:

If the scene is corrupted, open the last working version and merge the
broken scene into that scene. Now create a new scene (within the same
XSI instance) and the broken scene will open fine. I don't understand
the logic behind it, but if you merge a broken scene into a working
scene, create a new scene and open the broken scene - it works. Then
just save a new iteration. You'll get a "FaceConnections" plugin error
(whatever).

And to note, Softimage support know of this issue and have been very
helpful in working with us on this.

--
_Chris L. Harkins (charkins.com)

[Ahmidou Lyazidi]

>From Stephen Blair about the merge solution:

"If the corruption is related to materials, then I suspect the reason this works is that loading a working version creates all the required shader defs, so the problem scene is able to use those shader defs.

When the problem scene is loaded by itself, some shader defs are not created and then you crash.

That's what I think, I don't know for certain yet."

Ahmidou Lyazidi
Director | TD | CG artist

2010/9/14 Chris L. Harkins <charki...@gmail.com>

[Stephen Blair]

Yes, that is the reason (Yanick from R&D confirmed it).
The beta Hotfix fixes that specific problem.

The problem with presets does sound like another problem with shader defs, as Ahmidou wrote earlier...
Still trying to repro that here.

From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Ahmidou Lyazidi
Sent: September-14-10 11:12 AM
To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: material issues, SHOWSTOPPER (workaround)

>From Stephen Blair about the merge solution:

"If the corruption is related to materials, then I suspect the reason this works is that loading a working version creates all the required shader defs, so the problem scene is able to use those shader defs.

When the problem scene is loaded by itself, some shader defs are not created and then you crash.

That's what I think, I don't know for certain yet."

Ahmidou Lyazidi
Director | TD | CG artist

2010/9/14 Chris L. Harkins <charki...@gmail.com<mailto:charki...@gmail.com>>
Hey folks,

We had this problem with several jobs. My scenes would get corrupted when I localized models (when material libraries were localized) or when I imported material libraries. Aside from saving LOTS of iterations and testing the scene in a new XSI instance, a consistent workaround that I found was this:

If the scene is corrupted, open the last working version and merge the broken scene into that scene. Now create a new scene (within the same XSI instance) and the broken scene will open fine. I don't understand the logic behind it, but if you merge a broken scene into a working scene, create a new scene and open the broken scene - it works. Then just save a new iteration. You'll get a "FaceConnections" plugin error (whatever).

And to note, Softimage support know of this issue and have been very helpful in working with us on this.

--
_Chris L. Harkins (charkins.com<http://charkins.com>)

[Sam Cuttriss]

hahaha, nice, i think i tried every absurd technique but this.
thanks for the heads up.

[Orlando Esponda]

There's another workaround when localizing ref models:

BEFORE you localize the model, open material manager and go to its material library. After all the shaderballs are created localize your model and the new (local) created library will be fine. It works 95% of the time.

I have scenes where non of the other workarounds worked (including the one you described) but this one did.

Hope that helps a bit.

Orlando.

[Sam Cuttriss]

here is my list of 2011 issues.
i would be interested if anyone else has any "creative" workarounds
that could save me a day or two, of tears and expletives?

we have sent a bug report too.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________

critical

* scene corruption when importing material presets, merging models etc...
* expressions going missing regularly ie "this.Crumble.CumbleOn !=
1" assigned to visibilty, CrumbleOn is a custom parameter assigned and
animated on each object.
* material nodes becoming disconnected on load scene
* often getting crashes when clicking on nodes in an ice graph/
editing parameter/ playing back ice sim with "write cache on playback"
enable
* pass visibilty/ override parameters occasionally not refreshing
correctly on change pass.

mildly problematic

* render tree shader list displays incomplete, pressing the
refresh button updates with the correct shaders. this only happens
with some workgroups attached. and often works correctly once, then
fails to load correctly the next time softimage is opened.
* plotting focal length when fov is animated needs attention.

[Adam Seeley]

Hi,

 

Getting a bit nervous about this as we're throwing a few materials around between scenes which are rather large and complex.

 

Has anybody had the same problem when loading Models into a scene with the new shaders applied to the objects within them?

I just figured it might be a safe way to get a bunch of shaders from one scene to another.

 

Safety first etc.

 

Thanks,

 

Adam.

 

---

From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Stephen Blair

Sent: 14 September 2010 16:30
To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com

Subject: RE: material issues, SHOWSTOPPER (workaround)

 

Yes, that is the reason (Yanick from R&D confirmed it).

The beta Hotfix fixes that specific problem.

 

The problem with presets does sound like another problem with shader defs, as Ahmidou wrote earlier…

Still trying to repro that here.

 

 

From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Ahmidou Lyazidi
Sent: September-14-10 11:12 AM
To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: material issues, SHOWSTOPPER (workaround)

 

>From Stephen Blair about the merge solution:

"If the corruption is related to materials, then I suspect the reason this works is that loading a working version creates all the required shader defs, so the problem scene is able to use those shader defs.

When the problem scene is loaded by itself, some shader defs are not created and then you crash.

That's what I think, I don't know for certain yet."


Ahmidou Lyazidi
Director | TD | CG artist

2010/9/14 Chris L. Harkins <charki...@gmail.com>

 Hey folks,

We had this problem with several jobs. My scenes would get corrupted when I localized models (when material libraries were localized) or when I imported material libraries. Aside from saving LOTS of iterations and testing the scene in a new XSI instance, a consistent workaround that I found was this:

If the scene is corrupted, open the last working version and merge the broken scene into that scene. Now create a new scene (within the same XSI instance) and the broken scene will open fine. I don't understand the logic behind it, but if you merge a broken scene into a working scene, create a new scene and open the broken scene - it works. Then just save a new iteration. You'll get a "FaceConnections" plugin error (whatever).

And to note, Softimage support know of this issue and have been very helpful in working with us on this.

--
_Chris L. Harkins (charkins.com)

 

No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
Version: 9.0.851 / Virus Database: 271.1.1/3116 - Release Date: 09/13/10 19:35:00

[adrian wyer]

We’re still having real problems here and I’m finding it really difficult to pin down what’s going wrong and where!

 

A scene that we had problem presets in, has been fixed by importing a new library (of fixed materials) transferring the fixed materials to all the objects and removing the broken library….

 

So far so good, but after a day of animating cameras, moving objects around etc…. the scene crashes on load…. We have major openGL errors with the scene when it does open (you can load the scene if you are in the compositing layout, delete a point cloud which seems to be corrupt, then switch to default layout)

 

I cleaned the offending objects from the scene and saved it as a new one, which seemed to work for a while, but now we are getting new crashes, and openGL errors…

 

Tried the ‘load old working scene, merge broken scene’ type fix….but it didn’t work…

 

Getting desperate!!!

 

a

 

Adrian Wyer
Fluid Pictures
16-18 Beak St.
London W1F 9RD
T.++44(0) 207 434 3565
F.++44(0) 207 100 1989
E. adria...@fluid-pictures.com
www.fluid-pictures.com

Fluid Pictures Limited is registered in England and Wales.
Company number:5657815
VAT number: 872 6893 71

[Alan Fregtman]

You don't need to switch layouts to disable viewports. Just maximize
one of them and middle click on the letter (ABCD) on the top left of
the viewport area to mute it.

On Thu, Sep 16, 2010 at 9:28 AM, adrian wyer
<adria...@fluid-pictures.com> wrote:
> We�re still having real problems here and I�m finding it really difficult to
> pin down what�s going wrong and where!

>
>
>
> A scene that we had problem presets in, has been fixed by importing a new
> library (of fixed materials) transferring the fixed materials to all the

> objects and removing the broken library�.

>
>
>
> So far so good, but after a day of animating cameras, moving objects around

> etc�. the scene crashes on load�. We have major openGL errors with the scene

> when it does open (you can load the scene if you are in the compositing
> layout, delete a point cloud which seems to be corrupt, then switch to
> default layout)
>
>
>
> I cleaned the offending objects from the scene and saved it as a new one,
> which seemed to work for a while, but now we are getting new crashes, and

> openGL errors�
>
>
>
> Tried the �load old working scene, merge broken scene� type fix�.but it
> didn�t work�

> as Ahmidou wrote earlier�

>
> Still trying to repro that here.
>
>
>
>
>
> From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com
> [mailto:softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Ahmidou
> Lyazidi
> Sent: September-14-10 11:12 AM
> To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com
> Subject: Re: material issues, SHOWSTOPPER (workaround)
>
>
>
> >From Stephen Blair about the merge solution:
>
> "If the corruption is related to materials, then I suspect the reason this
> works is that loading a working version creates all the required shader
> defs, so the problem scene is able to use those shader defs.
>
> When the problem scene is loaded by itself, some shader defs are not created
> and then you crash.
>
> That's what I think, I don't know for certain yet."
>
>
> Ahmidou Lyazidi
> Director | TD | CG artist
>
> 2010/9/14 Chris L. Harkins <charki...@gmail.com>
>

> �Hey folks,