Kray only render once then freezes

[djwaterman]

Hi, I'm still using the demo version and I'm liking it more and more, but I've just en-counted an issue when rendering. I have Kray demo installed in LW 10 and LW 9.6, I don't get this problem in LW 10, only in 9.6.

Anyway what happens is I set off a render and it renders the frame and all is well. Then if I set off another render it will start but stop at the 'preparing photon maps' stage in the render log, then it just hangs and I'll have to close down LW. When the scene is reloaded it will again render just the one frame.

This same scene I rendered out as a sequence and I had no problem (great flicker free GI), so it's not like LW and Kray can't render out more than one frame.

Is this a common problem? It's the only thing stopping me buying the product now because I'm so impressed by it.

[jure]

Hi, I'm still using the demo version and I'm liking it more and more, but I've just en-counted an issue when rendering. I have Kray demo installed in LW 10 and LW 9.6, I don't get this problem in LW 10, only in 9.6.

Anyway what happens is I set off a render and it renders the frame and all is well. Then if I set off another render it will start but stop at the 'preparing photon maps' stage in the render log, then it just hangs and I'll have to close down LW. When the scene is reloaded it will again render just the one frame.

This same scene I rendered out as a sequence and I had no problem (great flicker free GI), so it's not like LW and Kray can't render out more than one frame.

Is this a common problem? It's the only thing stopping me buying the product now because I'm so impressed by it.

What are your system specs? Could you post a scene so I can check it?

[djwaterman]

Here is more information about my computer than you would want as an attachment. But I don't think it is my computer or even Kray, it's more likely the scene. The scene is kind of heavy and it would take me a while to edit out all the unused textures and object layers in the file directories so I haven't given you that yet.
Regardless of these things I still think this is a plug-in I have to have now, I don't think there is any going back now.

I do have a question though, I saw on a video someone demonstrating Kray, and they had the other Kray plugins listed in the side bar right under the Kray options, Frame and Animate tabs. Are there instructions on this site on how to set that up? Seems I'm missing out on a lot of the other options like tonemapping and so on.

[djwaterman]

Just another thing that I've noticed during my renders. The sequence I was rendering froze at one point and I had to shut LW and then restart the render from the last frame. Well I've noticed that the first 1-3 frames will kind of blow out a little before adjusting into a more stable render, almost like what happen when you stop and start a film camera with the light adjusting (although I'm not suggesting Kray is mimicking that effect).

This was also the case at the start of the animation, the first few frame a little blown out and then it would adjust to a more regular smooth solution.

it's just an observation and you don't have my scene or settings so you may not be able to answer this question, but I'm just wondering if this is something that happens sometimes?

[jure]

I do have a question though, I saw on a video someone demonstrating Kray, and they had the other Kray plugins listed in the side bar right under the Kray options, Frame and Animate tabs. Are there instructions on this site on how to set that up? Seems I'm missing out on a lot of the other options like tonemapping and so on.

Go to the tutorials page and click on "Download Scene" to get the config file which you then import to LW menus. You can also build your menus manually by going to LW menu setup and search for each Kray plugin and insert it into your new menu. You can puti it into side menu, under mouse menu etc. More on how to build menus you can read in LW manual.

[jure]

I have not noticed this and there can be several different reasons for this kind of behavior so it's really hard to say without a scene. It helps also a lot if you append your kray log file - You get log file by adding "logfile kraylog.txt;" command to header or tailer.

[djwaterman]

Okay, thanks for the log file advice, the header and footer aspect of Kray is something I really don't understand.

Regarding the scene freezes, it was doing it for animation also. The scene is the one I posted an image elsewhere with the Volkswagen in the art gallery. Well I just did a test where I completely removed the car and it's various motion plugins and set off a render, this time it rendered all the way through 300 frames and didn't crash. So I think I've established that the freeze has something to do with the car geometry or the car rig plugins.

I'll update you on further tests.

[djwaterman]

If there are two objects in a scene, and they are more or less duplicates of each other and are sharing the same space in the scene, will this have any effect on Kray freezing? I'm still trying to pin-point what keeps causing scene to freeze up.

[jure]

Could be...

[djwaterman]

Well I've certainly tested this scene in many ways and it still crashes. I went through the car geometry and merged all the points and have removed all the plugins that I was using on the rig and it is still freezing/crashing after only one frame render. If I package up the scene can I send it to you to see if you can see what the problem might be. It contains a car model which I plan on making a commercial model so it can't be openly posted because I can't have people taking the model, how do I send it to you?

[jure]

Send it to my email: jure at kraytracing.com

[djwaterman]

Hi Jure,
Did you get my scene and if so did you do any testing?

[jure]

Got them tnx. Swamped in work atm. Will check asap.

[djwaterman]

Okay thanks

[brownie]

I have the same problem when :

-Swap disk space is full

-I do multiple changes in scene (like materials) without properly saving both the scene and the objects. Generally speaking, Kray is quite sensitive to changes between two renders.

A common crash saving habit is to use Kray render frame button instead of F9.