Large animation fly throughs continue to crash... PLEASE HELP!

[Johnnybells]

I am running two 64bit i7 rigs linked through a local connection. I am using Bongo for the animation. Where I think that I am getting in trouble, is the layering of 2d trees on planes and vray's struggle to calculate the light through them when they stack up in certain views.

The animations are about 500 to 600 frames long each. The animations render efficiently until I get deeper into the model. Then it freezes. I am using a exterior visopt file that i downloaded from flying architecture.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

[fooprobe]

Re: Large animation fly throughs continue to crash... PLEASE HELP!

if you go to the frame where it freezes and try to render a single frame, does it still crash? you're saying "freeze" - does it actually crash out, or is it just non-responsive?

[Johnnybells]

Re: Large animation fly throughs continue to crash... PLEASE HELP!

the program will allow me to close the render windows, but that is all. You can enter a command, but nothing happens other than its name showing up in text.

I have attempted to calculate the frame at which the animation crashing on, so that I can restart them. Most often than not, the rending crashes again. Sometimes it works. All I keep thinking of when I do this is the definition of insanity is "doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results". And then I want to cry.

[fooprobe]

Re: Large animation fly throughs continue to crash... PLEASE HELP!

it doesn't sound crashed as much as just thinking really really hard - running out of RAM. can you post an image of the model at the frame that crashes, and your settings? if you think it's the maps on the trees, try removing them and see if it renders that frame better.

[Johnnybells]

Re: Large animation fly throughs continue to crash... PLEASE HELP!

Will do... I will post tomorrow when I am at work. I am starting a new long animation then. Should crash soon enough.

The trees in some scenes stack up. The calculation seems too intense for the 32bit Vray. I think I am just stuck.

[pickinboy]

Re: Large animation fly throughs continue to crash... PLEASE HELP!

Will do... I will post tomorrow when I am at work. I am starting a new long animation then. Should crash soon enough.

The trees in some scenes stack up. The calculation seems too intense for the 32bit Vray. I think I am just stuck.

FYI - i have recently got upto 256 MB Rhino 4 model animating OK across 5 servers.

pls excuse if you know all these....

Try and reduce number of reflective materials,
make the render buckets small - 15 x 10
delete_anything_you can't see in fly thru.
use general tex maps (across several faces seems better) with adequate resolution 1024, etc.
try and use HDRI lighting wherever possible - strong light contrast and multiply at 1.7
make sure you have the last release of VFR - on both machines
use 'seldup' command - just to dbl check you don't have duplicated crap in your model.
try and use only VRay materials if you can - use the noise map instead of texture as well if possible. (makes great carpets, etc)
as the previous post mentions - render different positional shots at different time positions.
have no other programs running
double check your network connection speed is good.

[pickinboy]

Re: Large animation fly throughs continue to crash... PLEASE HELP!

oh yes - I have found Rhino 4 seems happy with only one texture channel
if you are using transparency and a leaf map in your trees (ie. two channels) - that might be an issue.
maye get the leaf map to double up as your trasnparency map?