Render Problem: Groups not appearing in render

[phorest]

I have a problem when rendering an animation done with a number of scenes.
My animation is basically a concrete slab and beams with the reinforcement bars in them.
The animation basically starts off with only 1 group unhidden, then in the 2nd scene a 2nd group is also unhidden, 3rd scene - 3rd group is also unhidden etc until at the final scene all 20 groups are unhidden showing the final structure.
When i view the animation on sketchup it works perfectly, but when i render it with vray, it goes through all the scenes with just the first group unhidden, keeping all the other groups hidden for the entire animation, which is very frustrating seeing as it takes so long to render. Any ideas on what the problem is?

[dalomar_cg]

Re: Render Problem: Groups not appearing in render

V-Ray only retrieves the geometry on the first frame of the animation. Therefore, any changes to layers or things like Face Me components will not update through out the animation. As of now, this is designed behavior, but there is the potential that this could change in the next version.

[phorest]

Re: Render Problem: Groups not appearing in render

Does that happen in 3dsMax aswell or is it just with sketchup?

[thomthom]

Re: Render Problem: Groups not appearing in render

SketchUp only.

[dalomar_cg]

Re: Render Problem: Groups not appearing in render

The issue (if you choose to call it that) is two fold. First, SU isn't an animation platform, so its interface for animation is extremely limited. Animation in V-Ray is extremely explicit, so proper animation workflows are destroyed by SU's animation interface. Second, pages have a number of different uses, animation being one of them. Due to this, it causes potential inconsistent data between frames, and this can cause animation issues.

If anything more than basic flythroughs are what you're looking for, then I would advise you to investigate fully featured animation software. Its not that V-Ray can't handle the information, its that SU is not structured in a way that animation at a scale and/or scope larger than basic flythroughs can be efficiently achieved.

[patplace_cg]

Re: Render Problem: Groups not appearing in render

I have put some point in that experience. I only render still image and i had that issue before but not all the time. the group was disappeared in the render image. I am not sure what that cause because not happen all the time. Maybe the group/object was selected in the same time while i was render. Or maybe the camera bug. Because I was select that object. and i was moving a little bit the camera view then the group come back on the next render.

[phorest]

Re: Render Problem: Groups not appearing in render

Thanks for you help, I've done most modeling in sketchup so far so I think I'm going to just finish with sketchup.
I found a longer way around animating what i have in sketchup, basically while in sketchup i have a long series of scenes where things appear and then dissapear, the only difference now will be to keep all the scenes with the same geometry together and just render them scenes separatly. So basically ill be rendering 5 or 6 different walkthoughs (all having differnt layers unhidden and all scenes between renders tieing in together) then add them all into one smooth video file which technically should work.
Im in the process of preparing that now, unless anyone has any other ideas?
I imported the 3D model into 3ds Max but i havent much experience in 3ds Max so i found it tough to get used to. The 3d file was very big and caused 3ds Max to be very sluggish.
Anyways, any input would be appreciated, thanks!