TheKitchenAbode

1 minute ago, robdyck said:

A wmv is working for me. Check out this beauty! I literally put no effort into this.

Untitled_1.wmv

Works perfect, for some reason I can't get the file to insert. Will try a zipped one in a few minutes. Thanks

1 minute ago, robdyck said:

I'd try the opposite of whatever you tried...if you used the "choose files" tool and it didn't work, then try dragging the file instead. Or vice versa. I've experienced the same behavior once or twice.

Thanks Robert. I did try that but will try a few more times, maybe just a glitch, hopefully not a virus.

I don't experience any problems with lighting changing between rooms with a PBR walkthrough.

Would provide an example but don't know how to upload(attach) a vid. Tried using the "choose file" but it keeps telling me "this type of video file is not supported". Tried with both .WMV & .AVI.  and the vids are only 3.2MB. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

9 minutes ago, Kbird1 said:

 

Especially true if the Motherboard is only capable of PCIe 2 , not PCIe3 as most modern GPUs need this  to achieve their highest performance.

 

A newer system would also come with the ability to use NVME SSDs etc which may also help Chief...

Absolutely, computers are systems and they are generally only as good as the weakest component. You could go out and buy a $2,000 CPU but if you can't feed it the data fast enough then it's really a waste of money, it just sits there while it waits for more data to process. A bit like having a Ferrari idling in the driveway, lots of potential but it ain't going anywhere.

From my experience, given the age of your system I would not expect too much from the addition of a new high end dedicated graphics card. It's important to understand that in CA any and all graphic generation requires a combined effort by the CPU and the graphic card, the CPU must first prepare the data and only then can it be sent to the graphics card for final processing. Due to this the CPU and the graphics card must be balanced as best as possible so one or the other does not become a bottleneck. Imported PDF's are problematic as these require extreme CPU processing and unfortunately the graphics card can't help out, zooming and panning are similar. Camera views including PBR'ing take more advantage of the graphics card but even so I would estimate that about 60% of the processing time is still CPU related.

Just as an example, here is a snap shot of my CPU and GPU usage levels when generating a PBR. The vertical green line is when I opened the camera view and the red vertical line is when the PBR was finished. The total time was 30 seconds. As you can see, initially the CPU cranks up while the GPU remains essentially 0, it's only at about the last 10 second time point that the GPU starts to crank up, if you look closely at the GPU graph you can see that only in the last say 5 seconds (flattened curve) that my GPU was running flat out. Given this, if I were to just upgrade my GPU how much better performance could I really anticipate, maybe a few seconds at best.

Might wish to check your plan materials list, there are times when two differing materials can have the same name. If you have a Knotty Alder that is light in color and then another one with the same name but is dark in color then when you try to paint the darker one with the lighter one the spray painter may not work. It can assume that the cabinet is already Knotty Alder and therefore ignores it. I believe in the latest update of X12 CA addressed this problem to prevent multiply materials with the same name.

That's more likely a job for Photoshop if you do not wish to recreate the rooms.

In this example I saved a CA PBR render, now it's a standard pic, and then brought it into Photoshop and then cropped in the people, cat and dog.

You can place the light source in a fixture anywhere you wish, even outside of the stretch zone. Note that the light source does not change when you alter the size a light fixture even if the light source is within the bounding box. Complained about this several years ago but this issue has not been addressed. If you change a light fixtures size you need to go back in and adjust the light source position manually in the offset boxes.

This might shed some light on the subject.

https://www.nspe.org/resources/issues-and-advocacy/action-issues/licensure-federal-engineers

I don't have an answer to this but what happens in a situation where a federally run infrastructure project crosses over state boundaries or a project being conducted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers spans more than one state. I find it hard to believe that they would have to find a licensed engineer in each State to approve the portion of the project that crosses over each boarder.

All I can say is that you can create some fairly complex 3D molding lines. Just takes a while to find the right combination of needed views and when to use the lines DBX to make adjustments via coordinate entries.

This railing system was done using 3D molding polylines.

1 minute ago, rickwookie said:

And since you can't rotate a section view once placed (another bug?) or from what I can see, place it with a specified numerical angle, trying to have it lined-up with the line section, when that section is off-angle, is nigh-on impossible!

Yes, that's a major problem if your molding is not symmetrical. CA needs to purchase a more sophisticated compound miter saw.

2 minutes ago, rickwookie said:

It only works until you have any depth (relative to that view) applied. Try it. Draw a Polyline in plan, convert to 3D Molding Polyline - you can insert as many breaks as you like - now select section of the 3d Molding Polyline and set its Z coordinate to something non-zero (maybe try setting a different Z value at each end to have it sloping up or down for extra "fun") - now try inserting a break...

Agree, there are situations where the original view is not conducive to inserting a break, depends upon the lines direction. If I started the 3D molding line say in plan view then if a segment was vertical I would need to flip to a section view, however it seemed that the ability to insert a break varied depending on the section views camera position, front, back, left or right view. It seemed that whatever view you are in you need to make certain that when you click on the segment that the break is to be inserted that the segments end, start and center nodes display properly, if not this seemed to indicate that CA was not seeing the segment properly and the break insertion might fail.

From my time playing with 3D moldings I found that when inserting a break it was best to go back to the same view type that I originally started to draw the 3D molding line in. Once inserted I would then flip to the best view to adjust it. Not sure it's a bug but the ability to insert a break seems to be dependent upon the view you are using such as plan versus an elevation versus 3D.

Here it is in X12.

I put a roof on it to get rid of the light bleed and grain. Used the adjust image properties in the Raytrace window to adjust the contrast, intensity and brightness.

I believe in X12 they added the ability of Raytrace to use the adjust light assignment. Open up the camera DBX and make sure that the lights to use are not limited to 8. Either set that higher or select it to use the default light set.

I would recommend that you might be best to only consider the Surface Book as this is available with a discrete NVidia graphics card. All other Surface models are only available with the Intel integrated graphics chip.  Though this chip seems to work I have found things to be glitchy, especially if you are PBR'ing and it is definitely a lot slower than a dedicated graphics card.

1 minute ago, Ridge_Runner said:

That view is pretty impressive, Graham. Is that a PBR or done in Blender? Do you have an estimate of how much time you invested in setting up the lighting, materials, etc. to get that quality of image? Subjective, I know, as many of us would take much longer to get to that same point - if ever. I am always blown away with the quality of your images as compared to mine.

Thanks Mike, that is an X12 PBR. It did take a while to get things adjusted as everything needed to be changed, all lights and materials. What also took time was to correct some other problems with that plan, always takes longer when working with a plan created by someone else as you have to check everything. My own plans take less work as I'm using my saved library items as the model is being built.

The comparisons are interesting however, I'm not certain that they are actually providing any guidance on which rendering program/method is best. The reason I state this is that each rendering program will interpret the materials and lights differently, as such a render may look better in one program but that may just be due to the materials and lighting being a bit more aligned with that particular program. From the last set of comparisons, I don't find any of them to be acceptable, appears to prove that no matter how capable in theory a particular rendering engine is, they are all capable of producing poor results.

I tried Blender about 2 years ago and found it to be very awkward to use and it seems to be lacking in any detailed documentation.

I loaded up that Bachelor plan from Chief and adjusted the sun, lights and materials to be more conducive to CA's PBR rendering mode. This renders in about 15 seconds on my system.

1 hour ago, Cheryl_C_Crane said:

I think that trying to create reflectivity off the apples may have started the issue.

You mat be right about it being related to reflectivity.

Here, the table is 100% reflective as is the floor. Just one light over the fruit plate. Notice that the fruits show up on the vertical legs of the table and they are also showing up on the floor. Will play a bit more to see why this is happening.

Just a guess without the plan to look at but is it possible that those apple materials have an emissive setting. If so try changing it to zero.

If a particular material from the library has a map it will show in the DBX you have displayed. If one is not there then you will have to create it, save it to your library and then browse to select. If you do not want to create your own, you can try using the Texture Source file displayed in the DBX, might be good enough as a bump or ambient occlusion map.

8 minutes ago, gpenelton said:

 

I placed a light inside the closet but it didn't help.  What is interesting is that I have these doors all through the house and any that are open display fine, while those that are closed are dark grey.  That goes for pocket doors that are patially open as well.  Maybe I will try redoing the symbol, and change the default material before I do.

To narrow it down, place the standard door in that closet and then change the door to that concrete material and see if it then behaves like your custom door. If so then it's most likely related to the material. If the standard door with the concrete displays correctly then it's most likely a problem with that symbol.

6 minutes ago, gpenelton said:

Graham - I placed a light in the Foyer as you suggested and the problem still persists (Screenshot1). When I change the door to a stock CA door ther is no issue (Screenshot2).

 

Would the fact that the material for the custom door was originally Concrete (default for Polyline Solid) have anything to do with it? 

Concerning the added light, it needs to be placed inside the closet, not outside in the foyer if the problem is that CA is lighting the material according to the wrong room.

Could it be that the original material was concrete, maybe. There are times when painting materials don't always take properly but what is interesting is the fact that when you had the door open the material was properly lit/displayed but displayed improperly when closed.