VRay for 2013 crash. The same file in max 2011 no!

[cecofuli]

Hi Vlado,
I used 4 days of my life and I don't understand what's the problem... I don't know if the problem is 3ds max or VRay.



The scene, as usual is an outdoor, very complex, with a lot of proxy, Multiscatter, high res textures etc...
But, with max 2011, I do more complex scene. In my opinion is not he biggest scene I did.
Anyway, I try to render the scene for the final output, but every time, with my workstation, I had a crashed!
I check the task manager and 3ds max crashes when I had 19-20 GB of occupied RAM. But I've 24 GB RAM.
This is the first time that I use 3ds max 2013 and this file is a full, new 2013 project.
I delete all displacement, I convert a lot of geometry (roof, fences) in a proxy, nothing.
So, one by one, I tried all the layer. But, with half of layers off and 15 GB of occupied RAM, I had crash during the first 4-5 sec of LC calculation

I spent hours and hour and a lot of my hairs, but when 3ds max try to exceed 19-20 GB, I had a crash (also with BB in another node)
I was very frustrated... 4 days and no idea what I can do! I try all, all , ALL . FOr example, if I load the scene with nitrous, I have 9 GB of RAM occupied, in DX only 5 GB.
But at the end, during the rendering, the amount of occupied ram is the same.
So, my last chance was install 3ds max 2011. With this version I remember I had 24.2 GB RAM some disk swapping, but I can render a very big scene without problem.
Ok, after another half day (install 3ds max 2011, all the script, plugins etc...) the magic!!! I saved the file in 2011 format, without any changes and I can render the scene and I have 19 GB occupied without crash!
So, my question is: is the problem in 3ds max 2013 or in VRay for 3ds max 2013? I know also that the problem could be in multiscatter.
Tell me that you have an idea, because I'm very frustrated

[vlado]

If you get me the scene, I'll tell you... or if you have a crash dump from 3ds Max... Btw do you use other plugins like MultiScatter?

Best regards,
Vlado

[cecofuli]

Hi Vlado, thank for the fast reply!

I do right now some other test. This is the reason why I answer late =)
Yes, only multiscatter (or some freeware maps, I don't remember well)

LC setting: 1000 subdivs, 0.01 in screen mode:

(*) I save the file in max 2011 version, but render in max 2013: crash with 19 GB occupied
(*) I reduced the LC from 1000 to 200 and it seems to work (in max 2013, with 2013 format) with 18.1 GB occupied, but obviously the LC subdivs is too low
(*) I reduced the LC from 1000 to 500 and it seems to work (in max 2013, with 2013 format) with 18.2 GB occupied, but obviously the LC subdivs is too low
(*) I reduced the LC from 1000 to 800 and it seems to work (in max 2013, with 2013 format) with 19.5 GB occupied
(*) After these tests, I render again with 1000 subdivs (in max 2013, with 2013 format) with 19.6 GB occupied, and it's works. Grrr...
(*) I close 3ds max 2013, reload the scene with 1000 subdivs: crash! Better. Ok, not better, but this is a behavior expected
(*) I save in 2011, open and render, without any changes with 1000 subds: 19.0 GB occupied stable and OK!

I think there is some problem in the LC "task". If I send you the scene with all the proxy, texture etc... as you can image, is very, very big. But give me some hours and I upload on my FTP.
About the dump, HERE

[cecofuli]

I upload now the scene, but it'll take me 14 hours. I've a slow upload connection and the zip file is big.

[Morbid Angel]

just curious, does it render if multiscatter is not present? in any case it may be multiscatter which is responsible...

[cecofuli]

Hi Morbid... mmm I tried to render a simple layer, with one or two multiscatter objects inside and the test render was ok.

[cecofuli]

Hi Morbid... mmm I tried to render a simple layer, with one or two multiscatter objects inside and the test render was ok. I contact Karba too. Anyway I finish successfully 5 view without problem with max 2011 with 22 GB ram occupied. Soon I'll send the file to Vlado and Karba

[Morbid Angel]

just curious what was the bucket size in your scene and your dynamic settings? I found that with scatter plugin the size of the buckets matters a lot. And on such scene like this where 1 gb more or less means a difference between crashing or not could impact your performance. Are you using dynamic textures too?

[cecofuli]

I Morbid, the problem is/was (now "solved" with max 2011) during the first 10 seconds of LC pass, not during the final rendering.
With max 2011 I see 21-22 GB occupied RAM, so, as I wrote, the problem is not the amount of RAM, but something different (Max 2013, VRay 2013, Multiscatter, some corrupted meshes, some textures??)
Otherwise, I don't understand why the same, identical file is ok with max 2011 and I have crash with max 2013.
Anyway, now Vlado has my scene. I'm waiting for some debugging from him =)

[windowlicker]

I always check my scene for errors in the same, rather simple, way: Hide everything - render. Unhide one thing at a time and render, until you hit the problem object/texture/proxy/whatever. Then you know what to fix.

If you have no single object causing the issue, and you get a crash due to running out of memory, try rendering it without textures and see if it solves you problem. Then only use highres textures where you absolutely need them. No use having highres textures for objects that are far away from the camera.

From what I can make out from that screen dump, your geometry doesn't look that complicated. Sure everything is as instanced as it should be?
One other idea: Merge your file into a clean file. Max still is a bit too good at storing all kinds of garbage in the files...

[cecofuli]

Windowlicker, I worked 4 day to debug (hide, unhide, use proxy bitmap etc...) and I was out of deadline =(
I Merge the file 2 times in a new file: problem not solved and the crash was so random.
One day I thought: ok, nice I found the wrong layer ( the multiscatter forest with border option ON)
When I turned OFF all was OK, when ON: crash! I turn off this parameter in all multiscatter objects.
During the night, 2 of 7 view was ok, the third: crash! So, the border option wasn't the enemy!
Yes, the geometry and file is simple. Ok, I used 2,4 and 8k texture, but I never had a problem before.
If I render BF+BF or with LC pass I have crash after 5-15 second with max 2013.
With max 2011 all is perfect. And the files was created in max 2013. So, the file is OK in my opinion.
If I'll have time, I want to check better the files, but 4 days of debugging is a lot of time. But, now, I don't know where to "search"

[cecofuli]

Mmm...
I worked inside max 2011 (new geometries,models, proxy and multiscatter)... And after today, I had again a crash with the new work added!!!
Before, no problem. I don't know if the "today problem" with max 2011 is the same as the problems 2013. But this time I isolated the "bug" in the rose geometry multiplied by Multiscatter.

(*) With sphere OK
(*) with Proxy n°1 (bush): OK
(*) with Proxy n°1 (rose): OK: Crash!

etc.. see the screenshot

In this case, the problem was in the Multiscatter (leaf shader -> Normal map)
In this shader, we didn't use a VRayNormal, but Normal Bump

So, after my fight, will be useful a script that automatically, replace the Normal Bump with VRayNormal Map.
I think, my problem with the entire scene (1.8GB and 200+ shader) was the same. But it's very complicated an time consuming task check all the shaders to see there is this fuck Normal Bump!!!
I remember, some months ago (or years?? ) about a bug with MS + Normal Bump, but I forgot it!!!
I don't know if It's useful add a "warning" inside VRay Log about the shaders where this Normal Bump (if used) is.


--- SCENE ---

[vlado]

Well I got a copy of MultiScatter to test here, so hopefully I'll have more info on that soon. But it is true that the Normal map will not work correctly with MultiScatter and V-Ray proxy objects and there is nothing that we can do about it. We could print a warning though.

Best regards,
Vlado

[cecofuli]

--- double post ---

[cecofuli]

Ehh... now, I remember about that problem, but I forget it! Damn...
Also, in the MS forum, if you search, Karba three years ago wrote the same:

Karba:
"I think it is easy to write simple script to convert normalbump to vraynormalbump"

LINK

Thank you Vlado =)