Digital Art Zone

I have a scene where I experiment and have tried some animation, etc.  Now when I go to render, I have it set to active viewport, it will render the first time and then every time after that will go back to the first picture regardless if I move the camera position around or whatever.  I even moved something on the table to check.  because of the new window opens up it obscures the window behind it but when I move it I can see the old picture, then when the rendering is done it reverts back to what it currently is.

Have any idea what I did?  I restore all the render settings back to default but nothing gives.

I’m used to rendering, moving around the screen for the next shot and rendering again and so forth sometime 30 and 40 pics but haven’t had this happen before. 

Thanks.

The render engine uses the ‘current’ camera that you have selected in the camera drop-down menu.  If you move that camera, the render will be of the view you see in the viewport.  Are you changing cameras before rendering?  Are you talking about animation?

What camera are you using, see below.

Thanks for the reply.  It’s not an animation although I did do some in this scene so was thinking that it may be part of the problem. 

And maybe it is my workflow.  I’m trying to find the best ways to do things to get around my annoyances.  So usually I’m in perspective mode and move things around.  If I find a certain view I like, I create a camera position for it.  Then under perspective view I move everything around and then switch to the camera view of the one I like and then render.

This morning I did a test.  I went in and the camera was already set to “Camera Straight”, just a stupid name I made up and rendered.  Then under the same camera I moved forward to the other side of the room and rendered again.  This time it rendered the first position instead of the new position.

So I then opened the other file, normally I have a backup in case I mess up but this time I don’t.  I just have a second copy of what I have now.  It does the same thing.  I open the file, keep the same camera view, render.  Move forward, and render again.  While it is rendering I can see the view in the background change to the previous view.  After the render is done it reverts back to the current view.

I could just start over.  It’s not like I haven’t a billion times.  Lighting is the part I hate the worst.  So I hate ditching this setup only because it looks ok lighting wise.  not to say that it is but at least everything looks more 3d and not so flat.

This just caught me at a bad time.  There are little things that bug me.

Like:

1) Moving around.  I can’t rotate around a pinpoint.  I end up all over the place.
2) Moving a character from one location to another.  I often have to rotate around to see the handles to grab.
3) if I have a tab open like the content library, sometimes the items disappear.  I have to minimize and then maximize it to see them again.
4) Lighting - what can I say.  I suck at it so far.
5) I buy a lot of stuff but I can hardly ever to get it to look like the promos lol. 
6) Menu Item Figure>Move to Floor.  Very handy but was wondering if there was a way to move to next object instead of floor like if a character is lying on a bed.  If I do Move to Floor then of course it does and falls through the bed rather than stopping on the bed’s surface.
7) I’m on the other side of the world in a scene and merge a character or pop in something else and it is created on the other side of where I am.  It would be great if it was merged or created where I currently am.  Hence moving all around again.
8) Applying a pose.  I know now I can hold down the CTRL key when applying the pose and turn off the translation stuff but it still moves around some but at least I don’t have to chase the figure back to it’s original position or worse.

Sorry I know you DIDN’T ask but this is my top 8 (only cuz I have to get ready to go to work) newbie annoyances (and yes I’m still a newb after all this time.  But I’m determined to really get to know this stuff this year.)

Maybe I could make a YouTube vid of It after work.  Even if I start all over I would still like to know what’s going on.  It’s the fix-it guy in me.

Thanks for listening to the meandering.  That’s the ADD in me lol.

1: you have a Frame button among your Camera Control icons. Select an object and use the Frame button and the cam will rotate around that item
2.: Go to Top view or have more camera viewport windows open at once for easy positioning.
3: Open GL issues I think…I got the same in DS4.5.1.6
4 and 5 comes with time and dedication to learning.
6: There is a Collide script available https://sites.google.com/site/mcasualsdazscripts2/mcjcolliderds45
7: sorry don’t understand that one
8: You can Lock figures so the bones cannot move.

7. Yes, if you are at X,Z co-ords of 1,000, 1,000 in your current scene and merge in a previously saved scene that had it’s figures at -1,000, -1,000 then they will be ‘across the world’ from where you currently are.  A quick method might be to parent all the merged scene items to a Null and then manually set the X and Z co-ords of the Null to 1,000, 1,000 to have the old scene shifted, en masse, to your current location in the scene.  If either scene also made use of the Y co-ord, modify that too!

What would be very useful, is a screenshot of your Advanced Render Settings like shown below.

I think you still have it set to animation, and it is always rendering the first frame because that is what you have it set to do.

Szark - I have started using the Frame button.  Sometimes I do get strange results though.  Like last night.  I selected the figure from the scene selection tab and then did the frame button and it put me on the opposite side of where the figure was.  But I noticed I selected the group name rather than the figure itself.  Other than that, it really does help a lot moving around in big scenes.

Simon - I’ve never used a Null before but have grown really fond of grouping.  Recently, I took a shower room and doubled it in size.  I just grouped everything together (the parts I wanted to duplicate anyway) and then saved and then merged back.  Probably an easier way but it worked then I could drag around the entire room and contents from Top View.

Like I said I’m still trying to learn best practices but it does get the job done in the short run.  LOL.

Jimmy, here is my Advanced Tab.  It maybe something super simply but I’m not seeing it and it doesn’t look any different than another file I’m using with no problems.  I think you are right though that it has something to do with the animation in that file.

Your render settings look OK to me. 

The only other thing I can think of is to go to the Parameters pane, and using the drop-down menu there, choose the option ‘Clear Animation’, and see if that does anything to help.

whispers65 - 21 January 2013 06:33 PM

Szark - I have started using the Frame button.  Sometimes I do get strange results though.  Like last night.  I selected the figure from the scene selection tab and then did the frame button and it put me on the opposite side of where the figure was.  But I noticed I selected the group name rather than the figure itself.  Other than that, it really does help a lot moving around in big scenes.

Yes if you group things togther then effectively you are using a Null object and the frame button will frame the null object.

Szark - 20 January 2013 07:39 AM

6: There is a Collide script available https://sites.google.com/site/mcasualsdazscripts2/mcjcolliderds45

Here is something that integrates mcjcollider into a one or two click solution.
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewthread/15219/

Thx for that BWSman   I even posted in that thread…DOH!