This refers to inserted photos generated through the Photo Board Wizard. Anybody have any ideas as to why these photos would/could disappear from the 3D view?
Sometimes the photo is there, and sometimes it disappears, and there is just a gray rectangle of the proper dimensions, but without the photo. The item is still listed by name in the catalog, but the small ICON (which normally shows the photo) is a blank white square.
It's not a major problem to bring the photo back via the properties dialog of the blank area (assuming the photo is saved someplace), but it shouldn't be necessary. Any ideas?
While on the subject of disappearing items, any ideal how an item could be visible in 3D (in this case, a floor), but not be visible in 2D? Seems impossible, but it happened. I tried everything, but was unable to make it visible in 2D. (I finally deleted it in 3D, then re-built it in 2D) Any thoughts on how it could happen, and how it could be restored in 2D without rebuilding?
-----Otto
Hi Otto,
Photoboards are not actually in the program but just a link to wherever it is saved on your PC. If TFP is unable to access the original image because it has been moved for example or a folder renamed or something similar that breaks the link, then TFP would not find the image. Or maybe even the PC did not have the free RAM to handle the image. Closing TFP and re-opening it may free some memory or closing other programs that may be still running. Maybe some of these or a combination may be the cause(?)
Floors cannot be selected in 2D plan view unless you can actually click on it's edge. Watching the popup identifier indicates which line it is. You can select the floor in2D rendered view or in 3D view. If you select it in 3D, then return to 2D plan view, you can then go to Edit / Select Previous and your previous selection, the floor, will be highlighted.
Bear in mind with floors, and ceilings, that you can insert more than one, so if you replace a floor make sure you have deleted the old one first or you will get different textures competing.
Allan
Alan-----
Thanks for the info on Photoboards. There is an option for "Saving Imported Photo Boards to the Catalog" which I always use. That would seem to negate the need to have a link to a photo stored elseware. Nevertheless, I'm going to create a photo folder in the TFP directory, and re-do my photoboards. That should eliminate any problem with availability.
Re item visible in 3D and not 2D. It was not a matter of selectability. It was as it should be in 3D, but the durn thing was absolutely not visible in 2D. I tried everything. And it was not a matter of other stuff being on top of it. After deleting it in 3D, and rebuilding it, it is now visible in both 3D & 2D. It seems impossible, but it happened.
-----Otto
Each item has options for how it appears in 2D and in 3D
Perhaps 2D was turned "off" for that item or its line color matched the surrounding background colors and it blended-in making it appear as invisible
If it happens again, look for the 2D view settings and colors for that item...maybe change it to something very visible to help find it.
Doug has a good point re colours of lines. I created a white line to use for hiding lines in DXF imports and it became the default line for imported 3DS files. Every file I imported dissappeared in 2D but was there in 3D. Very frustrating till I realiised what was happening.
Re photboards, your option of a photoboards folder is the way to go or you can put them in the TFP Textures folder. You would not want them in the catalogue itself or it will become so big it will slow everything to a crawl. This is no doubt why they are just links.
If you have them in the Textures folder you can easily add them also to a thin box for example but be aware that if it casts a shadow it will cast two-one of them in reverse and you do not get the autorotate option.
Allan
Alan & Doug----
Thanks a million for your comments. Greatly appreciated.
Re floor visible in 3D and not 2D -- I tried everything, including everything (eye) off except floors. And the line color for floors is dark blue. As far as putting one item on top of another, I've made that mistake often enough that it's something I double check. Guess I'm going to consider it a weird one-time corruption. It's probably not worth worrying about because it was possible to correct the situation with a delete & rebuild -- but I thought I'd check just in case someone else was familiar with the situation.
Re Photoboard -- There is so much stuff in the catalog, I would think that a reasonable number of photoboards stored there should not slow things down. That gives good access to photos that are used repeatedly. Still don't understand how photos could partially disappear from the catalog, leaving the name & dimensions, but no photo. Oh well, guess I won't worry about it -- gotta keep things moving. Photos somewhere in the TPF directory should work OK.
----Otto
Hi Otto,
The problem with photoboards in the catalogue is that they have to be BMP files for the transparency to work properly and so they can be quite large files. It would be OK if you could use JPG files as they are so much smaller.
Allan
Alan-----
Maybe you have inadvertently diagnosed my problem with photoboards. When I use the wizard to generate a photoboard, my pictures are JPEG. Are you saying that JPEGs cause problems? That I should only use BMPs? I would not have thought the picture format would matter to TFP. (I used JEPGs because of their smaller file size, but obviously it's easy to change my JPEGs to BMPs, and redo my photoboards, if necessary)
----Otto
Hi Otto,
JPG can be used - it will work but usually photoboards are used to create a cutout image, eg trees, people, animals, so they can be used in a scene and become part of it. To do that the background of the image has to be 'cut out' and replaced with Magenta colour, Red - 255, Green - 255 and Blue - 255 (bright Pink). This true Magenta will become totally transparent in TFP making the object look like part of a 3D scene.
The compression process used for JPG images results in some of the colours blurring slightly into each other with the result that the pink is not true around the edges and you will get a pink halo around the cutout image. If you are using the full image - no cutout, then the JPG should still work.
The house and nearly all the plants and trees in the images in this post http://forums.turbofloorplan.com/index.php/topic,771.0.html are BMP photoboards and would add up to about 40 MB, yet the BLD file is only 500K as none of the photos are actually in the program. Many of the trees and shrubs are over 4MB each. You can cut them down in physical size of course but the quality deteriorates if you do unless they are some distance away from the camera. Most of the plants already in TFP are not very high resolution so look somewhat fuzzy by comparison, which is why I have used my own.
Allan
Alan----
Thanks for all the info. Always something new to learn with TFP!
-----Otto