Trouble rendering plants in Turbo Floor Plan Pro

[Computeracer]

When I goto render a Japanese Barberry I get a black plane that is rendered perpendicular to the plant. It only shows up when I do a "render 3d real view" has anyone else ran into this problem?

Thank you,

Dan

[Doug.S]

I've had many many render problems but not your problem exactly....

Usually one or all of these issues;

- set quality higher...I almost always use 3. 1 does not always render everything correctly. 5 rarely needed and takes much longer

- try with hardware acceleration "off"

- there are a very few items that have a bug and don't work right

- change angle of object or camera....even a very slight change like 1 degree may fix it

- rendering with sun on or off can make or break a render even if the shadow is not visible in the view

- see previous render explanations posted by Allan as he has had to work around many rendering issues


I also see that the shadows look incorrect (hi/low) which hints at the object is not correct somehow?


I just tried a barberry render and it looks OK.

[Allan Chesney]

Hi Dan,

Yes this is an issue - I actually experienced it on the very first renders I ever did but it has only occurred once since. It is not related to a specific plant. I had one model that did it with almost every plant and tree in the model.

I was unable to work out under what circumstances it occurred. I thought it seemed to occur if some of the plants overlapped something else, but I could not get it to fail when I tired to do so. I also thought it was when the sun was behind the plant but that was inconsistent also, although yours is that way. One of Doug suggestions got rid of the problem - move the camera, but that doesn't explain what causes it.

You will notice it also causes a rectangular shadow! I have not had the chance to test it thoroughly but will have to soon as I have a project comming up that focuses on the exterior quite a bit.

As Doug said there a number of rendering issues and I know the programmers are working on them, so hopefully this is one that gets fixed soon.

Allan

[Nik]

Can you look at these plants' models outside TFP ??

IIRC, I've seen something like this in another program when the apparently complex 'object' was only a trans-map texture on a rectangular carrier. Caught at the wrong angle, at the wrong render settings, the base object showed and threw shadows...

This trick is often used with several layers to make remarkably-low polygon wigs and trees for games, but I have no idea how to tweak a graphics engine to cure such artifacts...

[Doug.S]

You may be able to "substitute" the plant by using a photoboard and have it always point at the camera

Perhaps you can export/import the image or find it and apply it to a photoboard.....I have not tried, it may not be possible.

But alternatively you may be able to find an image or make a photo to apply yourself to a photoboard....search the web for images via Google.

BUT be sure to use .bmp images (NOT .jpg) and use "magenta" color for transparency.....and look very carefully at the image to avoid stray bits (usually at the outline edges) for colors that are very close to magenta but are not exact and show up as bright magenta-like colors.....usually created by making a selection and using anti-aliasing in your bitmap editor (like Photoshop)

[Allan Chesney]

Yes you can easily use your own photos (see the cat in the image), and plants work just as well (potentially better in fact as some of the trees are not a very high quality images).  The most difficult part is cutting out the background to replace it with Magenta. 

I would suspect though that this would not solve the problem as it appears that it can happen with any photoboard, along the line of the points Nik made, angle of light etc..  Yes Nik you can see them outside the program or using the integrated plant encyclopedia (all 7000+ of them!).

Allan

[Doug.S]

you can see them outside the program

Allan,
I am able to see the plant/garden encyclopedia contents via TFP OK

And I found the plant db:
C:\Program Files\IMSIDesign\TurboFLOORPLAN 12 Home & Landscape Pro\Resource\garden.000   291,849,836
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\IMSIDesign\TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro\Plant Encyclopedia\garden.db   4,140,497

but I don't know how to open the file to extract a plant image...How do you do that?

[Allan Chesney]

Sorry Doug, looks like I may have misled you (and Nik) on that one. I had a very quick look in the Textures folder and within that the Encyclopedia folder. Half a dozen trees spring up into the image browser and I assumed the the rest of the folder contained the rest - it doesn't only half a dozen or so.  There are a few scattered through the thousands of textures but certainly not all by any means.  Looks like the encyclopedia in TFP is only way to see all of them.

Allan

[Computeracer]

Wow, I can't beleive it. I just move the camera slightly and the black planes disappeared. Well I am glad it is not just me. Any idea when this will be fixed? Thank you all for your help.

[Allan Chesney]

Everyone is expecting a patch shortly particularly for some rendering issues. At least this one is easy to work around.

Allan