Render preview pass either takes forever or freezes

[robw]

Hi,

I updated to the new version of Arnold the other day thinking this is great, a new version, what goodies have they come up with now. Only to find my scene that I've been working on for the last 6 weeks, either won't render or takes soooooooooo long it's unworkable.

The scene is around ~2.5 million polygons, and a ~130MB Max file.

It worked fine before the update, but now I can't get it to render. I've even split up the scene in more more manageable chucks and xref'ed them back in. It just hangs on the render preview pass. Even if it is working in the background, it's so slow it's no good to me. I can't do test renders as I go along anymore.

Is there anything silly that I'm missing / should be doing?

Max 2019

[Stephen.Blair]

Can you get an Arnold log (increase the verbosity level in the Render Settings)? That will give us some idea of what's going on.

[robw]

Something like this?

I have to crash Max to stop it every time, since it goes away thinking for so long.

arnold-log-file-2019-03-22.zip

Thanks

[Stephen.Blair]

@Rob Wesson Unfortunately that's not enough, the log stops during the initial loading of Arnold. Can you render anything with the latest MAXtoA? That will confirm at least that Arnold can load and MAXtoA can start a render.

I'm wondering where the slowdown is: is it the translation of the scene from 3ds Max to Arnold, or is it the actual render? I was hoping to see something in the log that would tell me.

If you have time to test, I would hide a big chunk of the scene (at least half) and see if what's left will render, and if that is super slow too

[Stephen.Blair]

Or maybe do a command-line render of the full scene, and see what log we get?

[robw]

That log was when I try to render just one of the xref's I created from the original scene, not the whole thing. I've just left it going for 30 minutes trying to get more into the log file, but that's as far as it gets.

Ok, the previous test scene I was trying to render was one of many xref's (there are ~12 in the complete scene), with a couple of other xref's added in for context.

Previous scenes xref's were the floor, and another for an open elevator/wheel chair lift.

All I did was turn off the xref for the elevator/wheel chair lift, and pressed render.

It completed in 1:24 and produced the following log file.

arnold-log-file-2019-03-22.zip

I'll open the elevator file and try to render.

Thanks

[robw]

arnold-log-file-2019-03-22-elevator.zip

Well that worked as well. It took 1:04 to render.

No problem.

I await instruction.... 🙂

[robw]

I left the command-line render going for 20 minutes, but it didn't move after the first few seconds.

I tried to render the tanks with the elevator xref.

[Stephen.Blair]

@Rob Wesson Sorry, I forgot to tell you to to add the -v 5 flag
Then we should see where it gets stuck

[robw]

Do I just add that to the end of the command line? (I've not rendered from the command line before)

[robw]

like this?

command-line-text.txt

[Stephen.Blair]

examplelog.txt

@Rob Wesson Yes. But strangely a lot of the Arnold messages are not there (see my attached log). But it does look like it gets to either scene init or rendering.

Try this: in the render settings > diagnostics, enable Ignore Lights, Ignore Shaders, and Ignore Textures. Save a copy of the scene with those settings, and do a command-line render.

[Stephen.Blair]

You're using CPU, right? Not GPU?

[pproestos]

Guys IT'S VERY SUPER SLOW. Happens the same, I try to open a max file I rendered before with the previous arnold version. With the previous arnold everything worked perfect, now with this release I cannot work at all. It take centuries to render... And I have 32 xeon cores. Something is wrong here.

I think it has to do with the lights. I will try to delete everything and create all lights from the beginning. But I dont have time right now. Going back to previous version...

I have a feeling that our old max files are going right to the waste can... 😐

[Stephen.Blair]

@Petros Proestos Can you provide an Arnold log, or even better, a scene file that will reproduce the problem?

To get a log file:

• Render Setup > Diagnostics
• Verbosity Level = Debug
• Enable Log to File, and set a location for the Arnold log file

[barninator88]

It is a problem for me as well.

[pproestos]

@Stephen ok of course, I 'll send you the max file and tell you my rendering times with both latest arnold releases on my machibe specs. I will send it via wetransfer, but not in public. Can you tell me where? Can I pm you via this forum?

[robw]

Hi, I turned on ignore shaders, textures and lights, and pressed render from inside Max (since I was already there). It flew through in 25 seconds producing the attached.

arnold-log-file-2019-03-24.zip

Didn't do the command line version, but I can if that'd help.

CPU, not GPU.

Thanks

[Stephen.Blair]

@Petros Proestos support at arnoldrenderer dot com

thanks!

[Stephen.Blair]

@Rob Wesson

Ok, let's try with lights. Disable Ignore Lights and render again.

And for the log, can you do one extra step?

To get a log file:

• Render Setup > Diagnostics
• Verbosity Level = Debug
• Enable Log to File, and set a location for the Arnold log file
• On the Arnold Renderer tab, in the Sampling and Ray Depth section, disable Preview (AA)