Flickering Lines

Hatrack · 8 Mar 2023, 18:40

When modeling, I often find that edges do not display smoothly, but will instead flicker on and off as I rotate or pan.

The disappearing lines also carry over into JPG and PNG exports.

I have an M1 MacBook Pro, and it happens on both the laptop and external displays.

I have tried all all possible combinations of OpenGL settings, with no improvement in the problem.

Does anyone else have this issue?

Screen Recording 2023-03-08 at 12.33.44 PM 720.mov

Rich O Brien · 8 Mar 2023, 20:59

It could be a sizing issue where the distance is so small its hard for SketchUp to decide what to prioritize.

If its not size related then it's just a straight up annoying display issue.

It looks like the latter to me. Not something I've seen happen on Windows.

Can you reproduce it on a small piece of geometry? Or share a portion of a file?

Its weird

Hatrack · 9 Mar 2023, 17:20

Thanks Rich - Your response helped me figure this out. The model started with a plan imported from CAD and was over 400 meters from the axes origin. I moved it to the origin, and the display issue is gone.

It's a bit of a bummer, because this is a shared file and the axes location may matter to my collaborators (for geolocation?). I tried temporarily moving the axes to the model, but the display issue recurred. So, for now, I'm marking its original location with a few lines, and even though there's now a little geometry in the distance, the model is displaying well.

Mark

Dave R · 9 Mar 2023, 19:54

@hatrack said:

The model started with a plan imported from CAD and was over 400 meters from the axes origin. I moved it to the origin, and the display issue is gone.

This definitely an issue. Not sure where it comes from but OpenGL gets confused.

@hatrack said:

I tried temporarily moving the axes to the model, but the display issue recurred.

The axes don't determine the location of the origin. The origin is a fixed point in the model space. By default the axes are placed at the origin.

@hatrack said:

So, for now, I'm marking its original location with a few lines, and even though there's now a little geometry in the distance, the model is displaying well.

Keep an eye on that, though. That geometry might cause you issues, particularly with Zoom Extents. My inclination would be to identify the coordinates of that distant point and write them down for later reference. YOu can always move the model back to that point later if you must.