Rayscaper, My trip down the road to adjumacation.

Mike Amos

Ta mate, onwards.....

Mike Amos

Well, things are not exactly consistant at the moment.

Settings are lost betwwen sessions with Rayscaper which is a nuisance. Also, inconsistant render times. Sometimes 20 minutes and others, like here, over two hours for the same settings and GPU render.

En avant, avanti.

2 175s 1891 x 1019 2h 10m 04s GPU.png

Mike Amos

@Mike-Amos
Changed view without changing anything else, altered render time is apparent from the title of the next image.

3 175s 1891 x 1019 1h 41m 37s GPU.png

pixelcruncher

Hey @Mike-Amos ,

Nice Renders!

Settings are lost betwwen sessions with Rayscaper which is a nuisance

Do you mean between opening and closing the Rayscaper window, or between opening and closing SketchUp? If it's the first, I can reproduce it and will provide a fix for the next release (which I plan to land this week).

Sometimes 20 minutes and others, like here, over two hours for the same settings and GPU render.

Those render times are too high, even for CPU rendering. From your images, I gather that for an 1891 x 1091 resolution, you are seeing:

Picture 1: 2h10m10s
Picture 2: 1h41m37s

Can you provide a screenshot of your render settings?

Mike Amos

@pixelcruncher

No can do, I cannot open Rayscaper with that model now. Instant crash no bugsplat.

Mike Amos

I cut out one of the component groups, a bed with some pictures.

That alone almost halved the file size.

possibly some bad geometry or a texture way too big to be realistic, or both.

Fun, this testing. Learn something new about something old every day.

Back to it and I will report again when I have something.

Stay well mate.

pixelcruncher

Hey @Mike-Amos

Thanks for sharing the scene! The crash was caused by a bug in Rayscaper, which will be fixed in the next release.

I tried to render one of your camera viewpoints, but I don't see those high render times. Granted, I might have different hardware, and I didn't exactly replicate your original shot, but the render time for me was only 3m18s.

Could you accidentally use CPU rendering because of the settings lost between sessions bug? It would help if you provide a screenshot of the whole Rayscpaer application (including your render tab) when it's taking so long.

The scene you shared is heavy on the geometry, but that shouldn't have a massive impact on render times. It will impact the responsiveness of the SketchUp viewport and how quickly you can load the scene in Rayscaper.

I found this nifty extension called SB_Statistics_Probe that can help you find high-poly geometry:

Mike Amos

@pixelcruncher

Screen Test.jpg

pixelcruncher

@Mike-Amos Thanks for sharing that screenshot.

That is indeed ridiculously slow...

What kind of GPU do you have?

Rayscaper Menu > File > Settings:

Is CPU rendering faster for this case?
What happens if you disable the denoiser?

Mike Amos

@pixelcruncher

I have had a response from the NVIDIA tech support. Very helpful bunch and they exonerate the graphics card/drivers. Seems to be a BIOS issue. Looking for a fix.

Mike Amos

@pixelcruncher

SSD failing it seems.

ssd Failing.jpg

Mike Amos

I feel like I am re-learning this dark art. new perspectives on things I suppose.

Health wise stuff is loud. Certain sensations etc which are dementia alike bring a feeling of not really being in charge of the mental process, forgetting stuff for example.

I believe this older pc is just outclassed by Rayscaper so while I try to lay out this flat, post window replacement I will be limiting myself to Twilight and Maxwell for rendering.

For those of you who also have little niggling doubts about 'stuff', you CAN get through whatever the issue is. Noli Illegitemi Carbonundrum.

I apologise for asking questions which probably should be simple to 'know', I'm going to do what I can. This place remains important to me for the joy we share on building and rendering whatever the hell it is we make.

Keep on keeping on, never let crap get in the way of trying to be the best you can be 'today'.

Tomorrow is merely smoke and mirrors.

Rich O Brien

@Mike-Amos said in Rayscaper, My trip down the road to adjumacation.:

I apologise for asking questions which probably should be simple to 'know'

There's no need to apologize for what you consider simple questions. Path tracing render engines are complex beasts.

I encourage to stay on your journey. Learning new apps and techniques is good for the mind.

You can still achieve a lot with the hardware you have.

Mike Amos

@Rich-O-Brien

Another little 'lesson' todays crash provided some ino at least.

Crash #298860

It looks like there might be an issue with Microsoft Visual Studio. The Microsoft Visual Studio C++ Redistributables are required for SketchUp to run and may need to be reloaded. Please try the following:

Check to make sure your graphics drivers are up to date: https://help.sketchup.com/en/sketchup/how-can-i-update-my-computers-graphics-driver

Quit SketchUp (and LayOut)

Go to Add/Remove Programs and uninstall the Microsoft Visual Studio C++ 2015 and above Redistributables (there may be a 32-bit and 64-bit version)

Uninstall SketchUp from Add/Remove Programs

Re-run the SketchUp installer. You can download it here if you need it: https://www.sketchup.com/offline-download

Restart your computer

If you continue to experience issues please reach out to our support staff at: https://help.sketchup.com/en/contact-support/technical-question/form

pixelcruncher

Hey Mike,

I hope you are doing alright!

I believe this older pc is just outclassed by Rayscaper so while I try to lay out this flat, post window replacement I will be limiting myself to Twilight and Maxwell for rendering.

Your specs should be good for rendering with Rayscaper. CPU rendering, in particular, should require nothing beefier than what's needed for Twilight Render.

I apologise for asking questions which probably should be simple to 'know', I'm going to do what I can. This place remains important to me for the joy we share on building and rendering whatever the hell it is we make.

Echoing Rich's statement, there is no need to apologize! It's indeed a complex matter, and you have already produced great results. Having you as a user definitely makes Rayscaper better. You have the patience to tolerate beta software and have helped me squash a lot of bugs so far.

Cheers,
Thomas

Mike Amos

@pixelcruncher

I'm doing OK, Thomas.

Certainly finding there are system wide issues, no matter how small they are, reduces my "I am so stoopid" sensation a fair bit and I am looking in to ways to understand and work round this.

The disk issue and the visual studio ussues point out there being life in the old pc yet.

I am talking to various people around hardware and software issues and hope to get a solution within a few days.

All jokes aside and despite 'issues'. I am still a lucky barkeep.

Mike Amos

@Mike-Amos

2024/Tools/extensions.rb:197:in `eval'
C:/Program Files/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/Tools/extensions.rb:197:in `require'
C:/Program Files/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/Tools/extensions.rb:197:in `load'
C:/Users/User/AppData/Roaming/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/SketchUp/Plugins/rayscaper.rb:18:in `register_extension'
C:/Users/User/AppData/Roaming/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/SketchUp/Plugins/rayscaper.rb:18:in `<module:Rayscaper>'
C:/Users/User/AppData/Roaming/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/SketchUp/Plugins/rayscaper.rb:6:in `<top (required)>'

pixelcruncher

@Mike-Amos Sorry to hear that you are running into this.

~~Which version did you try to reinstall? Can you provide me with the filename of the *.rbz file? Could it be that you tried to install one of the older versions that is not SU2024 compatible?~~ Nevermind this, I think the ones downloaded from SketchUcation are all named Rayscaper.rbz.

Can you try to reinstall Rayscaper using this guide: https://rayscaper.com/getting-started/installation-guide/#download-and-install-via-the-sketchup-extension-manager?

It's not a licensing issue like you mentioned in your email; I think the installation is broken.

Cheers,
Thomas

Mike Amos

@pixelcruncher

Extension Errors Report
SketchUp: 24.0.594
OS: Windows 10
Ruby: 3.2.2

Extension: Rayscaper (0.9.30 Beta)
Error: LoadError (126: The specified module could not be found. - c:/users/user/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2024/sketchup/plugins/rayscaper/installed/Windows/3.2.2/0.9.30 Beta/resources/SUEX_Rayscaper.so)
<internal:C:/Program Files/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/Tools/RubyStdLib/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb>:85:in require' <internal:C:/Program Files/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/Tools/RubyStdLib/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb>:85:in require'
c:/users/user/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2024/sketchup/plugins/rayscaper/main.rbe:97:in <module:Rayscaper>' c:/users/user/appdata/roaming/sketchup/sketchup 2024/sketchup/plugins/rayscaper/main.rbe:5:in <main>'
C:/Program Files/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/Tools/extensions.rb:197:in eval' C:/Program Files/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/Tools/extensions.rb:197:in require'
C:/Program Files/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/Tools/extensions.rb:197:in load' C:/Users/User/AppData/Roaming/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/SketchUp/Plugins/rayscaper.rb:18:in register_extension'
C:/Users/User/AppData/Roaming/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/SketchUp/Plugins/rayscaper.rb:18:in <module:Rayscaper>' C:/Users/User/AppData/Roaming/SketchUp/SketchUp 2024/SketchUp/Plugins/rayscaper.rb:6:in <top (required)>'

James at Seeit3d believes the Sketchucation store is broken.

Numerous reinstals and various different plugins fail each time I go through the uninstall plugin folder and reinstall.

pixelcruncher

@Mike-Amos

Do you mind trying a direct install? You can download the RBZ file from here: link. This should download the RBZ file directly from my Google drive.

And then install it in SketchUp directly via the extension manager: Menu > Extensions > Extension Manager:

Restart SketchUp after a successful installation.

That should exclude SketchUcation.

Thanks,
Thomas