[EONA]

Hello all,

Do your Maxwells also crash a lot?

My new crash type is on the Rhino plugin (crash message below).

Do you know if there's a new release to come? Or some solution for this problem?

Thanks!

---

A 'System.NullReferenceException' has ocurred in 'Maxwell.Rhino'
*******************************************
Exception report.
Type: System.NullReferenceException
Message: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
Source: Maxwell.Rhino
Has StackTrace: True
BEGIN STACKTRACE: 'System.NullReferenceException'
- at Maxwell.Rhino.mxMesher.WriteMesh()
- at Maxwell.Rhino.mxMesher.ExportGeometry(Boolean selectedObjectsOnly)
END STACKTRACE: 'System.NullReferenceException'
Has InnerException: False

*******************************************
The purpose of this dialog is to collect information about the error which has just occurred, so that it may be sent to the support team for diagnosis.

Use the space below to include include any additional details about this issue which you feel may be useful:
*******************************************
Additional Details:
*******************************************



*******************************************
The following information will be sent, as well as the contents of the Log Viewer. Although you are completely free to remove any portions you are not comfortable sending, it is recommended to send the whole text, to aid in diagnosing this issue.
*******************************************
LOG_REPORT [TYPE=EXCEPTION] [ID=5121]
*******************************************
Operating System Info:

OSFullName: Microsoft Windows XP Professional
OSPlatform: Win32NT
OSVersion: Microsoft Windows NT 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3
UserInteractive: True
BootMode: Normal
CLR Version: 2.0.50727.3603
DebugOS: False
CurrentCulture: en-US
CurrentUICulture: en-US
SystemDirectory: C:\WINDOWS\system32
*******************************************
Machine Info:

ProcessorCount: 8
TotalPhysicalMemory: 3488899072
TotalVirtualMemory: 2147352576
AvailablePhysicalMemory: 2091347968
AvailableVirtualMemory: 734449664
MonitorCount: 2
MonitorsSameDisplayFormat: True
VirtualScreen: {X=-1280,Y=0,Width=2560,Height=1024}
NativeMouseWheelSupport: True
ButtonsSwapped: False
WheelExists: True
WheelScrollLines: 3
*******************************************
Process Info:

AssemblyName: Maxwell.UI
AssemblyVersion: 2.0.5.0
AssemblyDirectory: C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\Maxwell.UI\2.0.5.0__0c67436bca449732
CommandLine: "C:\Program Files\Rhinoceros 4.0\System\Rhino4.exe" "S:\Projects\0649\3D_Model\MESH_Models\0649-3d_100527_MESH_GLOBAL_VIEWS_MAXWELL.3dm"
LoadedAssemblies: 19
CurrentDirectory: S:\Projects\0649\3D_Model\MESH_Models
WorkingSet: 782249984

[polynurb]

to make sure JD (the rhino plugin creator) reads this, post it again in the rhino section.

[Josephus Holt]

to answer your question, I use Maxwell only with Rhino and am not experiencing crashing problems. I'm sure JD can help you get it fixed.

[JDHill]

Hi Edwin,

Sorry I did not see this post until now -- as noted above, you would probably be better off to post about Rhino plugin problems in the Rhino plugin forum, since I check there often. I got a copy of this error report by email that you sent from the plugin, and it looks like something is wrong with your Rhino document -- it is not a general plugin issue. If it is not too large, you could zip up the document and send it to me (jeremy at nextlimit dot com), so I can try to figure out what is causing the error, and therefore to handle it more gracefully in the future? Naturally, confidentiality regarding your file would be guaranteed.

Also, please see this post for links to download the latest 2.0.6 version of the plugin, which has not been released yet. As I do not know the nature of this particular issue, I cannot say whether it will make any difference, but it does include some core changes made since version 2.0.5, so it might.

Thanks,

JD

[EONA]

Hi JD,

Thanks for your answer!

I'll download the new release of the plugin.

Regarding the file, it's too big to send (saving only the mesh it's 130MB).

I'll describe my issue. I noticed some funny behavior of both Rhino plugin and Maxwell with this specific file and others too.

This problem I had when trying to render one small area of a big image I had rendered before on the Maxwell 1.7... Trying to render with the "Render Region in Maxwell (Scene)" button it was giving this error; and selecting the area with the "Pick Film Size Rectangle" button and then rendering it was passing on the Rhino plugin but Maxwell itself was crashing right after the Voxelization. The solution I found to this problem was deleting 90% of the model, only leaving the surfaces that would actually reflect on the area I wanted and then I rendered with the "Render Region in Maxwell (Scene)".

With the "Pick Film Size Rectangle" command I also had an issue when trying to select the area to render... For some reason I can't select the area I want, if I have some area close to a corner it automatically moves my rectangle to close to the center of the big image. Is this something I'm doing wrong?

Thanks!

[JDHill]

I understand about the file being large -- you can do some of your own checking there if you want to. If you look at the plugin's Log Viewer when you export, you will see that it is reporting that the Rhino geometry contains some invalid data. You can also use the command Maxwell_CheckFixAndReportBadGeometry to identify the objects. The bad objects in this file are two meshes, both of which Rhino reports as degenerate, by virtue of their having zero faces:

Code: Select all

* line 41: listing errors - objects with no triangles:
* line 42: mesh_object, id=ae9bee7b-6bec-4015-acc2-b0300ed5bb45
* line 43: mesh_object, id=69ae28a8-86ac-43d4-b9dd-7f7d4deac2b5
* line 44: listing errors - objects with no mesh faces:
* line 45: mesh_object, id=ae9bee7b-6bec-4015-acc2-b0300ed5bb45
* line 46: mesh_object, id=69ae28a8-86ac-43d4-b9dd-7f7d4deac2b5
* line 47: listing errors - invalid objects:
* line 48: mesh_object, id=ae9bee7b-6bec-4015-acc2-b0300ed5bb45, error={ON_Mesh.m_F.Count() < 1 (should be at least 1).}
* line 49: mesh_object, id=69ae28a8-86ac-43d4-b9dd-7f7d4deac2b5, error={ON_Mesh.m_F.Count() < 1 (should be at least 1).}
* line 50: errors were detected in meshable geometry - IDs have been listed in the log viewer. objects
* line 51: which generated the errors are now selected in the viewport (note: you may see nothing - it
* line 52: may not be possible to display some of them). if they later become unselected, and you wish
* line 53: to find them again, please try one of the following methods:
* line 54: - use the command: 'SelBadObjects'
* line 55: - use the command: 'Maxwell_CheckFixAndReportBadGeometry'
* line 56: - highlight the object's ID in the log viewer, right-click and choose 'Select Object'

The question for me is related to the fact that something in particular about this model is causing the plugin's code to get into a bad state, and this is then causing the error reported in the dialog. If you can isolate these two bad meshes into another file, maybe you would then be able to zip and send that along, and I can try to identify what's happening here, because the plugin should be handling the situation, even when there are bad objects like this.

Regarding the Pick Film Size Rectangle command, it accomplishes what it does using the camera's Shift Lens feature, and as such, it can only render a rectangle offset +/- 100% of the film size in either the X or Y directions. That is why it snaps toward the center in some cases.

[EONA]

I deleted the 2 bad objects and tried to launch a render of the same area... It sends the scene to Maxwell, and then when Maxwell opens it shows everything normal, and it starts to load all the images and textures and when Voxelization is still 0% it crashes with a window showing the following message:

Microsoft Visual C++ Runtime Library

Runtime Error!

Program: C:\Program Files\Next Limit\Maxwell 2\maxwell.exe

This application has requested the Runtime to terminate it in an unusual way.
Please contact the application's support team for more information.

---

I'm sending you the 2 bad meshes now.

Thanks!

[JDHill]

Are you using 32-bit Maxwell? I have only ever seen that message when the machine has run out of memory. Commonly, this might happen during voxelization, when the model is too large to load into memory, or just after, when there is not enough memory to accommodate a large output resolution.

[EONA]

Yes, I'm using the 32-Bit Maxwell... Are there any problems with this version?

It sounds strange to me the machine running out of memory, because these are really small parts of an image, not using multi light and only simple materials... And for the memory... Why does it crash? If I don't have a lot of memory it's supposed to be slower instead of crashing, right?

What's your email address for me to send the Rhino file with the bad objects?

Thanks!

[JDHill]

As far as I am aware, there are not any problems specific to 32-bit Maxwell.

It's just an educated guess about your crash being related to insufficient memory. It's probably accurate though, as I've only ever seen this message when that has been the case. As far as it rendering slower due to low memory, this is not correct -- in 32-bit, there is a maximum amount of memory which can be used by any application, period. In a normal setup, this will be between 1.5 and 2 GB, though it can be pushed up into the 2.5 GB range using some more advanced options in Windows. The scenario in which high memory usage causes a performance slowdown is the one in which the amount of physical memory available on the machine is lower than the amount still available to the application for allocation; in this case, Windows will begin shuffling data in and out of memory, by swapping it back and forth between physical memory and the hard disk. That process is naturally very slow.

As to the reason why it crashes, rather than doing something more polite, my guess (since I don't technically know) is that the voxelization process is heavily optimized -- checking at each moment whether maximum memory was about to be reached would negatively affect performance, and not likely by a small amount. The price for checking this would have to be paid every time a scene was loaded. In most common types of applications, it's no problem to check for this kind of thing, but Maxwell is a pretty special case, since it can easily overwhelm even the most robust machine.

You can send the model to jeremy at nextlimit dot com.