Okay, so Blender destroys files. Suggestions?

General Forums Blender and CG Discussions
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Blender 2.55 is contuing to destroy files. Some weeks ago, I posted here and in the bug report about how I would save files with complex textures in them, and when I later loaded them, Blender had scrapped every single texture and left some bizarre non-texture in its place (no name, no effect, but still listed as an activated texture).

Now it’s keyframes. I am doing the Ninja Delivery Services project at the moment, and I have done extensive work on walkcycles. I load up the file I worked on a week ago (my job is killing my daily Blender routine), and voila! Dope Sheet shows nothing. Oh, the keyframes are still in there; the armature is walking. But when I go to the NLA Editor and click Tab to edit my walkcycle, the Dope Sheet just ignores everything. It did not do that when I originally worked on the walkcycle; Blender either erased the Dope Sheet data (without erasing the keyframes somehow), or is simply not displaying them.

If it’s a setting error that I can fix, please tell me, because it basically means I cannot work on the movie. If it’s a bug, please help me track down details on, because the detail I posted on the same problem with textures were not good enough, and the debuggers (including Ton, who replied directly, making me feel very humble) can do nothing with it. Reproducing the problem deliberately is apparently tricky, even though it happens 50% of the time I use Blender, and is making me sick of using it (which makes me sad, because I want to use it). Also, if others are experiencing this problem, it is basically destroying their ability to use Blender, meaning they probably just don’t.

So whether it’s user error or a horrifying bug mastermind, I need help, desperately. You’re my only hope (you can keep the droids) :frowning:

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Do you name your textures with specific characters ? change paths ? use absolute/relative paths ? pack/unpack ? special extension like .exr ? texture nodes ?

Be methodic.
Test the most basic step. Retest with a second step specific to your file .
If you can reproduce it, retest combining two steps specific to your file.
Etc…Until you can reproduce bug.

Did you activate/deactivate filters in dopesheet’s header ?

3

I’ve had a problem in the past where a file was corrupt and no matter what I did I could never seem to repair it.
The best solution I had was to export the models to obj and re-import. Lost everything pretty much though.

Best advice - save often, save numbered versions and also make use of the blender saves.

This will happen with all 3d apps btw.

Again - save often, save versions -1 -2 -3 -4 yadda yadda. Especially when you’ve made an important change.

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What about 2.56?

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In order of asking: No, no, relative, no, no, and no.

Be methodic.
Test the most basic step. Retest with a second step specific to your file .
If you can reproduce it, retest combining two steps specific to your file.
Etc…Until you can reproduce bug.

I did. For days. It just keeps popping up when it wants to. I am prone to think it somehow knows when I put a lot of effort into something, because it keeps going for important files. But that’s just me being paranoid :slight_smile:

Did you activate/deactivate filters in dopesheet’s header ?

Nope.

Not sure if it’s corrupt, the file opens nicely. It just eats the content. And since it does it 50% of the time, constant repairs are not an option; I can only repair so much again and again before losing my mind :frowning:

Best advice - save often, save numbered versions and also make use of the blender saves.

I do, extensively. It’s when I save (or load, not sure) that it eats the content. It never breaks down while I’m actually working on things, only between saves.

This will happen with all 3d apps btw.

No, this is a first. 2.4x never did it, MAX never did it, I’ve never seen anything do it so profoundly. It is something very particular to 2.5x, and possibly my version (Win32) or, sigh, my OS (Yeah, freaking Vista. I’m downloading Ubuntu to migrate as I write).

I only just got it, did some testing right away. If the bug was fixed, it’s a Save bug in 2.55, because the files still show up half-eaten. If it’s a Load bug, it’s not fixed yet.

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Have you tried opening in 2.56, then assigning back the texture, then saving to a duplicate, then opening the duplicate? That might shed some light on whether its a save or load issue.

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Pipeline,
Just as a suggestion: how old is the drive on which you’re storing your Blender files? I’ve had disks that were starting to go bad exhibit the same behavior as you’re describing. You may want to run a disk checking utility before you go to the time and trouble to load a new OS.

EDIT: I’ve been running 2.55 under Win7-64 and I’ve not seen the behavior that you describe.

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Pesho: I might try that. Or simply go 2.56 entirely and hope it just doesn’t happen again. Or maybe my upcoming Ubuntu lifestyle will solve it :slight_smile:

CallMeIshmael: I have suspected it is my online file depository, but I have also seen it on both my drives (one external). And the OS thing is long overdue, I’m really tired of Vista :slight_smile: As for version, I run WinVista32, but even within that version, the problem is sporadic; some never see it, some are ‘tormented’ (as it were) by it, apparently. I’m not much of a debugger, so I don’t know if that’s good or bad :confused:

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Might be anything. Personally i never have seen blender files corrupt, but since you are using vista, anything can happen:

  • Test your RAM to discard RAM failure: This is the most common cause: Go to http://www.memtest.org and download the memtest ISO image, burn to CD/DVD, reboot your machine and wait the program test the ram (can take from 10-15 min,m up to 1 hour, depending on your machine) look to the errors count, if not zero, then your ram is at fault and need replacement.

  • Windows vista retail has a known problem with file corruption under certain circunstances. These problems were solved in Service Pack 1, make sure your machine is fully updated.

  • Verify the drivers of your machine are up to date. Particularly the driver of yout mother board. If your machine is from a known brand, you need to look for the “chipset” driver, otherwise you might need to identify it, and search for an updated driver.

  • Viruses: Do you have an updated antivirus, and scan your machine at least once a month?

If none of the things mentioned solve the problem, then is most likely a bug in Blender, but a hard one to track… This will be problematic.

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I know how frustrating that kind of thing can be!
Wish I could offer helpful advice, but I only just got a computer together that would run 2.5x, and so far I’m totally lost on it. ( Got brave enough to give it another try just today, and installed 2.56…I made a coffee mug, carefully following a beginner tutorial, lol. )

If your going to try a version of linux, I highly recommend Linux Mint. It’s easy to get started with, and as Linux goes, it’s easy to learn. Plus it comes with lots of great software, and you have lots of options for new user software you can install easily. Once your comfortable with it you can customise it pretty much any way you like. I’m still a newcomer to Linux, and Linux Mint, but so far I like it very well. If you decide to try it, I suggest you begin with Mint 9, Isadora, because it’s a long term support release, and it gives you more options for customisation than Mint 10. You can find out more about it here: http://www.linuxmint.com

Totally agree with your idea of switching to blender 2.56 before you take the drastic step of changing your O.S. completely, but you might want to try Mint 9, even if that solves your problem ( maybe dual booting with windows ) I’ve had fun with it. Best of luck solving this frustrating problem.

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Some issues may also happen if you take files in “older” version of Blender Alfa or Beta. Few things have definitely been changed deep within the coding. Have you tried to re-open (but NOT saved in recent builds and versions!!!) these files with an older version of 2.5X?

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Again, I’m not sure they are technically corrupted, because they work, they just seem not to save/load vital parts. And yeah, Vista = unwanted adventure :confused:

  • Test your RAM to discard RAM failure: This is the most common cause: Go to http://www.memtest.org and download the memtest ISO image, burn to CD/DVD, reboot your machine and wait the program test the ram (can take from 10-15 min,m up to 1 hour, depending on your machine) look to the errors count, if not zero, then your ram is at fault and need replacement.

I doubt it, but if I can’t fix it, I’ll try (the process seems as demanding as, say, my switch to Ubuntu). A RAM issue should affect too many other programs. Everything is running a bit slow (yay Vista!), but Blender is the only program with these serious problems.

  • Windows vista retail has a known problem with file corruption under certain circunstances. These problems were solved in Service Pack 1, make sure your machine is fully updated.

Again, it’s apparently Blender-only problems. But I’m all for blaming Vista for anything :smiley:

  • Verify the drivers of your machine are up to date. Particularly the driver of yout mother board. If your machine is from a known brand, you need to look for the “chipset” driver, otherwise you might need to identify it, and search for an updated driver.

It’s a laptop, Acer, pretty good specs (for a laptop). What drivers should I be looking at, I have no idea?

  • Viruses: Do you have an updated antivirus, and scan your machine at least once a month?

I have suspected that, but found nothing so far. It is still my third pick (sorry, first pick is still a Blender bug. Second is, sigh, Vista-problems).

If none of the things mentioned solve the problem, then is most likely a bug in Blender, but a hard one to track… This will be problematic.

We need a large Australian, a big knife, and orchestral background music for this one, I fear :slight_smile:

@Mysteriousblend: Mint looks nice, but what are the pros/cons compared to Ubuntu? Btw, Mint is apparently in version 10 now (Julia, which is my niece’s name, so it got my attention :slight_smile: ).

The problems happen with files exclusively created in 2.55, and loaded in 2.55. I haven’t tried loading anything in earlier versions, I doubt it would matter when 2.55-only files do this to me… would it?

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Hum! 2.55 opened with 2.55 (same version and build, i presume) do that. Too bad! I was hoping to help (at least) a little. :frowning:

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never had any problems with loosing file but

if you are using old Script it could create some compatibility problems with older version and may be corrupt files!

Also i think there was some major problems amd updates in later version for IPO and NLA
and i know that it’s not compatible anymore with let say 2.49 !

you got to try to isolate and report this as bug devs might be able to help you on this!

never had any problems with blender since i have vista 32 vista
wish i could help more

good luck

happy 2.5

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I get a similar problem, but I assume I have reached the limit of my relatively poor graphics cards memory.
While baking, it quite often dumps the texture map, requiring me to save the map, and reload the blend to see the result. Now I am getting near the end of this project, it is struggling to even load all the textures at opening.
I have also now reached my rendering limit. It will just render once, some times. Crashing on the second attempt.
I have this time used a large number of high res textures, But I still think blender could be optimised a bit more in its texture handling.
I have succsessfully exported the same model to another game engine with no problems, addmitedly with a low frame rate.

The answer is, apart from a better graphics card and more ram, as usual, is to reduce the display of objects to wire or bounding box until needed.
As for rendering, I will keep my fingers crossed or compost.

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First and most important - it’s still BETA software so numbers of crazy things may happen.
Second - I don’t trust relative paths :wink: - I’m always using absolute paths or packing into .blend.
Third - could you just upload the file?

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I’ve personally suffered growing pains with Blender’s nameable node groups add-ons. It frequently disconnects all connections in/out of groups, and then I accidentally save if I don’t have the compositor open and notice this travesty :spin:

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@almux: No worries, even the debuggers (including Ton!) have tried to hunt this thing down. It seems pretty shady :frowning:

@RickyBlender: There are no scripts involved, and there is only one version (2.55) involved, so it’s not a migration thing. And I have tried reporting it, but I can’t give them enough details, because I do not understand the bug and don’t have time to do the research needed anymore (due to my work).

@rebogey: I think it’s different problems. Yours seems to be a memory overload. Oddly enough, I never experienced any memory problems, or anything else that warns me. This problem of mine just shows up out of the blue, no warning signs at all!

@jawra: I know it’s beta, I expect it is a resilient bug they have yet to kill. And it doesn’t even require linking to be involved, relative path or not; the texture version has happened on files with no links in them, many times. The keyframe one is on a proxy armature, so linking is involved, but it is not the link directly that is affected. Plus, it seems(!) that everything in the file is affected, linked or not. Hell, even the camera seems to drop keyframes! It’s not directly the links. not directly… Oh, and as for uploading, sadly this file does have linking, so an upload would be pretty complicated (we’re talking multiple links, within links). There are links, but they do not appear to be the cause of the problem. If I get another file that is easier to upload with the problem, I promise I will.

@ogbog: That actually sounds a lot like this problem, only for nodes. If it hits textures, keyframes AND nodes, it has to be deeply embedded in Blender… Damn, this is a nasty critter… What OS do you use??

Anyway, got Linux Ubuntu running now, so this weekend I’ll hopefully see if the problem appears in it, as well. If it does, it might be really bad. If not, then it might ‘just’ be a problem between Blender and Windows Vista. Or between Blender and my laptop :frowning:

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Windows, and when going between builds that do and don’t have the Renamable Node Group Sockets patch. As in, 2.56a builds that don’t use it don’t have the problem. Filicis’s response on graphicall was:

“it’s caused by the “Renamable Node Group Sockets” patch.
you need to open group node and reconnect.
http://www.pasteall.org/blend/4612”

Pity, because the namable node groups are frickin’ sweet.

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So, how did things go with Ubuntu? (really wouldn’t think it should be an OS difference, but with a mystery like this one, who knows?)
What about hitting the little [F] icon on to the right of each material name materials etc which tells Blender not to delete the material on save if it thinks it’s not being used?