Carrara 8.5 Pro video render error message, corrupt video file
Artistic Touch Multimedia Art and Design
Posts: 86
Carrara 8.5 Pro video render error message after large video resolution of 720p or larger and more than 30 seconds of video has completed rendering. The video file is saved automatically as a "doc" title in the Daz temps folder, but video is corrupt and unable to open it. Has anyone else run into this issue and is there a fix for this bug yet, or will I have to render 30 seconds or less at a time in 1080p, which I'm trying to achieve.
Post edited by Artistic Touch Multimedia Art and Design on
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That doesn't resolve the video rendering problem. As an update, I can render a video no more than between 15 and 20 seconds long in 1080p before the final rendered piece becomes unreadable by any video player or editing program. This never was a problem in any previous versions when Eovia owned Carrara. Some time between version 6 and 8, Daz dropped the ball on different technical issues and has not seemed to fix them. I guess for now, I'll have to do the pain in the ass work around by making seperate folders for image sequences, then compile them into a video format later on.
It does seem like a codec issue to me. I, too, am reluctant to render to image sequence, and evilproduce just really gave me the beans over it. But I like to be able to view the results of my test renders as soon as they're done without having to convert them first. But stepping forward, I think I shall concede and go the sequence route moving forward. We'll see.
I've had issues as mentioned in the original post when using a codec, so I started rendering to "Full Frames" instead. This has worked smoothly for me since I've started doing this stuff in 2010. The only ones that don't work are ones that end up in 0kb file size - in other words, and aborted render.
The temp folder might not contain your render. Check to see the file size of the video you're trying to play back. And, if the render actually completed, check to see if it's still in Carrara's File history by clicking the File menu and see if there's a movie file in there. Click on it and see if Carrara can open it. If it can, Carrara can save it again under any of the animated render outputs it has.
When I render out an animated video, I usually set a file name and location for it, rather than just leaving it drop into the temp folder.
TIP: With the exception of some documentaries, it's rare for the filmmaker to shoot any one clip for that (30 seconds) long. Most of the time it's just a few seconds per shot, then all of the individual shots get stitched together in the editing phase. Even when we're doing a long reveal of a flyover, it's still most often done using several clips.
Still, you should be able to run a render as long as you like, as long as your computer can handle it.
With video files, the final file is made first, and then Carrara spills each rendered frame into that package until it's done or we abort, at which time Carrara finalizes and closes the file it first created. In this, the computer has to have enough resources to hold each and every frame (and all of the resources to load and render the next one) until the process is complete. I stopped running into issues when I learned to stop trying to make my individual renders really long (and 30 seconds is MUCH longer than CG shots done in Hollywood - and they use image sequences).
Sequenced images, while a big pain for me, actually save (and therefore exit from) each frame as they are finished, so for long renders this option is MUCH easier on the machine doing the rendering. The other plus side is that animations that might not have finished before something went wrong, the next run can start right where the problem occurred instead of starting from scratch.
How can rendering to an image sequence not resolve the problem of video length? If the program crashes before the full number of frames is rendered, then the frames up to that point are already rendered and should be able to be compiled. You should also be able to check the frame number of the last frame rendered, and then continue the render from that point. If you are having difficulty, I really think you should use the render to image sequence option.
If for some reason you insist on rendering to a movie file, for videos of that length and resolution, you should use the batch renderer and render queue. You can pause the render using the batch renderer. When the render reaches near the limit, you can pause the render (hopefully) before it crashes, quit Carrara, and then relaunch it and continue from where it left off. The other advantage to using the batch renderer and the render queue is that when you add the file to the queue, you can close the scene file before you begin rendering. It saves resources that way. You can also customize the rendering settings of the file in the batch queue, which is helpful if you have multiple cameras in the same scene. You can load the same scene multiple times in the batch queue and then customize each instance pf the scene in the batch queue to use a different camera and save the videos with different file names.
I would also highly suggest you use the Save As Named File option in the renderer. That way, you can define where the file is saved so you don't have to dig through the scratch disk file to find it.
A lot of extra feedback and input. Thanks guys. I'll have to try some of those suggestions to see if any of them work. I'll get back later with hopefully different results
In agree. I've now adopted to rendering in image sequences. If all goes well throughout the render, Carrara can open the image sequence and play it back just fine. But if there's a crash before completion, Carrara will open the sequence, but must be manually scrubbed through.
I just downloaded the image sequence player from 3DRendero's second link above (MrViewer), and it works really well. I'll grab the other one(DJV) too.
Also, in case I haven't mentioned earlier, Carrara works great for converting therse files back and forth as well. If we render to Image Sequence, and then want an avi as well, we can load the image sequence (or leave it loaded after render) and then save again as an avi. We can also convert these to Gif, but that's a one-way trip so save in another format before making your gif!
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The benefits of rendering to image sequence are huge - especially in response to the issue of the original post.
One of my responses was to try and limit the actual length of any one animation render - and I do still hold to that. But what about those times when we truly need that seamless voyage across minutes of animation without a camera break? Again, still limit each single render to a more manageable length of time - number of frames, especially when rendering at fairly high resolution. Animated renders can chew up a lot of resources.
So go ahead and make the animation at its full needed length. Save it. Open it up in the Batch Queue of the render room. The file doesn't even need to be open anymore. In fact, I close mine before rendering in Batch, just to free up those resourses.
In the Batch Queue, we'll be specifying where we want to save the rendered animation and what type of file(s) to encode. This changes the browser path of the dialog for loading into the Batch Queue window, so go ahead and load that same scene file in as many times as we need to get to the end in manageable chunks.
Select the first entry in the Batch Queue, and go to the Output tab of the render room. Set this to render (as an example) the first 10 seconds.
Select the next entry in the Batch Queue and set it to render the next 10 seconds
Repeat the last step until the entire sequence can be rendered.
Be sure to set each Batch Queue entry to save to a new location as to not overwrite any of its previous work. I set up folders like "RT5_OrcFight01a", "RT5_OrcFight01b", "RT5_OrcFight01c" (example of three sequences that fit together) and then most often use those folder names as the name of the saved sequence file (currently using .png)
Wow. I just installed the other image sequence player (DJV) that 3DRendero so kindly linked to... I love them both! Both of them have more features that I'm unaware of at the moment. When post production begins, these extra functions will likely be most helpful. Howler totally rocks for tweaking my sequences, so I might only need them as players.
Do I have a preference?
Both load sequences instantaneously. Love that. The thing I love about DJV over MrViewer (currently) is that it shows my footage perfect by default. MrViewer defaults to Scene Linear and must be changed to sRGB to view correctly. While I was able to change the default FPS to 30 (from 24), I was unable to find a way to make sRGB my default image render. Still nice though.
Hey, thanks 3DRendero!!! As Always - So Helpful!