Unable to open files macOS Catalina

thoromyr

So I started with Carrara around v7 I guess and way back when I got Byodo In. Its installed into the C8.5 app bundle (I'm using a mac) and decided after these many years to do another render with it. Only it won't load.

First, it was the scene file I had made (and was going to add to). But going straight to the original Byodo In scene file also won't load. There are no errors, just nothing happens.

So I'm guessing that it is due to an incompatible file format change? Whether or not that is the case, anyone know of a workaround? I really love that scene and would like to use it again.

WendyLuvsCatz

can you import it into a scene instead?

thoromyr

sadly, no. And it appears that I made an erroneous assumption that Carrara, being 64-bit, would work on Catalina. Due to unrelated circumstances I have a new mac and so I guess I'm experiencing some of the "no longer supported" issues. While Carrara opens and appears to work flawlessly, it seems that only one of my projects can be opened. If I create a new scene and save that, it loads fine. I have a few hundred scene files and haven't gotten through them all, but so far only a single one opens.

I do have access to older macs so if there were some trick to the save in order for it work I could try that, but as it stands I have no idea.

 

edit: okay, what is broken is the open file menu. If it is in the recent files list it opens just fine. Not that that helps me really.

WendyLuvsCatz

will clicking on it (the .car file) open Carrara?

Yes sadly Catalina not supported and DAZ don't care, they have enough trouble supporting Macs with DAZ Studio their cash cow

Mistara

what if you add your saved scenes folder to the carrara tray and load scene from there?

thoromyr

That could work, but unless I find a way to work behind Carrara's back I can't add the directory I use because the file dialog is broken. I did find where the recent file list is stored and have put the ByodoIn scene file in it, started Carrara, and was able to load it. Rendering now (yay!)

Unfortunately, because the file dialog is broken I cannot set texture maps or, well, do anything that involves opening a file through a file dialog (boo!)

This would be an extremely simple fix for Daz -- the value returned from the file dialog changed and all they need to do is correctly use that. Seems like a ran into a similar problem a while back using Qt (which is what Carrara is using). But I don't expect they'll do that.

edit:

suggestion about double clicking -- I never do that so it hadn't occurred to me to try. Once the render is done I will. Sadly, the worse problem is inability to load texture maps, etc.

WendyLuvsCatz

can try submitting a ticket anyway although it is likely futile 

thoromyr

no harm, so yeah, I'll do it. A year (or two? three?) ago they went through and closed all of my open tickets for Carrara. But I'll give it a shot.

 

Heck, I can't get them to correct DIM (it is compiled in a way that is mostly harmless, but breaks for someone like me with any developer files -- I have an exact description of the problem and IIRC even got it escalated to the developers, but they aren't interested in fixing the compile options)

WendyLuvsCatz

is there some way to set up shaders without using Carrara I wonder?

editing the file adding bitmaps

yes

use 7zip to extract it

shdr {
scmp {
WfSt 0
Shc0 {
shdr {
smap 2
 {
WfSt 0
WHid 0
Alph 0
AMod 0
isEx 0
TMap {
Apth "I:\\My DAZ 3D Library\\Runtime\\Textures\\Those Things\\Food Shaders\\FS Apple Base Color 4K.png"
RRpt "\\Textures\\Those Things\\Food Shaders\\FS Apple Base Color 4K.png"
Rpth "I:\\My DAZ 3D Library\\Runtime\\Textures\\Those Things\\Food Shaders\\"
Ffmt PNG
TxID 36
Prot 1
MInf {
Tile 0
Smls 0
Rep0 1
Rep1 1
Flp0 0
Flp1 1
Rota 0
Inpl 1
Invt 0
Brit 1
Filt 3
}
TMpA {
%ani 0
}
}
ACom {
%ani 0
}
chnl 0
prkd 0
}
}
}
Shc1 {
shdr {
sval {
WfSt 0
Val 0.2
isEx 1
ACom {
%ani 0
}
chnl 0
prkd 0
}
}
}
Shc2 {
shdr {
sval {
WfSt 0
Val 0.2
isEx 1
ACom {
%ani 0
}
chnl 0
prkd 0
}
}
}
Shc3 {

thoromyr

I've hand edited the poser files -- I'll look into creating an empty frame that I can use just to carry the texture map. Edit and load. For other cases (e.g., texture map for light gels or scene backgrounds) doing hand editing of the relevant component might work -- but only for those cases where it can be loaded through browser.

I can also use an older mac for editing, but that gets tetchy, especially for complicated scenes. Nasty back-and-forth.

Mistara

mebbe there a way to edit the shader file so to apply settings without changing the loaded texture.jpg

Mistara

meebe rename this thread to ro grab the attention of the mac gurus

in VB 6, had to load reference to the comm lib for the file dialog to run. iirc, was 20 years ago
 

WendyLuvsCatz

I was thinking seeing as shaders can be extracted as plain text someone more skilled than me who can create stuff could make a utility to set Carrara shaders and other things that require file import outside of Carrara, it just needs to be able to populate the channels with pathways and values like one can do manually but perhaps in an easier user interface like a Carrara shader room one appears rather than editing a long string of text.

One of our (possibly Mac using) third party developers perhaps would know how, I use Windows on top of knowing nothing so no help, I cannot even make a Notepad++ macros to do it  Sparrowhawk maybe?

thoromyr

thanks so much for the advice!

For what its worth I do have a ticket in.

 

In terms of workarounds, I haven't looked at the file formats, but if they are as structured as the preferences file it should be possible to write a generic editor for the purpose of paths -- take a Carrara file, find file paths, display in a gui with file requestor to allow selection of replacements. That is something within my skill set, its a matter of having time to do. If this causes me enough pain I'll do something -- and if I do, I'll be happy to share. Not sure if/when that will be.

RuudL

 

I can also use an older mac for editing, but that gets tetchy, especially for complicated scenes. Nasty back-and-forth.

Using your old mac to modify/develope the scene/shader files and the new mac as a render node might be a workable solution. It will avoid the nasty back-and-forth. 

thoromyr

True, that would. What I really want is a way to use Carrara properly on the new system. Its a bit frustrating as it should be a straightforward fix, but Daz stopped all work on Carrara years ago. I'll probably end up doing as you suggest.

WendyLuvsCatz

to be fair they have possibly lost the source code 

they link to Carrara Cafe for the SDK and don't even have old versions of their goldenchild progam DAZ studio for people who's Nvidia cards recently lost support by iray. 

michael-kristensen_e59faa8f72

thoromyr said:

That could work, but unless I find a way to work behind Carrara's back I can't add the directory I use because the file dialog is broken. I did find where the recent file list is stored and have put the ByodoIn scene file in it, started Carrara, and was able to load it. Rendering now (yay!)

Unfortunately, because the file dialog is broken I cannot set texture maps or, well, do anything that involves opening a file through a file dialog (boo!)

This would be an extremely simple fix for Daz -- the value returned from the file dialog changed and all they need to do is correctly use that. Seems like a ran into a similar problem a while back using Qt (which is what Carrara is using). But I don't expect they'll do that.

edit:

suggestion about double clicking -- I never do that so it hadn't occurred to me to try. Once the render is done I will. Sadly, the worse problem is inability to load texture maps, etc.

Can you post where the Resent File folder is.

Thanks

Mic 

RuudL

 

Can you post where the Resent File folder is.

Thanks

Mic 

A 'Recent File folder' does not exist. The recent files are entries in the 'Preference.txt' file. You'll find the preferences file in '/Users/<your user>/Library/Preferences/DAZ 3D/Carrara 8.5/' folder.

 

michael-kristensen_e59faa8f72

Thanks RuudL

I have only been modelling in Carrara, so your solution might be a way for me to continue opening old files.

Mic

RuudL said:

 

Can you post where the Resent File folder is.

Thanks

Mic 

A 'Recent File folder' does not exist. The recent files are entries in the 'Preference.txt' file. You'll find the preferences file in '/Users/<your user>/Library/Preferences/DAZ 3D/Carrara 8.5/' folder.

 

michael-kristensen_e59faa8f72

A very easy way to open files:

When Carrara is in non-fullscreen mode, drag&drop the file you wish to open.

 

Mic

Mistara

i imagine this open file thing would be a deal breaker for new comers to carrara.

BrianP21361

Mic,

Can you import files into shaders and as backgrounds? There's no work around for those. I tried dragging and dropping them. It doesn't work. 

WendyLuvsCatz

BrianP21361 said:

Mic,

Can you import files into shaders and as backgrounds? There's no work around for those. I tried dragging and dropping them. It doesn't work. 

maybe a saved Background can be extracted with 7zip like the shaders and edited in notepad (or the Mac equivalents)

Mistara

they could at least put out a new non commital beta for mac

Khoe

i have a little trick to bring exterior objects to Carrara. I load the parts into Daz studio and add the textures and save them as a scene in Daz. then i can load the objects with texture. or I just make a plain and make the texture on it, I save it in a scene, load it and save the texture in Cararra, then I can use the textures again. Unfortunately it is the Qucktime player that was built into Carrara, it is based on 32 bit code and is not supported by Catalina. there would be a replacement (metal) but unfortunately there is no programmer. Daz seems to have no longer any interest in Carrara. Which is a shame. Sorry for the English is just a google translation.

 

BrianP21361

I just upgraded to Catalina this weeked (I made a backup in case I had to roll back) and Carrara is working fine for me. I haven't tried every feature, but so far, I haven't found any issues. When I first upgraded, all the menus were greyed out. Then I went to Security & Privacy Preferences and gave Carrara full access (see screen shot). I've tried opening files, importing objects, loading texture maps and HDRI's, even weight painting and it's all good. Maybe that is your issue. 

thoromyr

are you still able to open files? Does that include texture maps? I've double checked my settings and Carrara has full disk access but that didn't change anything. (Not that it should, I would only expect that to affect what files you could browse to, but worth trying).

 

This is starting to become a pain point again so I may review the situation with creating a basic tool for dealing with this.

 

Also, Apple is now pushing Monterey on me. Is it the same story in Monterey? Or does it break Carrara more?

 

 

BrianP21361

Thoromyr,

Sorry you're still having issues. I don't have any problems opeing Carrara files with Catalina almost a year later. I haven't tried Monterey because my hardware isn't supported. If Apple releases new 27" iMacs with M1 or M2 chips, I'll buy a new one and give it a try.