[KNOWN BEHAVIOR + WORKAROUND EXAMPLE] Fade does not work if both scenes contain 3D Player actor

[eight]

Isadora 3.1 and 3.2 on MacOS. Fade times are ignored between the scenes if both scenes contain 3d Players. I tried rendering to Stage and rendering to 3d Render (and then to Projector). 

Is this a bug or a feature?

Thanks!

[mark]

Dear @eight,

This is a known behavior since Isadora 1.0. Whether it is a bug or a feature is up to debate and depends on your usage.

The problem with fading out one 3D scene while fading in another, while keeping both in the 3D space, is a very difficult problem to solve because it involves 3D transparency. I went into great detail explaining why this in my post [INFO] Why Don't the 3D Player and 3D Model Particles Offer Transparency? If you read that entire thread, you'll see why this is something I chose not to tackle.

One solution would be for Isadora to render the 3D space down to 2D, and then do the fade. Being able to offer this as an option is a valid feature request.

The work around for the moment is to do just that: render the objects to alternating virtual stages, using the Get Stage Image actor to send the result to the output. 

Here's a patch that does just that.

Best Wishes,
Mark

3d-fade-example.zip

[eight]

@mark 

I added two virtual stages in the Stage setup and tried to recreate your patch from scratch, but the Get Stage Image was returning an empty image. I then pasted all my scenes into your patch and got the fade back. I then had to adjust the FOV in the 3d stage orientation actor because my projection got upscaled about 2 times. I also packed all of this into a user actor, and the patch looks as before to the stage technicians.

Thank you for excellent and timely support (I have a premiere today)!