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A render either produces a JPG or it does not, and most of the reports about it come down to three mechanisms: when a render is allowed to start, where the file is written, and what happens to that file when you change or delete the shot. This page goes through the symptoms in that order.
Applies to BASIC, STUDIO, CINEMA · Windows and macOS.
Nothing happens before the first sample
Cause. The renderer prepares the scene first: models finish loading, their detail levels are chosen, and the ray-tracing structures are rebuilt. Starting before that is finished would render old or missing geometry, so the program waits — up to 60 seconds, then it renders with what it has.
What to do. Wait. On a heavy set with many models that pause is normal, and the progress display starts counting samples as soon as it is over. If the sample counter is moving, the render is working. Only one render runs at a time; a second one refuses to start until the first has finished, and switching to another tab does not stop the one that is running.
I cancelled and there is no file
Cause. Expected. The image is encoded and written after the last sample, never during the accumulation, so a cancelled render writes nothing at all.
What to do. Render again. There is no partial file to delete and no half-finished image anywhere.
I cannot find my finished renders
Cause. Rendered images are not stored inside the .set file. They live in a folder beside your project that carries the project’s name, one <shot name>.jpg per shot. Two situations move that folder:
- The project has never been saved. Renders then go to a temporary cache folder, and nothing in it is meant to survive.
- You used Save Project As. From that moment the program looks for the images beside the new file, so shots you rendered before the rename look unrendered.
What to do. Save the project before you render anything you want to keep. After a Save Project As, copy the JPGs from the old folder into the new one, or render the shots again. Where the files land in detail is in Where your images are saved.
Apply Studio Changes to Shot removed my rendered image
Cause. Apply Studio Changes to Shot writes the current studio state into the shot and deletes its rendered image on purpose. The picture no longer matches the stored state, so the program removes it rather than leaving a wrong image in the gallery.
What to do. Render the shot again — Re-Render Shot on its gallery tile does it in one click. If you want to keep both versions, add a new shot instead of updating the old one. Do not confuse the control with Apply to Stage, which sounds similar and goes the other way: it loads a stored shot back into the studio and leaves the rendered file alone.
I deleted the shot and the JPG is still there
Cause. Deleting a shot removes it from the timeline and from the gallery, but it does not touch the file on disk.
What to do. Delete the file yourself in the project’s image folder if you want it gone. The same asymmetry works in your favour when you rename a shot: the JPG is renamed with it.
Render Failed
The dialog names the file and one of two reasons: Could not access file. or File is already in use by an other process. It offers Try Again and Cancel.
Cause. The program could not write the JPG. The target folder is gone, read-only or full, a sync client is holding the file, or the image is open in another program.
What to do. Close the image wherever it is open and press Try Again — the render itself is not lost, only the write. If that fails, check the folder and the free space, or save the project to a local folder and render again. The same dialog with the title Export Failed appears for a set plan or a video.
Render All Shots did not refresh my images
Cause. Two rules, and both surprise people. Render All Shots in the inspector skips every shot that already has a JPG, and it works through the whole timeline rather than what you have selected or filtered.
What to do.
- For one shot: hover its gallery tile and press Re-Render Shot. The button carries that text as soon as the shot has an image, and it renders again rather than skipping.
- For several: select them in the gallery and press the render button below it — Render Image for one, Render Images for a selection. A selection in which everything is already rendered is rendered again; a mixed selection renders only what is missing.
- Deleting the JPGs by hand before Render All Shots also works, but nothing requires it. Keep it as the last resort.
- Do not expect a group or a star filter to narrow Render All Shots. It does not.
The picture changed although I only changed the size
Cause. From five loaded, visible models the program chooses hair and body detail by itself, and in a final render that choice follows the output size. The same crowd scene therefore has slightly more detail at 3840 px than at 1200 px.
What to do. Nothing is broken. If you are comparing two renders, compare them at the same output size — that is a rule for every setting, not only for this one. See Make it faster for what else the number of models costs you.
Not a bug
- A render keeps running while you work in another tab. That is deliberate; only Cancel stops it.
- Detail in the studio view and the camera preview can visibly change around a render: the render borrows the texture-detail setting for its duration and hands it back afterwards.
- The image in the gallery can be the small preview rather than the render while the file is still loading.
Limits
- One render at a time, for both the single render and a batch.
- A cancelled batch keeps the images it has already written.
- What a very large render does when the graphics card runs out of memory is not documented here, because no behaviour has been established for it. Render large images from a saved project, and do not run other GPU-heavy programs at the same time.