Playblast problem
 

Hello all,

Whenever I create a .avi file using Maya's "Playblast" feature, the animation never appears on the file when I play it. Instead, I just get a black screen that lasts for however many seconds the original animation was supposed to last.

The steps I followed are from "Introducing Autodesk Maya 2012":

• - Right-click the time slider, then select the "Playbast" option box
• - Set the format to avi
• - Set the display size to "From Window"
• - Set Scale to 1.0
• - Check the "Save to File" option, then give the playblast a name
• - Click the "Playblast" button

As said above, once I've saved the file to my computer and attempt to play it, I'm just seeing a black screen. Why is this?

Try using vlc to play back the avi, you probably do not have the correct codec installed on your machine to view the video.

Tried to no avail. Tried Windows Media Player and Quicktime 7 as well to no avail. Attempted on both my Windows laptop and my Chromebook. I think it is a Maya issue.


Is there an alternative way to create a video file on Maya, aside from the way I outlined above?

you can make output as frames and put them together in after effects or something similar. i never got video output in playblast working properly.

Mickhah, how do I do that (output as frames, then put together)?

in the window with playblast options change "avi" to "iff". so you will get not the video file, but every frame as a single picture. then you need to put them in another program.

Currently, whenever I select 'iff' then run playblast, Fcheck opens and begins playing the animation (black screen only). What should I do then?

try to reset settings.
set to "iff", select the file type, select the directory and make playblast.

Still no luck :(

Another person I just spoke to thinks the problem is that I am working on a laptop, which uses a graphic "engine" instead of a graphic "card". Because of that, he thinks this problem may be unsolvable on my laptop.

Is there anyone on this board that renders on Maya with a laptop? Or must I have a desktop computer?

While you're working out the playblast issue, try this instead.

How to render out a movie in Maya tutorial:
http://simplymaya.com/forum/showthread.php?t=35479

Batch rendering tutorial:
http://simplymaya.com/forum/showthread.php?t=35318

Hopefully the laptop starts to cooperate again.

Nilla