3D Feature Lines not visible after Rendering the Drawing / Surface

[Jake6954]

Hi All,

I have a surface that was generated from USGS QL2 LiDAR Point Cloud Data, with lots of feature lines on it.  I have tried rendering it two different ways.  

(1)  Rendered the Surface using one of the materials from the material library

(2) Rendered the Surface after Draping a GeoTIFF image taken from GE Pro.  (The image exported from GE Pro was Georeferenced using QGIS)

The surface defines a mountain, and the feature lines were “Created from Objects”.  The objects in this case were all 2D Polylines (lots of them) that outline all the roads and property lines located on the mountain.  I turned these 2D Polylines into Feature Lines in order to take advantage of C3D’s ability to drape the resulting Feature Lines across the mountain’s 3D Surface.

In either rendering scenario above, the results, as far as the surface appearance goes, are astonishingly good, particularly if I use Coffee-Break Quality rendering, or better, the only problem is the feature lines simple do not show up after rendering.

The Feature Line Style is one I created by copying the “Basic” Feature Line Style, and then switching the Layer used in the Feature Line Style definition to Layer 0 (Zero); and I’ve made sure that Layer 0 is ON.  Then, during the process of creating a feature line from one of the 2D Polylines, when given the opportunity to change the default layer the feature line is assigned to, I assign the Feature Line to a layer that is relevant to whatever object the line represents (i.e. a Layer for paved roads, gravel roads, dirt roads, property lines etc.). 

I have also tried selecting all the Feature Lines and bringing them to the “Front”, but no luck.  It just looks  very much like they Feature Lines simply get turned off (or disappear) once the drawing is rendered?

Is there some setting or adjustment that I am missing?   (BTW I’m using Civil 3D 2018)

Thank you all in advance for any help you  might be able to provide.

[ChrisRS]

I have never used rendering.

Did you try sending the image to the back?

You might experiment with raising the feature lines so they physically float above the surface. (Relative to Surface +1 foot or more.)

[Jake6954]

Hi ChrisRS,

Huge apologies for this very late response, it took quite a while to make sure there weren't issues with the drawing itself that might any effort to find a solution utterly futile.

Your suggestions were very good ones, and I have now since tried them, several variations of them too in fact, but to no avail. 

Neither selecting the Surface and choosing “Send to Back”, nor selecting the Surface and choosing “Send Under Object” and then selecting ALL the feature lines as the “Object”, had any effect.

For raising the Feature Lines above the Surface, I used the “Raise / Lower Feature Lines” optins in the TOOLSPACE . Prosepector Tab  >  Feature Lines (right-click).  First tried raising them 0.5 ft, then 1.0 ft, then 2.5 ft.  but it had no effect. 

I then tried drawing ordinary lines well above the surface (probably should have started with that approach), but when that didn’t work and the lines "disappeared" when in the Rendered state.  

As best I can tell, the issue involves one or more of the following possibilities:

(a) My C3D installation needs to be Repaired?

(b) I have a corrupted drawing?

(c) There is something I am missing about how “Render” works, or some Render setting that I’ve got set wrong for what I’m trying to do?

(d) Something is not set right with the settings within the Feature Line Style I’m using, or the Layers that I’ve applied them to?

(e) Something is not set right with my Plotting Style or some setting with the Plotting Device itself?

I have been completely unable to find anything with the Feature Line Style, or the Layer it’s applied to that would explain this.  The Feature Line Layer, within the designated Feature Line Style settings, is set to Layer 0, so the Feature Lines should take on the properties of the Layer they are assigned to; and that is what seems to happen.  The Feature Lines do at least take their Color, Line Type, and Line Weight from whatever the relevant Layers are set to.  

The Plot Style for all my Layers is By Color (I’m using acad.ctb Layer Style), and I can’t change that b/c  that optin is ghosted, but the Feature Lines do print / plot just fine, if I do NOT Render the drawing, i.e. leave it in 2D Wireframe Visual Style, or even in Realistic Visual Style, but without Rendering.

So, I've done the following:

(a) I ran a Repair on my C3D installation via Windows. That did not solve the problem

(b) I attempted to repair the potentially corrupted drawing, and that is what took me so long to replay. 

Doing as thorough job of that I as possible, without losing or damaging anything important in the drawing took a bit of research and experimenting.  I believe I did as much as I possibly could to insure the drawing is not corrupted anymore via RECOVER, -PURGE, PURGE, MAPCLEAN, AUDIT and ultimately WBLOCKing the entire drawing, then running RECOVER, -PURGE, PURGE, MAPCLEAN and AUDIT again (and again, and again, and again), then WBLOCKing the whole drawing once more, and again doing RECOVER, -PURGE, PURGE, MAPCLEAN etc. etc. a few more times.  No guarantee it still isn’t corrupted though?

(c) Unfortunately, I’ve had no luck finding any pertinent info on Rendering that might explain why the Feature Lines do not appear to be included in the Render.  And honestly, that is exactly what it looks like.  It looks like only the surface (or even just the material applied to the surfaces) is rendering, and everything else is being left out of the Rendered image entirely.

(d) There does not seem to be anything with the Feature Line Style either that would be casing this.  The Plot Style for the layers defined within the Feature Style settings (which, again, I set to Layer 0) shows the Plot Style as By Object.  I can only assume in this case that the “Object” is the layer that the Feature Line is ultimately assigned to, but maybe not? 

If there is some place, or some way, within C3D where one can set the "Object" properties for Feature Lines, I would love to hear anything anyone might know about that.  As it is, if I look at the properties of any given Feature Line it says the Plot Style is By Color and Linetype, Line Weight, and Color are By Layer.  Nothing in properties that I can see relates specifically to rendering though.

(e) I’ve tried Plotting both with a Plot Style designated in Page Setup (acad.ctb in this case) and with “None” Plot Style designated, but it made no difference.  And I’ve tired every one of the Printer/Plotter options that would produce a PDF output (i.e. Windows PDF Printer, Adobe PDF, Bluebeam PDF, DWG to PDF.pc3 etc…).  I also tried finding something in the Plotter Properties settings that might affect the treatment of Lines, Feature Lines or Rendering, but found nothing.

The next thing I am going to look into is whether or not I can (or should) assign a “Material” to the Feature Lines, or the Layers the Feature Lines are associated with, and see if that will give the Render engine something to work with?

I do appreciate your input though, ChrisRS..  Thank you. 

[ChrisRS]

It looks like you are doing a good job of troubleshooting.

Have you tried starting a new drawing, shortcutting in the surface, adding the image, and then creating some line work?

You might want to attach a sample drawing so we can troubleshoot that. 2018 might be an issue.

[bonteng88]

Hi @Jake6954 ,

The AutoCAD RENDER command only renders 3D objects and Faces (Correct me if I'm wrong), that is why the Feature Lines doesn't appears in the render output, the only workaround in AutoCAD/Civil3D that I can think off is by turning the Feature Line into 3D Sweep Object as Shown in the Video below, but you have a Lots of them that mean a Lots of work to, maybe Dynamo can help (Don't know much on this), other option is by using 3DMax or other Rendering. Software that support DWG format