colorMask node + file node crashes Maya

[HmshDev]

Hello,

The first strange thing about colorMask node is that it has no documentation. the second strange thing is that doing the following crashes Maya and sometimes generates 3 error messages before Maya closes, the number of generated error messages depends on the type of nodes connected to the colorMask:

1- in Hypershade, create the following nodes: file node, colorMask node , colorConstant node

2- connect file node's color and alpha outputs to (In Color) and (In Alpha) on the colorMask node.

3- connect the same file node to the (Mask and Mask Alpha) inputs on the colorMask node.

4- connect the colorMask node's (Out Color) output to the (In Color) input on colorConstant node

5- connect the colorMask node (Out Alpha) output to the (In Alpha) input on colorConstant node

This will cause Maya to crash, the number of error messages which will appear before Maya closes depends on the nodes connected to the colorMask node

I attached a sample scene file, connect colorMask node's (Out Alpha) to the colorConstant's (In alpha) and Maya will crash.

I'm using Maya 2020.1

Thank you in advance for any help with this issue

Best Regards,

HmshDev

[mspeer · Accepted solution]

Hi!

Please report this problem (bug?) to Autodesk.
In Maya main menu:
Help -> Speak Back -> Report a Problem

[HmshDev]

Hello @mspeer 

Thank you for replying. I reported the bug and hopefully they'll fix it soon.

Best Regards,

HmshDev

[HmshDev]

There is an important note regarding the colorMask node being the cause of the error. If a colorConstant and a floatConstant are used as the input for the colorMask node the error will not occur. if the file node is used as input to the colorMask node the error occurs. if the output is a layered texture node 3 errors occur and one of them seems to be caused by memory corruption. It seems there is a problem with both nodes. I already reported it yesterday to be fixed in the next release and the bug report I sent today was for the current release.

well anyway I will keep this unsolved so the other's won't think there is a solution until Autodesk fixes it.

Best Regards,

HmshDev

[mspeer]

Hi!

@HmshDev 

This has been discussed several times.

This is not a bug track forum.

Setting it to accepted means that the best possible option is provided or the correct answer is given.

This prevents others from investing time trying to help you further with this issue, which is not needed and possible in this case.

If this will be fixed in a future Maya version you can come back and add a new answer and mark this as solution if you want.

[HmshDev]

@mspeer 

Thank you for the explanation. I wasn't reporting a bug, I was just sharing the problem with the community so others confirm if it's a bug or something wrong i'm doing. I was also aiming at saving Maya's community time and effort if they run into the same issue.

Best Regards,

HmshDev,

[mspeer]

Hi!

I understand and it's totally OK to get this confirmed by the community, but if it's confirmed it does not need further help by other users (except if you are asking for a workaround).

I would not have advised to report this as bug to Autodesk if I would not have been able to reproduce this here, so I confirm that this is action is crashing Maya.