CC3 keeps bugging out, showing nothing but a white screen.

I just purchased CC3 the other day, and began creating like a mad man. I'm neck-deep in developing an epic D&D 3.5 campaign, and grew weary of drawing maps by hand. So, I'm to the point of populating my primary continent with towns and cities, only to find that whenever I zoom in or out from the map, 75% of the time the map view will go all white. If I then minimize/maximize the view window, the entirety of CC3 goes all white. I have to exit and re-open CC3 to be able to use it again. I'm at the point that I have to do this every few minutes!

I've only been using CC3 for about a day, and within the first day, I'm already seeing this major error that is essentially preventing me from using this product almost entirely. The problem only started to appear after about six hours of mapping.

Any help or insight you may be able to provide would be much appreciated.

My system specs:

AMD Phenom II x4 965 "Black Edition" 3.2GHz
4GBs RAM
XFX Radeon HD 5750 1GB/128-Bit w/ newest available Catalyst suite.
Windows 7 Professional 64-Bit

Comments

  • It also seems to happen when I pan the view about, using the arrow buttons bottom-left, bottom-right and top-right of the screen. And to clarify my previous note; it occurs when zooming in, or out, by using either the mouse scroll wheel, or the zoom buttons within CC3.
  • JoeyD473JoeyD473 Betatester 🖼️ 2 images Traveler
    If it goes white, try hitting "Zoom to Extents" Because you may have moved outside the drawing
  • I'm not moving outside of the drawing; it's a graphical glitch. If I minimize, then re-maximize the entire CC3 program, all but the title bar of the program goes white as well.
  • I have a theory about why this happens. (Ralf or Simon might contest what I'm saying, and since they know the programming behind the software I would listen to them first.)

    In my opinion, this software eats RAM. The more you have the more it will use. Once used, it doesn't release it. (we call that a memory leak where I come from). The longer you work, the more buggy the software becomes. I find that I have to shut down the software every hour or so (I only have 1 gig of ram) and sometime need to restart my system to free up the ram. The fact that you can work for 6 hours before seeing any slowdowns or glitches speaks to your amazing system. (drool)

    This can be a hassle to have to restart often, but it is, and has always been my opinion that this software is worth it. Besides, a short break after 6 hours behind a computer screen is good for your eyes. ;)

    Oh, it the raster graphics that do this. I've never experienced any problems when working with vector graphics.
  • I've maintained monitoring of process RAM and CPU usage while running CC3, and have not seen CC3 (fcw32.exe) utilize more than 100MBs of RAM, and no more than 30% CPU usage on Core 0. The highest point of CPU usage is while zooming in or out.

    This information was obtained by both the Windows Task Manager and Process Explorer.

    Side note: I completely agree with you; this program is definitely worth it. I've just developed the habit of saving the map every 30 seconds or so, and I just restart CC3 as necessary. I do hope to find a solution, however.
  • edited January 2011
    Ok, now I'm quite annoyed. Now, every time I open CC3 and attempt to open my map, it shows as one giant green screen, and if I move/zoom in/zoom out, it goes from all green to all white... This now happens no matter what, every single time I open CC3, even after rebooting my machine. Unless I can fix this, I've just lost many, many hours of work...

    Edit: I un-installed, rebooted, re-installed, rebooted, re-patched, rebooted, and still the map appears to be totally bugged. This is extremely aggravating...
  • edited January 2011
    It sounds like a problem with the graphics card or driver. If the problem persists with the latest drivers, I would suggest submitting a trouble ticket to profantasy. That would be a more direct route than the forums.
  • I think it starts up with the last map you were using. Have you tried launching by double-clicking on a different map to see if anything changes?
  • JimPJimP 🖼️ 280 images Departed Legend - Rest in Peace
    Hmm. I haven't noticed many crashes. I have 3 gigs of ram on my Vista Home Premium computer. My previous machine was 2 gigs on WinXP. Both service pack 2.

    I don't use effects though.
  • RalfRalf Administrator, ProFantasy 🖼️ 18 images Mapmaker
    We are not aware that CC3 currently has any kind of memory leak. Trust me, I use CC3 A LOT during the day, and I'm not experiencing performance degradation or increasing crashes after even hours of work. This is not to say that crashes don't happen occasionally, saving your work regularly is always good advice.

    Of course we can't completely rule our memory problems with Certain graphics cards/drivers owing to the huge amount of variety out there. If you can provide information on regularly recurring crashes, your system information, any error messages, etc., please submit a tech support request (or mail me directly). While I may not be able to help directly with a graphics card related issue, it always helps us locating potential trouble spots.
    Posted By: ShessarI have a theory about why this happens. (Ralf or Simon might contest what I'm saying, and since they know the programming behind the software I would listen to them first.)

    In my opinion, this software eats RAM. The more you have the more it will use. Once used, it doesn't release it. (we call that a memory leak where I come from). The longer you work, the more buggy the software becomes. I find that I have to shut down the software every hour or so (I only have 1 gig of ram) and sometime need to restart my system to free up the ram. The fact that you can work for 6 hours before seeing any slowdowns or glitches speaks to your amazing system. (drool)

    This can be a hassle to have to restart often, but it is, and has always been my opinion that this software is worth it. Besides, a short break after 6 hours behind a computer screen is good for your eyes. ;)

    Oh, it the raster graphics that do this. I've never experienced any problems when working with vector graphics.
  • RalfRalf Administrator, ProFantasy 🖼️ 18 images Mapmaker
    Please send me a copy of the map to ralf@profantasy.com. It sounds like the map has become corrupted, perhaps I can fix it.
    Posted By: EvelmikeOk, now I'm quite annoyed. Now, every time I open CC3 and attempt to open my map, it shows as one giant green screen, and if I move/zoom in/zoom out, it goes from all green to all white... This now happens no matter what, every single time I open CC3, even after rebooting my machine. Unless I can fix this, I've just lost many, many hours of work...

    Edit: I un-installed, rebooted, re-installed, rebooted, re-patched, rebooted, and still the map appears to be totally bugged. This is extremely aggravating...
  • Ralf,

    I was able to get the map to re-open, and continue working on it, by opening the auto-save file and over-writing the manually saved map with it. So far, the map hasn't completely broken again (yet?). The original issue continues to occur somewhat often, but I am not receiving any error messages, nor am I seeing anything in the Windows Event Log. I've google'd my fingers off searching for anything related to Catalyst 10.12 and CC3, but I've been unable to find any known issues regarding this program and the ATI Catalyst 10.12 drivers.

    I am hesitant to roll back my GFX drivers to a previous version, as several other programs have seen marked performance increases with the 10.12 release.

    If I am able to find any sort of log indicating an error, I will follow your instructions and submit the information to you at once. But as for now, I think I'm stuck manually saving the map twice a minute, and hoping the map doesn't go and die on me again. ;)

    Side note: I began to think it may have been the size of my map, and number of entities that was causing this issue, due to the amount of memory CC3 was utilizing, so I ran a count, and this is what I came up with:

    30 2D Point Entities
    191 2D Line Entities
    12 2D Arc Entities
    164 2D Path Entities
    190 2D Polygon Entities
    61 2D Spline Entities
    36 2D Text Entities
    216 Symbol Definition Entities
    936 Symbol Reference Entities
    4 2D Text Attribute Entities
    410 XP Entities
    8 File Notes Entities

    2258 Entities occupying 409.85k of memory

    I don't think memory is an issue here, but I'm no CC3 expert, just an IT Professional. ;)


    ~Mike
  • It always seems to be the IT Professionals that run into the interesting problems.
  • RalfRalf Administrator, ProFantasy 🖼️ 18 images Mapmaker
    That doesn't seem to be an abnormally large map. I'm often working with larger ones.
  • 1 year later
  • Guys

    I'm having the same problem, very frustrating, looks like I have lost hours of work
  • Ok, that's odd, I displayed the info, out of desperation, and the map re-appeared.

    Very strange

    Mel
  • I have the white screen problem too, but I found a way to deal with it. Every time the screen gets white, I just save and reopen the map. I also learned to keep my fingers away from the scrolling wheel. For the northern local map of my world I had to reload any two till five minutes.
  • 9 days later
  • I recently bought and started working with CC3, Dungeon and City Designer, and I have also encountered this effect. However, I have noted that it doesn't happen until I have a lot of entities on the map.

    For example, I am building a ruined city, map size is 4,000x3000 units. In all my attempts, I only run into this problem when I start using the Random Street command. My original settings were for grey gothic ruins, with roof hatching, external outlines, and peak outlines. Everything went well, and I had 1/4 of my map filled with buildings. I found that altering my settings to dispose of all the extra outlines and just going with shapes and color cleared the problem up immediately, and I don't have that trouble with that map any more.

    The same is happening with an Overland Map I am developing, comparable size. I placed a large area of coniferous trees using the SS1b map style, and as soon as it processed my map has bogged down to where I give it a moment for every zoome command, and expect the redraw command to take a minute or two. And yes, occasionally I need to restart. However, if I roll back to a version I saved without the tree fill commands, I no longer have the issue.

    I really suspect this is a combination between my laptop's capabilities and the sheer number of entities I am asking it to process dynamically.
  • Also, if I hide the "Tree Symbols" sheet on my overland map, the issue goes away. Just discovered thet, heh. I can steel see the shadow outline for all my forests, which will serve my purposes fine for the placement of other features on the map, and even allow me to see features the forest was covering up. So now that I have finished placed my forests, I can leave the symbols off until it's time to start publishing the map.
  • 4 months later
  • IthrilIthril Traveler
    edited January 2013
    I am having a similar problem. Fortunately I've not lost any important information, though I have had to resort to the autosave a few times.

    If my system build/stats will help they are:

    AMD FX-4100 quad core processor black edition overclocked to 4300mgz
    16 gig ram
    win 7 64 bit home premium
    Video card is a Sapphire Radeon HD 6800 series with 2 gig 256-bit onboard v-ram
    ASUS M5A99X EVO system board

    I really don't think it's lack of available ram. ;)

    I
  • RalfRalf Administrator, ProFantasy 🖼️ 18 images Mapmaker
    Hi Ithril, if the problem persists, please submit a tech support request via the registration page.
  • I, too, have started encountering this problem. I was working on underground ruins with many collapses, putting numerous rocks around to visualize the collapsing nature of the ruins. I was doing close in work with my zoom, decided to zoom to extents and all I get now is the white screen, with all my recent work just gone (and the map too, only recovers on a previous version). Here is what I did, I opened an earlier version (I backup often, CC3 has always been buggy from my end with numerous crashes), which still shows me doing close in work from about 5 minutes previous. I try to zoom to extents, boom, it happens again. Do I have too many entities on the screen, or am I just hosed?
  • JimPJimP 🖼️ 280 images Departed Legend - Rest in Peace
    edited January 2013
    @Kendall-DM, you may have a small item off to one side so when you zoom extents the map area enlarges to show both the map inside its border and the item off to one side.

    Make a back up copy before you do this.

    Unthaw everything and do an erase rectangle all over the mapping area outside the map border. And keep doing it until you get x item[s] selected you cannot see. Hopefully that will fix it for you.

    Of course, it the seleted item quantity is enough to be your map, that isn't the part you want to delete.

    I have had this happen to me in the past. The above is how I fixed it for my maps.
  • No, I don't believe that is the case. I think there is something wonky with the CC3 software and my system, just can't seem to find any errors or logs that show what is going on. Because I restarted my machine, reloaded the previous version, and ta-da, it works fine now. Unfortunately, the later version is still FUBAR, but I will try your method since it's a loss right now anyhow. Thanks!
  • UPDATE: Ok, that was wierd, I did as you said, but the only entities were the map entities and no single entities. I decided to hit zoom to extents again, and there's my map. No idea what fixed it, because I did nothing myself to do so other than try to select entities without doing anything with them. I tested this again be reloading the map and hitting zoom to extents. Baffling.
  • On rare occasion I have had something odd like that happen. In every instance, turning the computer off and then back on has fixed it which makes me think that it is probably a memory leak.
  • 2 years later
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