Layering of Snowflakes

[danj]

I am using snowflakes as a layer to some text effects, with the snow accumulating under the text.   But, sometimes the accumulation seems to go back to 'zero accumulation".    It looks like it does this if I have a "break" between the text effects (e.g., 0.2 seconds of space between the end of one and the start of another...) or if there is a "break" in the timing marks (I found & deleted a few of these).    Is this the way this should happen?   Have never tried this layering, so not familiar with what it "should" do...  I attached the latest & greatest xml file--this one "stopped' and "restarted" the snowflake accumulation at the 1:15.00 timing point.
Is there something I am doing wrong here??   I am going to remove all the breaks and see if that makes this go away....  Thx!!

Edit--after I removed all "breaks" from the <higher level?> effect onto which I layered the accumulating snowflakes, all is well--no more "restarts" of the accumulation...    I added my RGBEFFECTS.xml file.

[Gilrock]

You need to post your xlights_rgbeffects.xml file if you want anyone to be able to look at this.  Otherwise we have to do way too much work to import it.  I logging for tonight so maybe tomorrow evening.

[keithsw1111]

It should only reset at the end of the effect.

[danj]

Keith--if I am reading what you are saying correctly, then wherever I had a break in the text effect the snowflakes should have stopped (and restarted) accumulating---which IS what they were doing (but didn't seem to be consistent on every break...).    Anyway, as noted in my edited post above I deleted all the breaks after which the layered effects continues to accumulate as I was trying to do.

THANKS.

[Gilrock]

The text effects should have nothing to do with what happens in the snowflake regarding accumulation.

[keithsw1111]

Gil is right. It's when it gets to the end of the snowflake effect that it resets.

[danj]

I am 100% that I did not have any "breaks" in the snowflake effect (it was a layer not a "main" effect...) but it was resetting to zero and restarting accumulation.    When I removed several breaks I had intentionally put into the effect to which the snowflakes effect was layered, the accumulation did not stop until the snowflake effect itself ended.

[keithsw1111]

If you had clicked on one of the shorter effects then the behaviour you described is expected. If you had clicked on the snowflake effect then you should not see it reset prematurely.

[Gilrock]

I am 100% that I did not have any "breaks" in the snowflake effect (it was a layer not a "main" effect...) but it was resetting to zero and restarting accumulation.    When I removed several breaks I had intentionally put into the effect to which the snowflakes effect was layered, the accumulation did not stop until the snowflake effect itself ended.

If you had rendered the sequence and played it straight through I'm 100% sure there would have been no problem.  If you click around like Keith says you can cause the preview to temporarily show something that is not reality for the final sequence.  When you click on effects you cause them to immediately render and not necessarily in the same order as what a full render will do.  It's just not possible for a text effect to cause the snowflake to reset it's accumulation.  I love making bold statements like that because if you really believe I'm wrong you'll prove it.

[danj]

THANKS Keith & Gil!!!    I'll see if I can prove Gil wrong tonight--I'll play around with it and see....  HAHAHA

Allright--I tried a few things and it was exactly as both of you said.   Not able to prove Gil wrong....
Once I re-rendered after putting a break into the "main" effect (which made the snowflakes stop accumulating when I had the cursor on the main effect....), the accumulation kept on going like the energizer bunny.