4.19p4 Foliage is black in editor

Hi

As shown in the screenshot, after upgrading a project from 4.18 to 4.19p4 the foliage (transparent materials?) are displayed/lit black in the editor, but are fine PIE. This happens in lit or unlit modes. Foliage has been completely OK in previous versions of the engine (4.18 and earlier).

Do I need to change a new setting somewhere?

Thanks

Gavin

Hello,

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Thanks

Ah, I hadn’t noticed that. Thanks will do.

Just to say this is still happening in 4.19 preview 5.
I’ve replied to email epic sent asking for repo steps, which can recreate the problem form a 4.18 upgraded to 4.19 project, but I’ve had no reply to indicate this issue is being investigated.
Do I need to re-submit the issue as a bug?

To reproduce –

Create a FirstPerson based Template project in 4.18
Then import the Broadload_Desktop.srt speedtree model from the Free SpeedTree Samples for UT4 pack (from Speedtree.com)
Add speedtree model to foliage system, and paint several models onto floor in FirstPersonExampleMap.
Build lighting, all is still good.
Close the project, and open the 4.19p4 editor.
Open a copy of the 4.18 project, fixing any compiler errors along the way.
Transparent leaves from Speedtree models are now black in the editor, but OK PIE.
Rebuilding lighting in 4.19 after loading doesn’t fix the black on trees in editor.

Level was in Volumetric Lightmap mode, still happens if lighting rebuilt in sparse mode.

There will be a speed tree color node in the materials. Workaround it to bypass that node until its fixed. Looks like they tweaked some of the nodes for the new speedtree 8 modeler and broke backward compatibility. Looks like the wind is a little different too. I think I like the new wind better.

Ah yes, it does appear the SpeedTreeColorVariation node is returning black when editing, but is OK when PIE, on an upgraded project.
Odd that this node should behave differently in these use cases though, not sure what the logic of that could be.

Just to confirm this is still happening in 4.19 preview 6.

I made Speedtree aware of the issue a couple of weeks ago.

No replies to my emails from Epic bug reporting.

Others are seeing the same problem, as reported on the Speedtree forum.

Really hope this will be fixed before the release version of 4.19, would love to be able to upgrade my project from 4.18.

Same issue here, in 4.19.0 release

Try putting in a piece of foliage that appears to have this issue in editor then CTRL+Z. This should fix the issue in editor for the current session.

I think the problem comes from the perInstance node in the material editor.

I’m having issues with foliage using perinstance and world offset to set it up so flat planes always face the camera. In editor theybdisapear and are all black in game. Sometimes they disappear and there will be flickering fb which I assume is the offset no longer working.

Odd flickering in viewport 4.19 - Rendering - Unreal Engine Forums Is my ah post

Yes, it’s still happening in 4.19.1

yes, that’s been noted in my post on the Speedtree forum… Still no fix though…

Hi as per this thread:

https://forums.unrealengine.com/development-discussion/content-creation/1451827-speedtrees-displaying-black

This problem was fixed for me by replacing the ‘Normalize’ node in the Speedtree Color Variation material function with ‘SafeNormalize’.

Just to confirm this issue is now fixed in 4.19.2!

Fixed! UE-56272 Incorrect foliage color in editor preview when using PerInstanceRandom node

Thanks!