Support for Sapphire Plug-ins v4 on Autodesk Systems

If you are using Sapphire 3, please visit the v3 support page instead.

If you have a technical support question that is not answered by the information below, please contact us at support@>genarts.com. Be sure to include your company name and info about what Autodesk version, and what Sapphire Plug-ins version you are using. When you load a Sapphire plug-in the version number should be printed on the shell window where your Autodesk product was started. If you have a non-technical license question, please email license@>genarts.com.

For support on Combustion, please visit our AE Plug-ins page instead.

Frequent issues:



My license doesn't work. A watermark appears.

  • Make sure you have run the Sapphire Plug-ins installer on your workstation instead of just copying the files or imaging the disk.

  • Check the shell where you started the Autodesk application and see if any useful information is printed there when you load a plug-in.

  • Make sure you are not running an old beta version of the software, which may have timed out.

  • Make sure the date on your computer is correct.

  • Make sure a different spark is loaded after the license is installed. They only re-read the key when they are first loaded or after the Autodesk application is restarted.

  • If the Ethernet address of your computer has changed since you ran the installer, you can get this watermark. Try reinstalling Sapphire Plug-ins and reentering your serial number and see if that helps.



On Burn, my license doesn't work. A watermark appears.

For Burn on 64bit Linux:

  • Make sure you have installed a serial number, and are not trying to use a FlexLM license. FlexLM licenses are not supported on 64bit Linux.
    If you have recently upgraded from 32bit to 64bit Burn workstations, please contact license@>genarts.com. to request a transfer to serial number licenses. Please be sure to include your company name, the number of Burn workstations you have, and your license server host ID.
For Burn on 32bit Linux:
  • On your Linux workstation, open the file /usr/discreet/sparks/sapphire_4/s_license.text and check that your license was entered there and saved properly. Make sure there are no spaces after any backslashes. Cutting a pasting from an email copy of your license is the safest way to enter it.
  • Check the Burn console for messages. If you see a FlexLM error "The hostid specified in the license file does not match the hostid of this system" please check the lmhostid of your machine and if necessary send us the correct one. If you don't know how to find the lmhostid you can just send us a copy of your Autodesk Burn license itself which can usually be found in /usr/local/flexlm/licenses/DL_license.dat.
For Burn on 64bit or 32bit Linux:
  • Make sure you have run the Sapphire Plug-ins installer on the Burn workstations instead of just copying the files or imaging the disks.
  • Make sure you are not running an old beta version of the software, which may have timed out.
  • Make sure you have a working Sapphire Plug-ins license on the Autodesk workstation submitting the Burn process.
  • Check that the date on your Burn workstation is correct.
  • If the license still doesn't work, please email us a copy of this log file /usr/discreet/sparks/sapphire_4/s_log.text on your Burn workstation.



Can v3 and v4 be installed at the same time?

Yes, Sapphire v3 and v4 get installed in different directories, and can be on your system at the same time. You can continue using v3 as usual even after installing v4. However, please be aware that the names of the sparks are the same in both versions, which can lead to some confusion, and sometimes the older version may continue to be used unintentionally.



How can I load old v3 setups into v4?

An 'update_setups' script is provided that automatically converts your setups from Sapphire v3 to Sapphire v4. For detailed information on how to use this, check the on-line docs installed with the software on your local Autodesk machine: file:/usr/discreet/sparks/sapphire_4/docs/general-info.html#update-setups.

Important note: if you want to apply this update_setups script to entire directories including non-Sapphire spark setup files, please be sure you have Sapphire version 4.04 or greater. (Versions 4.03 or earlier of this script could incorrectly try to process non-Sapphire spark setup files.)

You can alternatively install both Sapphire v3 and v4 on your system at the same time. This allows v3 setups to simply be loaded and used as before. However, in this case be aware that the names of the sparks are the same in both versions, which can lead to some confusion, and sometimes the older version may continue to be used unintentionally.



I can't find the S_Lens spark.

In v4 the S_Lens spark was renamed S_Distort.



In Batch, I get warnings saying "FrameNo out of bounds (API Bug)".

This is a known issue with invalid Total Frame Number values being given to sparks. It can occur when the Batch frame length is increased after creating some spark nodes, and the warning often starts after frame 100. The warning sometimes also incorrectly mentions 'VST Audio Spark'.

The workaround is to edit each spark node, and change the end frame number in the spark's timeline to be greater or equal to the end frame number in your Batch timeline.

This behavior should be improved in Flame 2007.



In Batch, there is garbage or noise in the image.

In some Autodesk releases, there is a memory management problem in Batch that can cause corruption or noise in the resulting images. This seems to occur more often when two or more sparks and one or more action nodes are used in the same Batch tree. A temporary workaround is to separate the action nodes and the sparks into independent batch trees. It is also recommended that you have at least 2GB of memory. Adjusting the Memory token in Autodesk's config file to allow for more memory buffers might also help in some cases.



When using S_Wipes I get corruption at the bottom of the frame.

This is a known Autodesk issue that occurs with some sparks in the Desktop module with certain resolutions and certain framestore configurations. It should be fixed in Autodesk's 2007 releases. The workaround is to either use the spark in Batch, or slightly animate an angle or other parameter which will cause the corrupted buffer to be recalculated every frame.



On Smoke, I get a crash when exiting the soft sparks editor.

This is a known issue which should be fixed in Autodesk's 2007 versions. A workaround is to make sure you are not on the last frame when you exit the editor.



All Sapphire Plug-ins give a "CAN NOT LOAD" error.

This can occur if Sapphire Plug-ins are not installed properly, or they were copied over from another machine instead of being installed at all. The solution is to just re-install from http://www.genarts.com/download-sapphire-sparks-linux.html.



One Sapphire plug-in aborts when first loaded, although the others work fine.

You may have a corrupt setup file for that spark. Type these commands to a shell, but replace "LensFlare" with the spark name that is not working. (The setupch file only exists in some cases.)
% cd /usr/discreet/sparks/sapphire_4
% mv S_LensFlare.spark.setup bad.setup
% mv S_LensFlare.spark.setupch bad.setupch
and then try loading the spark again. If this fixes the problem, please email us the bad setup files so we can inspect them.




How can I un-install Sapphire Plug-ins?

To uninstall Sapphire 4 on Linux: open a shell window, type su to become root, and then type:
rpm -e SapphireSparks4

To uninstall Sapphire 4 on IRIX: open a shell window, type su to become root, and then type:
versions remove Sapphire_Sparks4_64
or if you installed the 32bit version:
versions remove Sapphire_Sparks4_n32


To uninstall Sapphire 3 on Linux: open a shell window, type su to become root, and then type:
rpm -e SapphireSparks

To uninstall Sapphire 3 on IRIX: open a shell window, type su to become root, and then type:
rm -r /usr/discreet/sparks/sapphire_3.0


GENARTS, INC. info@>genarts.com 955 MASS. AVE CAMBRIDGE, MA 02139 USA TEL 617.492.2888 FAX 617.492.2852
GenArts and Sapphire Plug-ins are trademarks of GenArts, Inc. Flint, Flame, Inferno, Fire, and Smoke are registered trademarks of Autodesk.
© 2008, GenArts, Inc. All rights reserved.