Errors when exporting Sculpties from Blender - Help!

I've been playing with Blender quite a bit, and figuring things out, and feel like I'm getting decent enough at it that I can make stuff that's worth uploading into SL. However, about half the time, I get a random error when I try to export the sculptmap.

It happens when I try to export SecondLife LSL from the file menu, or when I try to Bake SecondLife Sculptie. The errors are slightly different, but clearly related. I just loaded an object that was giving me problems, and the darn thing exported the sculptmap perfectly (as I say, it's inconsistent, I don't know what causes it). So I loaded another one that was giving me problems, and this one gave me the error.

when trying to bake SecondLife Sculpties from the Render menu, I get "Python Script Error: Check Console." The console tells me this:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<string>", line 543, in <module>
File "<string>", line 515, in main
File "<string>", line 390, in updateSculptieMap
RuntimeError: couldn't load image data in Blender

When I attempt to use the file menu, and export > SecondLife LSL, I get the same python script error, but the console says this instead:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<string>", line 219, in my_callback
File "<string>", line 198, in export_lsl
File "<string>", line 167, in saveImageAs
RuntimeError: could not save image (no image buffer)

Sometimes I can close blender and re-open and it will work, sometimes not. It's seemingly random. HELP.

I'm using Blender 2.47, I don't recall the version of the sculptie import/export scripts I'm using and am unsure how to find out.

Anyone know how to solve this problem?

The errors sound like missing filename problems. Eg if you save a sculpt map, then the blend then exit blender. From a file manager if you then deleted or renamed the sculpt map, it might cause these types of errors in Blender with that blend file. The fix is just to create a new image and assign to the "sculptie" uv layer to replace the missing one.

But this would be a consistent error, not an intermittent one. So if the same file sometimes works and sometimes doesn't, I'd run comprehensive hardware tests on your PC.

I really don't think it's a hardware problem, I think it's more likely a "noob blender user hit the wrong button" problem. For one thing, my system is running fine except for this problem with blender. I've re-installed blender 4 times, and 3 different versions. I've gone and downloaded the latest scripts from your site (thank you, btw, you rock). Every version of blender, every install, gives me the same problem. The errors vary slightly in their method of delivery (the newer version of blender is a bit more verbose) but it's still the same errors.

I tried an experiment which further validates this. I made a new file, put down a sculpt mesh, poked it a bit, then tested to make sure it would bake to a sculptie, and it did. I then appended the .blend file for a known "broken" object, one that I have not been able to export at all, so that I had both objects in the same blender scene. Selecting the "broken" one and attempting to bake the sculptie, I get the same error as mentioned. Selecting the newer sculpt mesh in the same scene and baking it works just fine. So again, I think I managed to break this one somehow.

But as they say, the proof is in the pudding - so I ask, will you try my pudding? If you go to (url removed to save my friend's bandwidth now that problem is solved) you can download the .blend file for the "broken" object yourself and try it out. See if you can export it to a sculptie, and if not, maybe you can look at it and go "Oh, you noob," and tell me how to fix it.

Either that, or you'll load it, it will work fine for you, and I'll be even more frustrated.

The only problem I can see with the file is the one I described in my last post. The "sculptie" UV layer has a missing image assigned. Just go to edit mode, select all, then create a new 64 x 64 image in the UV Image Editor. Baking the sculpt map then works.

The filename was the default "Cylinder.tga", so if you normally just save then rename later, the intermittent problem with files not working then working again are probably due to saving "Cylinder.tga" from another file so that the blend file points to a proper image file again.

It's the renaming (or deleting / moving) of Cylinder.tga that would break it, and putting Cylinder.tga back or creating a new image in Blender to bake to that fixes it.

The hardware thing came from thinking that without changing anything, the file sometimes worked and sometimes didn't. This is a consistent error that would only work if you fixed the missing image problem, so as you said, it's not a hardware problem.

THANK YOU. You're right, that works. I didn't realize I had to be in edit mode and select all before creating the new UV map - I had tried it without doing that, but yeah. Noobish me.

Incidentally, the problem doesn't happen because I deleted or moved a file in windows, however - I can start off with my cylinder.tga, do some work on the thing, then try to render the sculpt and it works, do some more work, try to render it, and it fails. Probably because it's defaulting to a different directory than the one my base sculpts are stored in, I don't know. but I don't really care (I'm sure it's due to some key I'm pressing without realizing it, or something similar). Now I know how to fix it, and again, I'll state for the record, you rock. Much appreciated.