Sample Screen Color/Color Picker don't work on second monitor

[Avarones]

Giving some context: Last month I was working with a 24" and 19" monitors, then my Graphic card died and I bought a new one, buying a new 27" monitor together.
Formatted my computer, installed 3ds max, corona and everything back, everything working fine.

But I found out that the Sample Screen Color (or Color Picker) are not picking colors from the second monitor. It just appears to be picking a white color. Tried putting 3Ds max on second monitor, it doesn't work that way neither.

What could be happening?

Corona 5 / Max 19

[GeorgeK]

Giving some context: Last month I was working with a 24" and 19" monitors, then my Graphic card died and I bought a new one, buying a new 27" monitor together.
Formatted my computer, installed 3ds max, corona and everything back, everything working fine.

But I found out that the Sample Screen Color (or Color Picker) are not picking colors from the second monitor. It just appears to be picking a white color. Tried putting 3Ds max on second monitor, it doesn't work that way neither.

What could be happening?

Corona 5 / Max 19

Works fine for 2020 and 2019 corona v5, v4 on my end. Is your gpu drivers up to date? Also amd or nvidia?

Also note: It might be caused by the second GPU or by different DPI setting on the second monitor.

[Juraj]

It never worked for me either (same monitors, single GPU, latest windows and drivers all year around), but this is some Windows setting imho though I am not aware which.

[romullus]

It works for me, but it samples wrong values on secondary monitor, so i always have to be careful not pick colours from it. It probably would be better if it wouldn't work, than to work incorrectly.

[maru]

It seems to work fine here, Max 2020 and Corona 5. Tested both Corona picker and Max picker.
Could anyone with this issue please take a few screenshots showing what exactly they are doing step by step, or a video if possible, so that we could try replicating the behavior?

[Juraj]

Hi Maru,

here I made a screenshot, and because it doesn't capture cross-hair, I made small green square of which area I sampled.
To better describe the issue, it's actually what Romullus wrote, it is sampling something (because the color changes as I move around), but it's not where the crosshair is.
My setup is 2 identical 32" 4k display with same DPI scaling (150perc.) and one vertical 24". I sampled from the identical monitor though, I didn't try turning off the vertical, might do later.

In this screenshot, where 3dsMax ends is the end of middle monitor, it's full-screen. I take back what I wrote about Windows issue, because I tested with Photoshop and that one samples correctly.

[romullus]

It works for me, but it samples wrong values on secondary monitor, so i always have to be careful not pick colours from it. It probably would be better if it wouldn't work, than to work incorrectly.

Correction - it only samples wrong colours from a picture that is open in windows photo viewer. CCP picks colours without any issues from anywhere else - tried in 3ds max itself, in affinity photo, even in windows explorer and in firefox - no problems across multiple monitors. So in my case it's just an issue with windows photo viewer, not with colour picker.

[romullus]

Sorry for off-topic - Juraj, is this how 3ds max 2016 looks on 4K monitor? How do you manage to read its UI? It's super tiny!

[Juraj]

And this is with 150perc. scaling :- ) I used only 125perc. for past two years but I feel my eyesight is worse since lately bit.
With 2016 scaling is terrible, you can see Corona text is scaled (to a point where some texts are missing from fields) but 3dsMax is only somewhere.

I can read it since it's 32" big monitor and I don't sit that far behind. But yes, I can't wait for improved scaling with 2020, at least I hope it's better..and working.

[romullus]

I would need binoculars to read this O_O

[sprayer]

And this is with 150perc. scaling :- ) I used only 125perc. for past two years but I feel my eyesight is worse since lately bit.
With 2016 scaling is terrible, you can see Corona text is scaled (to a point where some texts are missing from fields) but 3dsMax is only somewhere.

I can read it since it's 32" big monitor and I don't sit that far behind. But yes, I can't wait for improved scaling with 2020, at least I hope it's better..and working.

Did you tried new options in last windows 10 for up-scaling in properties?



I am also using 125% upscaling and this options fix issue for example blurry fonts in 3d coat

[mferster]

Works exactly as it should for me:

Different monitors
Windows 7
3ds max 2015
Corona 5

[maru]

Just one question, which may seem weird, but I remember once case where a user did this: you are using the "regular" color picker, not the inverse one, right?

(Internal ID=441600529)

[Juraj]

For me, yes of course, that's why the sampled color is seen in left corner as it swaps that cursor.

[GeorgeK]

Tested this again with Corona V5,V4,V3, 3ds max 2020.03, 2019.2, 2014, 1080p monitors. All worked as expected with both pickers with different sample sources.

[Juraj]

I have a nagging feeling it will be connected to Windows DPI scaling in some way.

[GeorgeK]

I have a nagging feeling it will be connected to Windows DPI scaling in some way.

Possibly! I will be testing this soon with 2k and 4k monitors and asymmetrical  DPI scaling.

[maru]

So far we were not able to reproduce this (tested on at least 3 computers, also with 4k monitors), so we will need some more details. We will also keep testing with different scaling settings, etc.
Some extra questions:

- is this happening only with windows viewer? (as Romullus suggested)
- which Windows, Corona, and Max versions are you using (this applies mostly to new reports if this information has not been provided yet)
- is this happening with 100% Windows scaling too?

[Juraj]

Tested everything except scaling because I can't do that because of work right now.

It's not application specific, all apps (including Viewer) work within main central monitor, and none work correctly on secondary displays.

[maru]

Confirmed, reproduced! This happens when using two or more monitors, and they are using different scaling. E.g. if you have a main 4k monitor with 100% scaling and secondary Full HD monitor with 150% scaling. But it happens with both Corona picker and default Max picker, so I'm not really sure if we can do anything about it. We will look into it though.

[Juraj]

What is funny that I have setup like this:

{ 32"/4K/150perc. } + { 32"/4K/150perc. } + { 24" Vert/2k/200perc. }

And I am sampling from the main monitor to the left one, and these are identical in everything including scaling.
So the fact a third monitor is able to throw this off is pretty interesting :- ).

[maru]

So maybe it happens if anything has other scaling than 100.

[Avarones]

Sorry for taking such a long time to reply.

My GPU is a RTX 2060 and I am using the latest drivers on my PC. I didn't even know there was a Corona Color picker, tried it and it didnt work neither. I tried to use photoshop's color picker and it worked pretty fine.

Edit: Oh I didn't see there's two pages here. Maru, I am currently using one monitor with 150 Scale (the 4k one) and the full hd one I am using with 100% scaling, so might this could be the problem

[maru]

This seems to be a Max issue. We will investigate and will contact Autodesk if needed.

[BVVV]

This seems to be a Max issue. We will investigate and will contact Autodesk if needed.

same issue in
system: windows 10 Pro 2004.19041.572
Software: 3Ds Max 2021 update3
Renderer: Corona 6 hot fix 1
Monitor: 27 4K

[cjwidd]

Also having this issue - never had this issue before with Corona Renderer, but also haven't used the color picker on non-100% scaled display before.

Windows 10
3ds Max 2020
Corona Renderer 9, hotfix 1 (9.1.0.17740)
Monitor 1: 4k, 175% scaling
Monitor 2: 4k, 175% scaling

EDIT: This post is almost three years old, certainly there has been a fix since then!?!