Troubleshooting

Canvas Is Black / No Preview

Cause: Hardware-accelerated graphics are unavailable in your browser.

Fix: Use Chrome or Edge with hardware acceleration enabled (check chrome://gpu).

The 2D ILDA Viewer has the broadest browser support. For the 3D Beam Viewer and Cinema mode, use a current Chrome or Edge browser with hardware acceleration enabled.

Export Won't Play on My DAC

Cause: Your DAC only supports Format 0 (indexed color), not Format 5 (true color).

Fix: Re-export with Format 0 selected. SD card projectors and some older hardware DACs only understand Format 0. In Export options, switch from Format 5 to Format 0.

See ILDA Format Versions for a full comparison.

Audio Isn't Reactive

Cause: No audio file loaded, or no mapping rows configured. BT Laser Studio's audio features are file-based — Animation Studio analyzes an uploaded track (MP3, WAV, OGG, M4A), it never listens to your microphone, so there is no permission to grant.

Fix:

1. Upload an audio file in Animation Studio's Audio Panel and wait for the analysis (BPM/beat grid) to finish
2. Add at least one audio mapping row (+ Add) on the layer you want to react — see Audio-Reactive Features
3. Check the mapping's Min/Max range — a 0-width range produces no visible movement

File Opens But Shows No Frames

Cause: The ILDA file has a missing or malformed terminator header, or uses an unsupported format code.

Fix:

1. Check the Validation panel for specific format errors
2. Ensure the file ends with a terminator header (records = 0)
3. If the file uses an unusual format code, contact the original software vendor

3D Viewer Shows "WebGL Unavailable"

Cause: The browser cannot start the 3D graphics view, usually because hardware acceleration is disabled or a graphics driver needs attention.

Fix: Enable hardware acceleration, restart the browser, and check chrome://gpu for reported problems. The 2D viewer remains available while the 3D view shows the static error message.

For Cinema mode, use the latest Chrome or Edge release.

SVG Conversion Produces Too Many Points

Cause: The SVG has excessive intermediate points from the export tool (common from Illustrator, Figma, and web fonts).

Fix:

1. Raise Trace → Simplify from its 2.0 default and use Show Point Density to see whether long runs become sparse without losing visible curves
2. Use Smooth curves only when the source actually contains curved paths; it does not round straight logo corners
3. If the SVG still contains thousands of meaningful nodes, run a Simplify Path operation in the source editor before export

Still Image Adds Vertical Lines at the Sides

Cause: The image contains real contrasting edge pixels, or the background-removal/crop settings are exposing content at the boundary.

Fix: Start with the default Trace → Silhouette, turn Crop off, and check EDGE MAP. Still PNG and JPEG sources keep their aspect ratio, and a uniform background that reaches the image edge should not become a pair of side rails. If the rails remain in EDGE MAP, crop the unwanted edge pixels or make the source background uniform before tracing.

Video Conversion Is Slow

Cause: Large file size, high resolution, or complex content.

Fix:

1. Lower the Max Frames Limit in the left panel and reload — fewer frames means less to extract and trace
2. Trim your video in an external editor to only the section you need before uploading
3. Lower the target FPS (15 FPS is often sufficient)
4. Use SVG Parser instead of ImageTracer if your content is motion graphics (it's significantly faster)

Animation Studio Keyframes Not Saving

Cause: Project auto-save may not have triggered, or the browser session was closed before save.

Fix: Animation Studio auto-saves in the current browser — there is no manual save step. Clearing site data removes the session, and sessions do not sync to another browser or device. Give edits a moment to persist before closing the tab.

Further Reading