When I compile this minimal example using Tikz 3D Plot with pdflatex, version pdfTeX 3.141592653-2.6-1.40.25 (TeX Live 2023/Arch Linux), I end up with a series of "Missing Character: There is no in nullfont". Here is the minimal example:
\documentclass[]{article} \usepackage{tikz,tikz-3dplot} \usetikzlibrary{calc} \tdplotsetmaincoords{70}{110} \begin{document} \begin{tikzpicture} \node (P1) at (-5.0, -1.0) {}; \node (P2) at (5.0, 1.0) {}; \clip (P1) rectangle (P2); \shade[ball color=blue] (0, 0) circle (1); \pgfmathsetmacro{\rt}{10} \pgfmathsetmacro{\start}{(90/32)*(-16)} \pgfmathsetmacro{\angle}{(90/32)*(\rt-16)} \pgfmathsetmacro{\cstart}{cos(\start)} \pgfmathsetmacro{\sstart}{sin(\start)} \pgfmathsetmacro{\cangle}{cos(\angle)} \pgfmathsetmacro{\sangle}{sin(\angle)} \begin{scope}[tdplot_main_coords] \tdplotdefinepoints(0,0,0)(\cstart,\sstart,0)(\cangle,\sangle,0) % FIXME: This is not working for some bizarre reason. It used to work in an older version! \tdplotdrawpolytopearc[red, thick]{1}{}{} \end{scope} \end{tikzpicture} The errors dumped to the terminal are:
Missing character: There is no - in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no - in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no + in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no + in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no ( in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 0 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no . in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 0 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no , in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 0 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no . in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 0 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no , in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 0 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no . in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 4 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 7 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 1 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 3 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no 9 in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no ) in font nullfont! Missing character: There is no ; in font nullfont! angles for cross product: phi: 0theta: 0.0 This used to work smoothly in a previous version of PDFLaTeX without these errors. The rendered image looks okay, though.
Any idea how to fix it?
\font\nullfont=cmr10to see the offending characters to possibly track down where they're coming from. That might not help in this case, since it appears to be a package bug.