Scene Fader - Please Help!

[El-Deiablo]

This is the first time I have had this issue and I have been working on this project for 6 months and am almost done. I have seen several others with this issue, but no one has answered. Below you will find my code as well as photos showing my hiearchy and inspector panel. I have gone through several tutorials (Here’s a link to the most recent that caused this same error - - YouTube), debugged, and scoured the internet for a solution, but continue to get this error (Lines 22 and 34 located in Code 1 - SceneFader.instance.FadeIn(“Title Menu”); / SceneFader.instance.FadeIn (“Gameplay”);):

NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object
ChangeSceneManager.MainMenu () (at Assets/Scripts/Mangers/ChangeSceneManager.cs:25)
UnityEngine.Events.InvokableCall.Invoke (System.Object args)
UnityEngine.Events.InvokableCallList.Invoke (System.Object parameters)
UnityEngine.Events.UnityEventBase.Invoke (System.Object parameters)
UnityEngine.Events.UnityEvent.Invoke ()
UnityEngine.UI.Button.Press () (at /Users/builduser/buildslave/unity/build/Extensions/guisystem/UnityEngine.UI/UI/Core/Button.cs:35)
UnityEngine.UI.Button.OnPointerClick (UnityEngine.EventSystems.PointerEventData eventData) (at /Users/builduser/buildslave/unity/build/Extensions/guisystem/UnityEngine.UI/UI/Core/Button.cs:44)
UnityEngine.EventSystems.ExecuteEvents.Execute (IPointerClickHandler handler, UnityEngine.EventSystems.BaseEventData eventData) (at /Users/builduser/buildslave/unity/build/Extensions/guisystem/UnityEngine.UI/EventSystem/ExecuteEvents.cs:52)
UnityEngine.EventSystems.ExecuteEvents.Execute[IPointerClickHandler] (UnityEngine.GameObject target, UnityEngine.EventSystems.BaseEventData eventData, UnityEngine.EventSystems.EventFunction`1 functor) (at /Users/builduser/buildslave/unity/build/Extensions/guisystem/UnityEngine.UI/EventSystem/ExecuteEvents.cs:269)
UnityEngine.EventSystems.EventSystem:Update()

Here’s my code:

using UnityEngine;
using System.Collections;
using UnityEngine .SceneManagement ;
using UnityEngine .UI;

public class ChangeSceneManager : MonoBehaviour {

	// Use this for initialization
	void Start () {

	}

	// Update is called once per frame
	void Update () {

	}

	public void MainMenu(){

		//SceneManager.LoadScene ("Title Menu");
		//SceneFader.instance.LoadLevel("Title Menu");
		SceneFader.instance.FadeIn("Title Menu");

	}

	public void HowToPlay(){

		SceneManager.LoadScene ("How To Play Scene");
		//SceneFader.instance.LoadLevel("How To Play Scene");
	}

	public void Play(){

		SceneFader.instance.FadeIn ("Gameplay");
		//SceneManager.LoadScene ("Gameplay");
	}
}

Code 2:

using UnityEngine;
using System.Collections;
using UnityEngine.SceneManagement;


public class SceneFader : MonoBehaviour {

	public static SceneFader instance;

	[SerializeField]
	private GameObject fadeCanvas;

	[SerializeField]
	private Animator fadeAnim;

	void Awake(){

		MakeASingleInstance ();

	}

	void MakeASingleInstance(){

		if (instance != null) {

			Destroy (gameObject);

		} else {

			instance = this;
			DontDestroyOnLoad (gameObject);

		}

	}

	IEnumerator FadeInAnimate (string levelName){

		fadeCanvas.SetActive (true);
		fadeAnim.Play ("FadeIn");
		yield return new WaitForSeconds (1f);
		SceneManager.LoadScene (levelName);
		FadeOut ();

	}
		
	IEnumerator FadeOutAnimate(){

		fadeAnim.Play ("FadeOut");
		yield return new WaitForSeconds (0.7f);
		fadeCanvas.SetActive (false);

	}

	public void FadeIn(string levelName){

		StartCoroutine (FadeInAnimate (levelName));

	}

	public void FadeOut(){

		StartCoroutine (FadeOutAnimate ());

	}
}

I have been working on this scenefader for days now and continue to run into this issue. I am so close to finishing my game and want to add some polish to it. I would really appreciate some help.

Here are some screen shots of the gameobject as well:

[Glurth]

I would guess the object you have the SceneFader behavior attached to is disabled or corrupted somehow: preventing it’s awake function from being called. This would leave the “instance” member variable uninitialized, and therefore equal to NULL.

The specific error you are getting means that you are trying to access a member of the “instance” variable, but since it’s null (not instantiated), it can’t store members yet.

P.S.
I’m not sure why SceneFader is a monbehavior, rather than just a static class. Seems like not having to deal with the game object would make things simpler: MakeASingleInstance() for example could be a static function, called by any object that need it, in THEIR awake function. Matter of taste I guess.