3D layers no longer move on z axis

Ok so last night I was making a shot of some photos travelling away toward -z. mulitple photos were linked to one null that was keyframed to animate. All of a sudden both the photos and the null stopped moving backward and just stayed at their initial size. layers were still parented, there were no 2d layers in between, and all layers are 3D. I've tried adding a new null, remaking everything. but every 3D layer I make is now broken. 

I updated to the latest update as that usually fixes most bugs in AE but it's still happening. seems like this is a symptom of the new 3d space addition. Please help! hopefully i'm just missing something obvious...

going to attach two screenshots showing that the z position of the parent null does not affect the child layers.