FBX exporter improvements WIP #36971

New Issue

Jens Restemeier · 2013-10-06T11:33:24+02:00

Jens Restemeier commented

2013-10-06 11:33:24 +02:00

%%%I am currently working on the Blender FBX exporter to improve integration with Unity3D (http://unity3d.com/ ). Main issues are to bake the space transform (from Z up to Y up) into the mesh data, and to export textures assigned to a material so that normal maps come across correctly.

Please don't apply the patch, yet. I am currently collecting feedback from the Unity3D community and want to implement their fixes first. I just want to avoid duplicated work by someone else.

I tried to implement these changes in a way that is compatible with all applications using FBX, but I have only Unity3D to test.
%%%

%%%I am currently working on the Blender FBX exporter to improve integration with Unity3D (http://unity3d.com/ ). Main issues are to bake the space transform (from Z up to Y up) into the mesh data, and to export textures assigned to a material so that normal maps come across correctly. Please don't apply the patch, yet. I am currently collecting feedback from the Unity3D community and want to implement their fixes first. I just want to avoid duplicated work by someone else. I tried to implement these changes in a way that is compatible with all applications using FBX, but I have only Unity3D to test. %%%

Jens Restemeier commented

2013-10-06 11:33:24 +02:00

Changed status to: 'Open'

Jens Restemeier commented

2013-10-31 17:50:47 +01:00

%%%I spoke with someone else who submitted an improved FBX exporter a few months ago, and I decided to split my patch into two. From what I understand you're doing a total rewrite of the FBX IO anyway, so please just consider the idea behind the patches. I think he did more work exporting blend modes between texture layers, while I was more interested in getting Unity3D to pick up correct diffuse and normal maps.

To summarise the patches:
io_scene_material.patch : If a material is set on a face, the textures on the uv layers are ignored and the textures on the material are exported instead. I tried to find reasonable keywords for the different texture types, but Unity3D only picks up diffuse and normal, so the rest is untested. If no material is set a dummy material with the textures from the uv layers is created. I think the other FBX script did more work in matching blend modes and material settings, so you may want to use that one instead.

io_scene_geom.patch: The default fbx exporter only appends the space transform (Z up to Y up) onto each world matrix. As a result you'll get mostly unchanged transforms in Unity3D, with a 90 degree rotation around X on the root transform. That is a bit awkward for example with code that expects an identity on the root transform, or the terrain instancing system. To make that work a user would have to export objects laying on the side in Blender. To make this work more intuitively I added code to bake this transform into vertices and normals. This defaults to off, because it may confuse Unity3D after an object that was imported with the old exporter is imported with the new importer. It would be useful if that was exposed as a setting in Unity3D, but I'm not sure if I could reach a developer responsible for fbx import, of if I'd run into a wall at tech support.

%%%

%%%I spoke with someone else who submitted an improved FBX exporter a few months ago, and I decided to split my patch into two. From what I understand you're doing a total rewrite of the FBX IO anyway, so please just consider the idea behind the patches. I think he did more work exporting blend modes between texture layers, while I was more interested in getting Unity3D to pick up correct diffuse and normal maps. To summarise the patches: io_scene_material.patch : If a material is set on a face, the textures on the uv layers are ignored and the textures on the material are exported instead. I tried to find reasonable keywords for the different texture types, but Unity3D only picks up diffuse and normal, so the rest is untested. If no material is set a dummy material with the textures from the uv layers is created. I think the other FBX script did more work in matching blend modes and material settings, so you may want to use that one instead. io_scene_geom.patch: The default fbx exporter only appends the space transform (Z up to Y up) onto each world matrix. As a result you'll get mostly unchanged transforms in Unity3D, with a 90 degree rotation around X on the root transform. That is a bit awkward for example with code that expects an identity on the root transform, or the terrain instancing system. To make that work a user would have to export objects laying on the side in Blender. To make this work more intuitively I added code to bake this transform into vertices and normals. This defaults to off, because it may confuse Unity3D after an object that was imported with the old exporter is imported with the new importer. It would be useful if that was exposed as a setting in Unity3D, but I'm not sure if I could reach a developer responsible for fbx import, of if I'd run into a wall at tech support. %%%

Bastien Montagne commented

2014-08-03 10:31:10 +02:00

Changed status from 'Open' to: 'Archived'

Bastien Montagne closed this issue

2014-08-03 10:31:10 +02:00

Bastien Montagne self-assigned this 2014-08-03 10:31:10 +02:00

Bastien Montagne commented

2014-08-03 10:31:10 +02:00

Think we can close this one, Jens? If there are still some valid work in here, please use fbx wip branch for it! :)

Jens Restemeier commented

2014-08-03 10:33:47 +02:00

Yes, this was old stuff against the ascii exporter and they are already in the new binary exporter.

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FBX exporter improvements WIP #36971