export animation from blender

[mc08]

I'm having a really hard time understanding how you export animated models from blender. I would really need some kind of tutorial or help from you guys about this. Any help or answer is really appreciated.

What I want to do is to export a animated character / thing or whatever to directx format *.x to be able to use it in a project my friend if working on.
However, any model I export is just static. I have tried exporting different simple animations multiple times and I am really stuck here.

I'm using Blender 2.45 and the animations i'm talking about is really basic motions between keys in the Action Editor of Blender, using weight paint to mesh n bones.

PLEASE help!

[dlangdev]

save yourself from hours of frustration...

use gandalf's b3d exporter.

and dont ask me where to get it.

[vermeer]

if using irrlicht, yep, b3d, ad use gandalf exproter. 3 posts ago in this very section. And u can purchase his tutorial (plugin is free) if in real need of the matter. i bet it takes you through every single step, no problem.

if for other engine, still b3d or md5 is better, but if must use x: , in the exporter dialog (please, use blender 2.46 or even 2.47 rc2, seems improved, am using rc1 ) , obviously press anim button or wont export animation!

also, press swap y-z, so that sentence says "Y-axis up".Unless your engine deals better with z-up. It depends, but usually engines are adapted to tools exportings, which in z-up, blender is almost alone.

usually, should say "left handed system", is more common (but i dunno if ur friend uses irrlicht, darkbasic pro, fps creator, conitec game studio, or what)

Speed. very improtant button. Some engine loaders deal badly with it, and play so slow it seems static. Try several values, but very different every time, as it can be thousands or 25 or...

actions...and...surely constraints...I think I remember you needed a constraints bake with x in blender. As far as I remember, not needed in b3d (but if it is, keep reading) You have in that same Actions section, an option in top menu called Key, whic is "sample keys" (before called bake) , this makes a keyfame...if you after doing all ur anim, simple one for a test, a pair of bones only with some cilinder weighted, and did hit menu view, view all, you will see in action editor all the bones keys (I hope you'r making animation using pose mode, not object mode for making the thing...bones must be blue..) .now, you're seing all keys... now in Key menu, hit "sample keys". Now you will see how it interpolated a key per frame per every bone WHICH had a key...so, for testing purpose, you prefer to: set a initial pose, select ALL bones (pose mode, a key) . Insert keyframe (i key, insert loc, rot , scale key)

Same with final frame.

just that, now the sample keys thing. now u have a lot of keys. It will export all that, in that "baked" way.So any engine can take it. *.MD5 blender exporter does not need this.

Probably x exporter was improved (it was indeed, in many many areas) , so , this may not be neeedd anymore. But long since I last went these roads.

But my adivice,valid for anything: when sth gives problems, get into it with the simplest, most error free possible way, then go adding cool stuff one by one.

I am more than sure that x exporter is now perfectly valid for game engines. It's just that x format, while during times was a neck saver as was the only really supported by some tools, today things have changed. Anyway, for db pro and similar, is the only way yet.

[mc08]

Thx alot for your help! My friend is using irrlicht for the game so the *.b3d format will do fine for me.

I installed and tested exporting with Gandaldf b3d exporter, and it worked out for me on the first try! Can't express the relief in words that I finally got the exporting to work!

Very nice description on exporting vermeer. Actually I messed around a lot with that swap z-y, speed options and tried exporting all, only selection and so on, and never got any animation in the exported file.

Well hopefully I wont have to bother you guys anymore now that it's all working for me. Thanks a lot for your help, both of you!

[torleif]

mc08: I'm using blender like you and was using the MD3 exporter to create my models.

I gave B3D a try and I had to admit, it looks a little better than md3. Looks like I'll have to swap to it

[BlindSide]

mc08: I'm using blender like you and was using the MD3 exporter to create my models.

I gave B3D a try and I had to admit, it looks a little better than md3. Looks like I'll have to swap to it

Dude, why were you using MD3? Did you not know that it's a vertex-based format like MD2? (MD5 is bone based though.)

[vermeer]

and it worked out for me on the first try!

that's the really nice thing of that gandalf exporter

The der_ton md5 one (but also in love with its unique no-bake-neeedd-constraints-supported) is problem free as well. But There's no md5 support in irrlicht.


Really glad it helped . Actually some of those advices are for all weight based formats. and there are many many more. But once you get it running as you do, all are details you go learning as you go. In case needed, that is.

B3d in irrlicht has the advantage added that will serve you to export levels with lightmaps and some other Level related features: handy to have a format that deals with both char anims and levels.

in my tests, Blender md3 exporter(s) does some unnacuracy in verts position, related to original anim, that makes shapes a bit with more peaks or deforms: can be slightly cured with playing with an script scale value. But am a freak of seamless exports...

md3 has it sense in case of many characters in screen, from a distance (so some issues are not seen), but only in the case that with modern hardware, or average of tdoays, and in the engine you work it, is showing better game performance due to not making calculations of weights and bones. In several engines is done by software not 3d card, and can slow things down a lot when a few are on screen. As it has not some weird weird limits of md2 (one of the worse: no spline interpolation ported in the format, however is that possible or has sense, am just an artist dealing with results, not internals) , and if used as single piece, not per chunks model, can be a "much better md2".But surely mainly for RTS games or the like... The geometry seams forced in every UV countour (which can hide with tricks, but..) that bothe vertex formats force is...not very cool, either. (*.3ds does that crap as well. )