Import FBX from Cheetah 3D Modeller/Animator

[MarkusR]

there is a issue, the object look wrong and the texture is missing.

i try much as in can, its impossible to get a good result.

the problem belongs wrong face normals. i had disable rounding.

please tell me with side the problem concerns.

 

MAC Software

http://www.cheetah3d.com/

[Josh]

It is not possible to evaluate your problem unless you provide the files needed to create the error.

[MarkusR]

ok here.

but there is also a demo of it for download.

 

the Untitled file is shade 13.

[Josh]

Leadwerks only loads the normals your file contains. It sounds like your modeling program is not exporting FBX files correctly. One easy way around this is to use the Leadwerks model editor to recalculate normals:

http://www.leadwerks.com/werkspace/page/documentation/_/user-guide/model-editor-r16

 

But that does look like a problem with this program's FBX exporter, and you should probably ask on their forum.

 

I can't check the texture issue without the required image file.

[MarkusR]

ok, i will write the cheetah author.

often it happens if the vertices shared a face and the normal is saved at a vertex point, thats wrong.

a normal belongs a surface.

the texture image should be inside fbx file. it was a math texture, should be baked as texture file inside fbx.

[MarkusR]

recalculate normals help, i can use as workaround :-)

thanks for this hint.

 

got a complex model looking good.

[MarkusR]

Hello Josh , today i got answer (in german) from cheetah developer,

he said the normals are in the file same i see the model at window.

he said his app wrote it as "polygon vertex normals" for each polygon point/edge a normal.

he said some engine input only one normal each mesh vertex, means for a cube you read only 6 normals.

[Josh]

Yeah, he isn't exporting the vertex normals.

[MarkusR]

can u use the "polygon vertex normals" from file?

he said normals are in file.

[Josh]

That sounds like it's just a setting that says to make the model faceted. You would get the exact same results by running the normals calculation tool with an angular tolerance of 0. In other words, he isn't exporting vertex normals.

[MarkusR]

i don't think its a option,i believe him, he said he wrote normals to the file.

seems there are two ways to save it.

did the leadwerks engine useing the autodesk sdk for reading fbx files?

 

i will search for some infos here ...

http://help.autodesk.com/view/FBX/2015/ENU/

 

here is something about the normals.

http://help.autodesk.com/view/FBX/2015/ENU/?guid=__files_GUID_5EDC0280_E000_4B0B_88DF_5D215A589D5E_htm

 

Assigning Normals

 

The normal vectors of a mesh are defined in an instance of <a class="a_multireflink">FbxLayerElementNormal. Layer elements such as normals can be mapped to the surface of a mesh in a variety of ways, such as by control point (FbxLayerElement::eBY_CONTROL_POINT), by polygon vertex (FbxLayerElement::eBY_POLYGON_VERTEX), by polygon (FbxLayerElement::eBY_POLYGON), by edge (FbxLayerElement::eBY_EDGE), or one mapping coordinate for the whole surface (FbxLayerElement::eALL_SAME)

[YouGroove]

Blender and Maya are the most used on indie scene and available on Windows also, i work with Blender that uses a complete FBX export format , i never had such problems with LE3.

I tested the import on Blender 2.72 , only "untitled" model loaded the others was full of errors or didn't had the good format.

 

The problem is on Cheetah3D side

(I would suggest you to use Blender or Maya instead)

[MarkusR]

no its not on cheetah side.

blender is a worst tool (in compare with cinema 4d) & maya is a expensive tool.

cheetah is a very powerful tool for modeling, rendering and animation with a best price on this earth.

(i have also alternative 3d apps.)

[YouGroove]

blender is a worst tool (in compare with cinema 4d)

It is used by so many people making games, and it is developped continuously, with support for FBX standards.

The problem of Cheetah3D , is it's Mac only, a major problem for a big majority of indies.

 

no its not on cheetah side.

It seems you are right finally

I made the test with zylinder2abloesen.fbx and zylinder4.fbx importing in several 3D engines, it seems LE3 rounds the models by default while others don't smooth the model faces if they don't find smoothing groups.

 

 

LE3 : model is smoothed

 

 

Unity : no smoothing

 

UE4 : No Smoothing

 

 

So this is something that should be changed in LE3 FBX import.

 

On the other side Cheetah3D FBX export is not so good ,as i have many errors when i import on Blender.

[MarkusR]

@yougroove, yes thanks, please look and read above my entry with Assigning Normals from fbx documentation.

 

blender have two fbx imports, one selfmade and one with the fbx sdk i had read.

the fbx sdk read&write a perfect file for version xyz.

cheetah export as fbx 7.4.0 or 6.1.0

long ago i try also blender 2.5 and the fbx export was unusable for me and i found better modelling software.

 

@josh,

please look at Quote above from fbx doc.

[YouGroove]

long ago i try also blender 2.5 and the fbx export was unusable for me and i found better modelling software.

You are wrong, on that statement, i used Blender and from 2.49 it's FBX export was always good for exporting models and animations to 3D engines. So i don't know what you was doing wrong ?

But you should stop bashing Blender that is used by industry people also and it is better than Maya in many points and it's open source FREE software. While Cheetah3D is not very known software and it's Mac only.

 

cheetah export as fbx 7.4.0 or 6.1.0

Blender do the same.

 

please look and read above my entry with Assigning Normals from fbx documentation

Sorry i don't have time, i try making games instead of digging the technical side of things.

 

This is a really minor problem as main of the time we won't import models with mixed flat and smooth faces.

And Josh has it's own priorities about LE3 that can be lot more important than some small details like this one.

[MarkusR]

@YouGroove

 

you not understand, the normals are in the fbx file and its possible to read this.

i believe i try blender for shiva engine but never mind.

i know blender is free but the usability is bad, my view.

it was not a bash, u can use blender if u have fun with it.

 

the original thread started as suggestion...

[Josh]

I'll ask the FBX importer author about it.

[MarkusR]

yo, thanks