Blender BZ2 exporter testers needed

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

Hey OM, I'm forcing myself to learn the ABC's of using B3D to focus on the basics of making some test animations using your XSI exporter. It'll be a while before getting used to the UI as it differs substantially from what I currently am used to modeling with, but I've DL'ed the tutorials and am studying them to get a handle on how B3D manipulates things and other related tasks. I think I've reached a point where one modeler is basically just like another modeler and the difference are relatively minor given a little time.

[OvermindDL1]

Try the animation support in B3D, I have the basics of the exporting done (maybe complete), but it is still pretty untested as any files I have received as tests did not implement animation correctly to begin with.  Also, I do not think I have bones complete, started yes, but not complete I think...

And if you want to try a 'different' style modeler, try Houdini, generally regarded as the best for high-poly things, and its interface is very different, although very easy oddly enough, it is more of a gui pov-ray.

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

Blender, is an amazing little modeler. The IK and bone animation module looks fairly easy to animate with after studying, "Gus the Ginger bread man." Working with textures looks really cool too. I'm going to attempt making Gus as a first animated model to get the feel for animating a simple model.

OM, what BZII animated model would be a good first animated unit to create for actual testing in the map editor? I'm thinking something fairly easy to start with, but easy enough to study in detail afterwords. Maybe a Scout type? They mostly have animated fins right? I'll study the XSI data pack and select at least 2 different unit types and give them a whirl to see what happens...BNG 

[OvermindDL1]

Moving cubes would be fine for me, so it is your choice.
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[TheJamsh]

Om i have in another post that youve entered in a dice model with a .png texture uv mapped in blender (however i do not fully understand mapping yet and didnt 'unwrap' the cube. the texture was applied face by face.

anyway, ive exported it. first it doesnt open in threed, but i can place it in the editor easily. it appears but cannot collide with it (maybe thats because im using i76building class and didnt make a collision mesh in BZ2) and the texture doesnt show (plain white it is)

its in another topic and i cant link it right now. try that as an example. im learning blender so may be able to help you a little more in the future

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

I was just wondering if any progress has been made with OM's exporter? Lately, I've hit a wall with the X format missing a texture when loaded into the BZII map editor. The geometry loads fine and my X models work well enough to pass as XSI based equivalents in game. Still learning the animation part in TS 7.6/6.6, but I did manage to make a walker type with the walk animation and save it as an X model.

Once I get past this hurdle then I'm going to try importing it into Blender and then try exporting it with OM's BZII XSI exporter. Does the X model file need to be converted to B3D format prior to exporting as XSI? Or can I just export from X to XSI in Blender? Any feedback would be helpful as to what I can try to help test OM's exporter. BNG.

[OvermindDL1]

Just try it, tell me what is wrong (in detail, how to reproduce it, etc... just saying something is wrong does not help at all).
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[Dianoga4]

Did anyone ever get a version of this exporter fully working? Or even the texturing part of it working? Just curious.

[VSMIT]

OM's probably still waiting for issues to address.

[anomaly]

Well I've encountered an issue but since I see no else has run into it I assume it's probably a problem with me trying to use blender.  Anyway, my problem is that any time I export my model, all polygons become detached from each other and I end up with a model that has a huge number of vertices. 

I've been making my models in Gmax, exporting to .md3 and then importing into Blender.  I did check to make sure all sub-objects were in one piece and made sure there were no vertices that needed welding before using OM's exporter.  Also this model is untextured and not animated if that helps at all.  I even tried just exporting the default cube thats generated when Blender starts up and encountered the same problem (along with an error about no textures or something).  So, is there something I'm supposed to do in Blender that I don't know about?

[VSMIT]

Try taking the .md3 through Lithunwrap and exporting as a .obj file, then importing into Blender.  Though I'm not sure if that would help.

Also remember that if you're using the newest version of Blender, the exporter was not written for it.

[anomaly]

I'll try that.  And which version of Blender was it written for?

[VSMIT]

Can't recall.  You'd have to ask OM about that.

[Dianoga4]

The thing I could never get to work was just getting a texture to show up on the model in the game. I tried all sorts of things, reported what I did to OM, and all that but I still could never get it to work. Someone said, I think it might have been OM even, that they were able to get a texture to show up. I asked a couple or so times what steps were taken to get this to happen and I never got a response.  

I didn't bother with trying animations because I couldn't even get the textures to show up. I don't mind using Blender and 3dmax 3 to get models in game but it would've been nice to be able to get them in straight from Blender.

It looks like OM is not even around anymore. It shows his last activity in August. Oh well, I was glad he at least took a shot at it.

[TheJamsh]

Check the .blend file included in that link i just posted.

The model DOES open in game with a texture.