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Home ? Importing Assets ? Help exporting from Blender 2.61

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14/01/2012 00:54:12

cdunaway
cdunaway
Posts: 10 		Firstly, I'm new to Muvizu but have watched all the tutorials. Secondly, I'm inexperienced in Blender (which may be the root of my problem!)

I am attempting to learn how to import a model into Muvizu created in Blender. To keep it simple, I started with a plain cube. I added a material and a texture, I UV unwrapped the cube and then used the ASE exporter found at katsbits.com. It seemed to create the ASE file and I placed it along with a .png for the texture in the same folder. They were named ob_testbox.ase and testbox.png. When I attempted to import the model into Muvizu, I got an error:

"There was an error importing the object" "File not found." D:\textures\testbox.png


Both the .ase file and the .png file for the texture are located in the root folder of D:. Why is it looking in the textures folder (which doesn't even exist)? Inside the .ase file, there is a BITMAP setting with what seems to be the correct filename for the .png file, so I don't know where or why it is looking for a folder called "textures".

I can post the contents of the .ase file if anyone is interested. I have tried tweaking the file by changing the path of the image. I have tried creating the "textures" folder and placing the image there but I still get the same error.

I'm thinking that I have missed some important step in Blender when creating the model or the ASE export script might be producing something that is incompatible with Muvizu. I have compared the .ASE scripts from a model downloaded from the Gallery (which imports fine) against the one produced by Blender and they seem to be the same. The Blender script puts some additional things in there. I tried making the script look as close as possible to one that imports correctly, and it still doesn't work.

Can someone post a simple model of a cube with a plain image texture (not an id texture, I'll tackle them next) or some step by step instructions for creating a model in Blender? Any hints or tips will be appreciated.

I am using the newest version of Muvizu (MZASS-v0.19b - build 2012.01.10.01R (64-bit)) and the latest version of Blender (2.61.0 r42615)

Sorry for the long post, but this has been a frustrating experience and I just need some help to make it "click"!

Thanks,

Chris
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14/01/2012 07:24:05

ukBertyMuvizu mogulExperimental user
ukBerty
Posts: 975 		Chris,

Welcome to Muvizu.


Could you post the .ase file somewhere for us to look at and I'm sure we'll crack it.

I've had a lot of this with the Arteria models and have always managed to work out what it can't find.

Berty
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14/01/2012 10:27:26

DyllyMuvizu mogulExperimental user
Dylly
Posts: 555 		Hi Chris,

First of all let me say that I tried blender and it confused the hell out of me, so I moved on to 3ds Max, a free lite version can be had at www.turbosquid.com, now back to your problem...


cdunaway wrote:
I started with a plain cube. I added a material and a texture, I UV unwrapped the cube and then used the ASE exporter found at katsbits.com. It seemed to create the ASE file and I placed it along with a .png for the texture in the same folder. They were named ob_testbox.ase and testbox.png. When I attempted to import the model into Muvizu, I got an error:

"There was an error importing the object" "File not found." D:\textures\testbox.png


Both the .ase file and the .png file for the texture are located in the root folder of D:. Why is it looking in the textures folder (which doesn't even exist)? Inside the .ase file, there is a BITMAP setting with what seems to be the correct filename for the .png file, so I don't know where or why it is looking for a folder called "textures".




I have a sneaky feeling you did not assign the UV map you created to the model before export. Here's the work flow in 3ds Max so you can compare steps.

UVW unwrap model
Render out and save texture map
Paint textures in Photoshop or Gimp et al and save out the map
Use material editor to assign saved map to selected model
Export out the .ase of the model

I think in the case of your model it may be looking for a folder named 'textures' as this could be where Blender stuffs the UVW when it unwraps it and the new map has not been added to the model, so Muvizu is still looking for the original UVW unwrap file and not your texture map.

Mind as Berty says if you post up the file we can take a look.
Hope this helps
Tim
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14/01/2012 18:20:20

cdunaway
cdunaway
Posts: 10 		Dylly wrote:
Hi Chris,

First of all let me say that I tried blender and it confused the hell out of me, so I moved on to 3ds Max, a free lite version can be had at www.turbosquid.com, now back to your problem...


Blender has improved dramatically since version 2.49 with a totally revamped UI, but I guess its workflow is still different that 3DS Max!

I went through similar steps again and still have the same issue. I moved my files to a subfolder on the D: drive (D:\MuvizuTest) and got the same error:

"There was an error importing the object" "File not found." D:\MuvizuTest\textures\TestCube.png


Dylly wrote:

I think in the case of your model it may be looking for a folder named 'textures' as this could be where Blender stuffs the UVW when it unwraps it and the new map has not been added to the model, so Muvizu is still looking for the original UVW unwrap file and not your texture map.


This is what puzzles me, however. How would Muvizu know to look for a folder called "textures"? Nowhere in the .ase file is that folder indicated. Does Muvizu somehow know to look into the .blend file? I wouldn't think so.

I have placed a .zip file which contains the Blender .blend file (v2.61), the .ase file produced by the export script, and the .png file that I created for the texture at the following location:

https://skydrive.live.com/redir.aspx?cid=1a1a8325d45b2ac0&resid=1A1A8325D45B2AC0!240&parid=1A1A8325D45B2AC0!201

If there is anything else you would like to see, please let me know.

Thanks for the help!

Chris
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14/01/2012 19:25:36

DyllyMuvizu mogulExperimental user
Dylly
Posts: 555 		Hi Chris

This is definately a case of sodomy non sapiens! I get the same error message that you did. In the end I made a quick cube in 3dsMax went through the basic steps of UVW unwrap and applying texture. I used you texture from your file source and it worked.



Other than the difference in file reference with the 3ds file referencing the location of the .png image and that your file is referencing the blend file for the scene information where as mine is blank, I can see little difference between the two files.

I've posted a copy of my 3ds .ase file so you can compare here http://www.mediafire.com/?b2avtc6i7763w8h

Perhaps ukBerty or one of the Muvizu guys can help on Monday, I think Jamie was having a look at blender at one point.
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14/01/2012 21:45:40

cdunaway
cdunaway
Posts: 10 		Thanks, I tried your file and it imports correctly as well. I can't see any significant difference between the two. I did notice in my file, under the MESH_TVERTLIST section, that there are 36 entries where yours had only 24. Some of them appear to be duplicates. I'm not sure what that section is used for, however.
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15/01/2012 17:52:46

cdunaway
cdunaway
Posts: 10 		The plot thickens!! From your test file, I copied the BITMAP line and merely overwrote the existing line in my file, and now my file imports correctly, even though that folder does not exist. It also works if I substitute my name instead of yours in the path.

What is strange, after I get it to import, if I change it back to what I had originally by manually typing it in, it works, but if I use the Undo feature (Ctrl-Z) in my text editor to revert it back to what I originally had, it then fails to import again! I looked at the file under a hex editor and I cannot see any strange characters and the file doesn't seem to be encoded in any special way.

I feel that this may be a bug in Muvizu.
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16/01/2012 10:43:49

JamieMuvizu staff
Jamie
(Account inactive)
Posts: 609 		cdunaway wrote:
The plot thickens!! From your test file, I copied the BITMAP line and merely overwrote the existing line in my file, and now my file imports correctly, even though that folder does not exist. It also works if I substitute my name instead of yours in the path.

What is strange, after I get it to import, if I change it back to what I had originally by manually typing it in, it works, but if I use the Undo feature (Ctrl-Z) in my text editor to revert it back to what I originally had, it then fails to import again! I looked at the file under a hex editor and I cannot see any strange characters and the file doesn't seem to be encoded in any special way.

I feel that this may be a bug in Muvizu.



Hi cdunaway, I've had this problem with blender exported ASE as well. What I tend to do is remove everything after *BITMAP<space> and then put the file name only in quotes after the <space>. I think the problem is, at least for me, that blender ASE export leaves 20 or so <spaces> after the end of the file name. Muvizu then reads the file name and includes the <spaces> as part of the file name and tries to load that - obviously failing - at which point it attempts to locate the file in the "textures" directory and again fails. I think this might be why you didn't see any strange characters in the hex editor and why when you manually replaced the file name it worked.

If you send the original files to bugs@muvizu.com I'll take a look and get back to you. Glad you got it working though!

Welcome to Muvizu, good luck with your movies and models!
Jamie.

--
Direct, don't animate!
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17/01/2012 00:04:02

cdunaway
cdunaway
Posts: 10 		Thanks Jamie!

That did the trick. Just removing the extra spaces at the end of the line caused it to work.

UPDATE:

For anyone that is interested, the python script was the culprit.

In an effort to keep the source code neat, the author added spaces to each line to indent the code, but those spaces were being output to the .ase file. The extra spaces were causing Muvizu to fail.

I can adjust the python script in Blender to take care of this, but I still feel this is a bug in need of repair.

Regards,

Chris
edited by cdunaway on 17/01/2012
edited by cdunaway on 17/01/2012
edited by cdunaway on 17/01/2012
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17/01/2012 13:52:21

JamieMuvizu staff
Jamie
(Account inactive)
Posts: 609 		cdunaway wrote:
Thanks Jamie!

That did the trick. Just removing the extra spaces at the end of the line caused it to work.

UPDATE:

For anyone that is interested, the python script was the culprit.

In an effort to keep the source code neat, the author added spaces to each line to indent the code, but those spaces were being output to the .ase file. The extra spaces were causing Muvizu to fail.

I can adjust the python script in Blender to take care of this, but I still feel this is a bug in need of repair.

Regards,

Chris



Glad that's fixed it for you Chris. This is the plugin I've been using -

http://campagnini.net/2011/04/16/blender-to-udk-ase-export/

--
Direct, don't animate!
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18/01/2012 01:18:01

cdunaway
cdunaway
Posts: 10 		Jamie wrote:
Glad that's fixed it for you Chris. This is the plugin I've been using -

http://campagnini.net/2011/04/16/blender-to-udk-ase-export/


Yes, that is the script I am using also. I altered the script to remove extra spaces on or about line 278. There are other sections in the script which output extra spaces. I don't know if they cause any adverse effects in Muvizu, however.

Thanks again!
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18/01/2012 18:57:49

andla
andla
Posts: 10 		I have tried many py scripts but none of them worked. Will try the recommended here in the forum but first I'm going to give scetchup a try first because I don't like to mess with python if I don't have to.
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