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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Hello everyone!
I've had a designer create this character in Blender and have been trying to import the FBX into 3dXchange, but it crashes once it reaches 100% as I saw someone else say in another post.
They said they corrected the issue by exporting it into an FBX format that 3dXchange recognized, but I need some help understanding what that format is.
I'm fairly new to iClone7 and 3DXchange, having tried it out a while ago and am now just getting back into it.
I have iClone 3dXchange v7.71 if that helps at all. Also, I zipped the blender doc, the textures, and the fbx files here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Xl2R5koQe6pgzR5gGsKu2kM3A5-Amtra/view?usp=sharing
In the zip file, I have two fbx files I was trying with.
I contacted support, but so far they have not yet responded after I had fixed the rig as they stated.
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
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By Rampa - 5 Years Ago
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I did set to only export The last one you sent worked. I saved an FBX from the Blend file, and was able to open it in 3DX. But only if I also imported the animation. So check the box on the import panel for animation.
EDIT: Oh. I did set check the box for "Only Deform Bones" in the FBX export from Blender. Not sure if that made any difference.
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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Exported from Blender FBX is unstable. It might open 4 times and then starts crashing thereafter. Something has to do with eyebrows. If you delete that mesh, export is stable and always opens fine.
So start looking into it. Also, the texture for eyebrows has .jpg extension, while file itself is a PNG file (it might not really be a problem, but has to be fixed anyway).
Advise: Before the export, set the pose to the "rest pose" and do not use detected Mixamo auto-convert in 3DXchange. Settle with manual conversion.
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Thanks for responding so quickly guys!
I wanted to wait until I had a chance to play around with it before I responded.
So I tried exporting the character using the "only deform bones" selected in Blender.
I'm going to ask my designer about the eyebrow mesh issue and texture.
I was able to import the character using the check box for ignore name space and import animation, but he came out looking kind of deformed:
Am I doing something incorrectly?
Also - I manually selected bones, but it won't let me convert?
Thanks again for the help, guys!
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Actually I see why it won't let me convert now. Not all the bones are selected. But the head bone is missing so I can't finish the mapping.
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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I went ahead and fixed it for you. It is beyond me figuring out what was wrong with eyebrows and whether or not it is a Blender or 3DX problem.
So I just did join the eyebrows with the skin and everything fell in place.
Export to FBX with all the default settings and optionally uncheck Add Leaf Bones.
I also included 3DX profile for easy bones mapping. Just load the file in 3DX.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/jpz3pwz4riezoqd/tonni_%20rig.zip?dl=0
Side note: Ask your developer to fix issues with texture (there are more than one in file extensions) and mesh for watches - there is an overlapping mesh and they are not fitted precisely.
Here is a guy in iClone..
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Thank you so much for that, 4u2ges!
When I exported from your blender file I used the presets, turned off leaf bones, and only selected armature and mesh:
But when I imported the fbx into 3dXchange I got the character with no color or textures:
Is there something I'm doing wrong in the exporting process or in the importing process?
Also thank you so much for the 3DX bone profile! It works perfectly!
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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But where did you open that blender file from? I only included .blend file. So you have to place that file beneath Resources folder with texture before opening in order for the texture to be mapped correctly.
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Awesome! Thank you!
I appreciate your patience with me!
I got it with almost all the textures into iClone7, but a few are missing:
But they are in the textures folder:
Is there something more I have to do?
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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That is what I meant, when I said you need to talk to your designer/developer. While Blender would *pardon* those inconsistencies, 3DX/iClone would not.
Some of things you may fix yourself though. But first you have to reveal file extensions in Windows Explorer.
highlights (cabello material) - has .JPG file extension, but the image is actually a PNG. Need to change extension to PNG and reassign the texture (can be done in iClone)
bracelet (reloj material) - this is a known iClone bug with 32 bit PNG texture maps. Just drag the map in material Texture Settings into different slot (AO for instance) and then drag it from AO back to Base Color slot. Delete map in AO.
emblem (Material.001) - texture file has an interchange file extension - .JFIF. Need to change to .JPG and assign texture to Base Color slot.
watch - there is a face overlap after bridging. Center piece needs to be straighten and then UV map fixed as well. And also overall better positioning on a hand. Your designer needs to fix it in Blender.
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Oh ok.
File Extensions
So I allowed "show file extensions" in windows explorer:
And unchecked hide extensions for known file types:
But the highlights still show as a jpeg, am I doing something incorrectly??:
Hair
I changed the highlights to a .png - and added it to the texture settings in iClone:
But it didn't seem to add the highlights. Can you let me know what I'm missing?
Bracelet
I dragged the bracelet to the AO and got a faint version of the texture:
But when I removed it from AO it disappeared:
Emblem
I changed the emblem to a jpeg and placed the emblem in the material.001 for it and it appears faint as well:
When I place it in the AO as well it appears slightly darker:
But when I remove it from AO it stays faint.
Questions Summary
How do I know that the hair is supposed to be a PNG instead of a Jpeg? Did I select the correct options to show extensions because it still showed as a jpeg when I selected the option?
Is there something other than adding the highlights to the base color that I have to do for it to appear on the character?
Is there something more I have to do for the bracelet and emblem as they appear too faint?
Thank you again for all your help! Hoping all this will help me grow and learn so I can avoid these issues in the future :)
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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When I suspect that the binary file type does not correspond to the given file extension, I open it in text editor (notepad, notepad++,.. etc) and look at the first couple of lines.
In most of the cases it pretty much gives an idea of what file it is.
In the workflow fixing the 32 bit PNG, you missed one step. That is before deleting AO map, you had to drag it back from AO to the Base Color (overriding it).
Doing so would place it into the opacity map slot as well (note, this is only for 32 bit PNG).
But that would not work well anyway because there was a UV>mesh inconsistency.
I have enclosed fixed version of blend file as well as .Avatar (with my choice of materials assignment). I also through in some additional normal maps for the watch and emblem in iClone.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/sxe0q3cby4jms7n/TONY.zip?dl=1
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By Rampa - 5 Years Ago
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Are the various parts of your model correctly UV mapped? If there is no UV, no texture will display, only the material color.
Also Blender textures always import at 80 percent strength, giving a washed-out look. Select the diffuse texture square, and make sure the strength slider is at 100 percent.
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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Rampa (2/1/2020)
Also Blender textures always import at 80 percent strength, giving a washed-out look. Select the diffuse texture square, and make sure the strength slider is at 100 percent.
Fortunately, starting with Blender 2.8 that is no longer a problem.
I did not like the watch band texture and updated it..
https://www.dropbox.com/s/sxe0q3cby4jms7n/TONY.zip?dl=1
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Wow!
Thanks so much, 4u2ges! You're super knowledgeable and have a great eye for design. The new band and chain texture look awesome!
And thanks, Rampa for your help as well!
This character is based of this original design I made:
The intention is to use these character models to create an online comic on webtoons (and eventually perhaps expand into mobile games using the models) - so I really appreciate the help!
I'm currently using a designer from fiverr who thankfully was nice enough to continue trying to fix his issues even after the job was finished. I would like to figure out what I should tell him to avoid these issues in the future as I'll definitely need more characters and his price is very good for a character with a rig.
What would be the best way to explain to him how to avoid the texture and mesh issues? And how did you discover the eyebrow mesh issue that caused the crashing?
I'd also like the characters to have face mapping so I can control and use expressions with iClone presets. I understand that this can be done in 3dxchange also, but the character needs face bones for it to work.
The original bone structure that my designer gave me included face bones, but he removed them after we had the original issue (instead opting for mixamo-like bone structure) which, Rampa - I believe I was working with you on in the support ticket.
What specific bones do I need to have on the character to allow face mapping to work as well as they can?
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By Rampa - 5 Years Ago
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You will likely save yourself a lot of headache just creating the characters in CC3 Pipeline. That way it already would have all the blendshapes for facial animation, and you could just have the clothing made in OBJ by your artist. Then you can auto-rig the clothing right in CC3 Pipeline. Hair too!
Like this:
But you can use the Expression Editor in 3DXchange to setup your facial rig, either with blendshapes, or bone movement.
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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Very nice job with character design I must say. Good luck with your project.
Now for the future I'd recommend to have the least possible objects in the rig. IMO, only those need to be set as an accessory (detachable) should be a separate objects.
The rest should be consolidated as a single mesh (separated by UV/Materials only). Eyebrows seems to be a simple, clean mesh. And I still have no idea why it was causing a problem.
I found it was a problem by stripping portions of mesh in Blend file and exporting to FBX until I narrowed it down to eyebrows as a cause of the problem.
Now the face rig is a whole different story. You probably need to get back to the original blend file with face bones. In that file try to merge parts of the body including eyebrows and see if that works well with export.
Number of bones for the face would be commented with face expression requirements. It could be as simple as opening/closing eye and mouth to as complex as visemes and extensive face muscle movements.
And mind the texture file types, now that you know :)
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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4u2ges, if I had my designer start off with the blender file you fixed and sent me would that be a good starting point to add the facial bones?
Rampa, it'd be much easier to make the character myself with Character Creator (which I do own as well), but I had trouble making the characters in the cartoony style I'm using. Do you know of any way to get it close to the designs I have?
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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I am not sure how your designer has done it in the first place. Whether they used template rig and just sculpted a character, or has made it from the scratch. Better ask them.
But to make a CC character (which is the method I would also preferred), the designer needs to be familiar with CC and have an access to it.
For skilled artist there is not much work to sculpt an OBJ exported from a standard CC body mesh and then import it back to CC as a morph. And then texture work.
Character tight cloth is even easier - body mesh extract and slight trim. Accessories, shoes, hair you already have - just need to be fit.
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By Rampa - 5 Years Ago
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You can send your texture to an external editor, or use the internal color adjuster. See these two help pages.
https://manual.reallusion.com/Character_Creator_3/ENU/3/Content/Character_Creator_3/3/15_Multiple_Channel_Texture_Mapping/Modifying_Texture_Settings_Basic.htm
https://manual.reallusion.com/Character_Creator_3/ENU/3/Content/Character_Creator_3/3/15_Multiple_Channel_Texture_Mapping/Using_Adjust_Color_Panel.htm
Same procedure for body skin materials. Double-clicking a texture square also lets you load a new texture.
You right-click drag an image into your scene to create an image plane. Scale and position it to use for modelling morphing/modelling your character. Or you GOZ it to Zbrush, or export an OBJ to sculpt in some other software for re-import as a morph, as 4u2ges mentioned.
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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Rampa reminded me about something...
While the hardest part is to sculpt the head, you have a great advantage by already possessing a character (not to mention since you have designed it, you may already have a high resolution head snapshot of your character ).
If you have a head-shot plugin, you may very well use it to create a head of your character with much less hassle.
Here is I've setup lights and took a snapshot of your character in iClone and then spent 15 minutes with head-shot plugin to generate the head.
Extracted the hair from Blend file and imported as an accessory into CC.
With head-shot plugin you have endless possibilities to sculpt the head and then body (which is a lot easier to make than the head).
iClone snapshot of the original character. I had to hide the hair, and add eyebrows in Photoshop (since I merged hair and eyebrows materials in the first place :doze: )
And this is a quick work in CC with head-shot and added hair
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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That looks awesome, 4u2ges! I'll have to get the free trial and try to get it working as you did!
And so what I gather from what you guys are saying - I can export a character from Character Creator have my designer morph the character to match my design, and then import it back as a morph?
So for example:
-I could have a character that matches the build mostly
-export the character (as an object?)
- have my designer morph his face to look more like my character design
- then import (the character? The object?) as a morph? Is that an easy process?
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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Fairly easy. I have 1.5m tut on this one.
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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That's a great simple tutorial! You guys are awesome.
1.) So when you export from blender you get the .obj and the .objkey?
2.) And would you recommend that I export the character without hair for my designer to morph before adding it back as a morph slider?
3.) I would add any hair he makes as an object like the video "creating clothing from obj files" that Rampa put here 2 days ago?
4.) Also, 4u2ges - can you show me how you were able to make head looking cartoony with the headshot plugin?
I got the free trial and was trying to do it as you did:
But he came out way too realistic looking haha:
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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Well, you certainly getting there.
1. No, the .objkey is generated when you export from CC. Then you use that key to import the mesh back as a morph.
2. When you export Nude in T-pose, it does not export any cloth, or hair, or accessories by default (even if character is fully dressed).
3. At the end, yes. You would bring it in, fit it and *weight* to the head as a hair.
4. I only changed material for left/right Cornea, switching from realistic Digital shader type to Traditional and set the opacity map strength for eyelashes to 0.
I would recommend using Pro mode for better quality and more options if you go with Head-shot plugin.
Over 1K additional morph sliders, which come with plugin (or might have to be purchased separately - don't remember already) makes it very easy for skilled (and not so skilled like me :)) artist to sculpt the head as close as possible to the *original*.
There are some useful RL and users tutorials can be found here: https://forum.reallusion.com/427885/Headshot-tutorials-hints-and-tips?PageIndex=1
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Thanks for all the answers and that link to the tutorials!
When I send the object to my designer - would he be able to change the skin texture as well to make it more cartoony?
If not - what would the best way to allow him to fix the texture for the mesh so they'll have that stylized look?
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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Yes, the object comes with base maps and .mtl file. The rest is just up to the designer to customize those maps.
Just export any character from CC toNude OBJ and inspect the exported structure.
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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I was trying to import the hair, but ran into some issues:
In the tutorial Rampa put up - the way to import objects is by selecting Create->Cloth,hair,accessories and then selecting the .obj file.
When I tried to do that it wouldn't show any of the object files and would only allow fbx files:
When I try Create->Accessory it allows obj file types:
But when I add it the hair doesn't appear and under the avatar it appears as glasses?
How did you import the hair? And why doesn't the Clothes, hair, and accessories not allow obj files?
Thanks again for the support! :)
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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I have not seen mentioned tutorial, but I believe you misunderstood.
"Create Cloth Hair Acc (with FBX key)" is restricted to bringing FBX character (previously exported out of CC) with cloth, hair or accessory added to it in some 3rd party program.
You cannot bring an item alone (even in FBX format) with this option.
"Accessory" is the only way to bring anything into CC alone and then optionally convert it to Cloth/Hair or have it retain an accessory status (that is the option I used for the hair).
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Thanks for clearing that up!
Here's the tutorial Rampa put up in earlier in this thread that I was referring to: [YouTube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=795&v=nsE5qJP2xAI&feature=emb_logo[/YouTube]
I tried importing using the accessories as you stated, but nothing seems to appear even though it appears in the scene as an accessory:
I even had the hair attached to the base head (thinking maybe it didn't show because it was attached to the pelvis - as the online manual also mentions):
I'm not sure if it's an issue with how I'm importing it or how I exported it from blender!
Here's the exported hair from blender (obj and mtl file): https://drive.google.com/file/d/18IXHqrX3Na0FqDiQZS6ht1T_a9KZCW4c/view?usp=sharing
Is there something I'm doing incorrectly?
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By Rampa - 5 Years Ago
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Blender OBJs are usually 1000 times to small. Try scaling it up! ;)
You can change the export scale in Blender if you would like it to come in bigger initially. FBX will be properly scaled, unless you change it.
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Thanks, Rampa! You were right - it was incredibly tiny which is why it looked like it wasn't there! haha
When I scaled it up it finally appeared:
I do have a few more questions:
When I tried importing the fbx (as I wouldn't need to scale it) I noticed the highlights weren't there:
I checked the texture file and it was there:
I even tried changing the texture to something completely wrong just to see if it would do anything, but it didn't affect the hair at all:
Is there something specific that's needed to be done when importing accessories as fbx files?
Also - when I import the obj base mode into blender I see that it creates the object file, the mtl file, and a folder with all the textures - but when I import it into blender it doesn't load any of the textures:
I do have the mtl file, obj file, objkey file, all in the same folder as the texture file folder that was created so I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong there:
So in summary, my two questions are:
1.) What should I do to get the fbx accessory to have textures (specifically the highlights in this case)?
2.) How do I get the obj file, when imported into blender, to show the textures from the mtl and texture folder that is created when I export the base model from Character Creator?
Once again - thank you for all your help guys!
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Actually I answered question #2 - there was an option in the viewport that allowed you to see textures (the small globe in the upper right corner).
But now my new question # 2 is why does the character base model that I exported look like he has huge eyelashes?
On the right is the character base model I exported as an object and on the left is what the character object looks like when imported into blender:
So to update my questions:
1.) (Remains the same) - 1.) What should I do to get the fbx accessory to have textures (specifically the highlights in this case)?
2.) (New): Why does the base character model object have huge eyebrows when I import him into blender?
Thanks again, guys!
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By dogscooby007 - 5 Years Ago
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Sorry my mistake... still learning! haha
So I answered question 2 again - I must've done something with the eyelashes, but the opacity caused me not to see it haha
I fixed the eyelashes and exported the object file again and got this (much better haha):
So now it's only the one question:
1.)What should I do to get the fbx accessory to have textures (specifically the highlights in this case)? :)
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By 4u2ges - 5 Years Ago
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It always comes down to material settings (whether in Blender or CC). Black usually means you have a black diffuse color which effectively overrides the texture.
And for the future - Black Ambient (below diffuse) color would effectively stop Glow map from emitting the light (if you ever need it).
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