3dsmax MDX Exporter - Supports Animations

did use bones
did set frame rate at 960
didn't use skin(don't YET know how)
didn't read readme(Yet)

I have a problem with my animations. For a test I made pole that was connected to two bones that connected at the middle of the pole. I edited the skin to make the pole move correctly when animated. The top piece rotates side to side around the middle. But ingame its stretched and the top rotates from below the middle to ground and to the other side.

This probably didnt give you much idea of what im talking about so.

MMEoD, search through the tutorials that come with 3dsmax and you will find plenty of info on how the skin modifier works
targash, i looked at the mdx but i still have no idea what you were trying to do emote_sweat - perhaps you could send me the .max

well I hade the same problem when I tested repubs script
you "must" create the bone in the left view of 3ds max
and the 2nd creation point must be over the 1st

if you create the bone in a other view you get rotation problems like you have right now

the second rule don't create bonechains and don't link bones

you can use more than one bone for an objekt but you have to rotate and move every singel one

so have fun with the script

C U Ced

republicola i think cedalvin solved the problem.
I did almost everything wrong according to that list. Left view was the only correct thing

here a explanation for the rotation bug
but isn't realy important

well its not repubs fault that the rotation problem comes up
the mdl and i think the mdx as well saves only the pivot position not the alignment
so its important that the pivots are in the correct neutral position since 3ds max saves the position of the bone and not the change since the last keyframe
unfortunately you can't cange the pivots alignment without changing the alignment of the bone which you can on normal objekts

the problem with the chains is still something I don't know about
the only thing I know is that the exporter for milkshape from kdub can use bonechains
but it supports only one geoset yet

C U Ced

bone chains should work
i think i have fixed the UVW problem but I'm waiting for nicoli_s to test the new version for me
i will release soon

i had a rotation problem also but i was too good for the mdl
edited the bone rotation and it started working

thats what i get for creating a bone on perspective and not the left view ............

i showed it

rotated on x and not the z like suppsed too in mdl the rotation was set on the x so i just copied all x to z and converted and BOOM it was working correctly

MMEoD did you use bonechains?
and did they work ?

C U Ced

OK, the new version with the fixed UVW export can be found here:
http://www.geocities.com/blank_vtek/
this also has a button that you can press instead of typing in the line of code above - remember to select all bones and helpers before pressing it
nicoli_s will soon release a good tutorial about how to use it

-- kdub, plz upload this one to your site

yet another update! this one fixed some issues with rotation (unfortunately, not all of them) and the error that make you run the script twice, and one more error that a few people got

i think this was what Cedalvin was talking about, but it was kind of unclear: If you have a bone (bone x) linked to another bone (bone y), for rotations, bone x will use bone y's pivot point
basicly, dont use bone chains (especially long ones) for rotation, because they will become distorted when put into wc3
i am still tring to figure out exacly how this works, and until then, you will have to comply with the above statement :(

http://www.geocities.com/blank_vtek/

here little comparison how bones look in the mdl

bone in a chain from Republicola

Bone "latz_v_m" {
ObjectId 13,
Parent 14,
GeosetId 0,
GeosetAnimId None,
Rotation 26 {
Linear,
0: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
133: { -0.121869, -6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
134: { -0.121858, -6.48323e-007, 0.0, 0.992548 },
384: { 0.121869, 6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
634: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
883: { -0.121869, -6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
884: { -0.121858, -6.48323e-007, 0.0, 0.992548 },
1134: { 0.121869, 6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
1384: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
1633: { -0.121869, -6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
1634: { -0.121858, -6.48323e-007, 0.0, 0.992548 },
1800: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
1832: { -0.121869, -6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
1833: { -0.121858, -6.48323e-007, 0.0, 0.992548 },
2083: { 0.121869, 6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
2333: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
2582: { -0.121869, -6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
2583: { -0.121858, -6.48323e-007, 0.0, 0.992548 },
2833: { 0.121869, 6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
3083: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
3332: { -0.121869, -6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
3333: { -0.121858, -6.48323e-007, 0.0, 0.992548 },
3583: { 0.121869, 6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
3833: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
4082: { -0.121869, -6.48384e-007, 0.0, 0.992546 },
4083: { -0.121858, -6.48323e-007, 0.0, 0.992548 },
}
}

single Bone from Republicola

Bone "hand_li" {
ObjectId 5,
GeosetId 0,
GeosetAnimId None,
Translation 7 {
Bezier,
0: { -0.0734925, 0.0, 0.512463 },
InTan { -0.0734925, 0.0, 0.512463 },
OutTan { -0.0734925, 0.0, 0.512463 },
100: { -0.0610144, 0.0, 0.155239 },
InTan { -0.0610144, 0.0, 0.155239 },
OutTan { -0.0610144, 0.0, 0.155239 },
600: { -20.5277, 0.0, 5.34136 },
InTan { -20.5277, 0.0, 5.34136 },
OutTan { -20.5277, 0.0, 5.34136 },
1100: { 5.12424, -1.90735e-006, 1.24771 },
InTan { -3.64557, -1.17493e-006, 1.24771 },
OutTan { 13.894, -2.63977e-006, 1.24771 },
1600: { 25.1484, -3.8147e-006, 14.9497 },
InTan { 25.1484, -3.8147e-006, 14.9497 },
OutTan { 25.1484, -3.8147e-006, 14.9497 },
1850: { 14.5293, -1.90735e-006, 4.44906 },
InTan { 24.1863, -3.37219e-006, 10.1897 },
OutTan { 4.87231, -4.42505e-007, -1.29161 },
2100: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0 },
InTan { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0 },
OutTan { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0 },
}
Rotation 5 {
Linear,
0: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
100: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
600: { 0.0, 0.258819, 0.0, 0.965926 },
1600: { -1.27401e-007, -0.5, 0.0, 0.866025 },
2100: { 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 },
}
}


bone in a chain from kdub

Bone "ellenbogen li" {
ObjectId 14,
Parent 13,
GeosetId Multiple,
GeosetAnimId None,
Translation 14 {
Linear,
41: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
2291: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
2750: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
3000: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
4000: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
4500: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
5250: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
7041: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
7500: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
7791: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
8750: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
9291: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
9750: { -0.000007, 0.000000, 0.000011 },
10250: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 },
}
Rotation 14 {
Linear,
41: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 },
2291: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 },
2750: { 0.000000, -0.121869, 0.000000, 0.992546 },
3000: { 0.000000, -0.121869, 0.000000, 0.992546 },
4000: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 },
4500: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 },
5250: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 },
7041: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 },
7500: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 },
7791: { 0.000000, -0.199368, 0.000000, 0.979925 },
8750: { 0.000000, -0.199368, 0.000000, 0.979925 },
9291: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 },
9750: { 0.000000, -0.165048, 0.000000, 0.986286 },
10250: { 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 },
}
}

bone in a chain from Blizzard

Bone "Cone11" {
ObjectId 19,
Parent 18, // "Mesh02"
GeosetId 0,
GeosetAnimId 0,
Rotation 7 {
Hermite,
12500: { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653428, 0.981627 },
InTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653428, 0.981627 },
OutTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653428, 0.981627 },
13667: { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653428, 0.981627 },
InTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653428, 0.981627 },
OutTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653428, 0.981627 },
18833: { -0.0172725, 0.0432919, 0.0736449, 0.996195 },
InTan { -0.0207932, 0.0521164, 0.0886565, 0.994481 },
OutTan { -0.0197983, 0.0496227, 0.0844143, 0.994997 },
20000: { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653427, 0.981627 },
InTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653427, 0.981627 },
OutTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653427, 0.981627 },
20433: { -0.185845, -0.0189551, 0.104815, 0.976789 },
InTan { -0.188403, -0.0149451, 0.115302, 0.975185 },
OutTan { -0.187897, -0.015742, 0.11322, 0.975514 },
21100: { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653427, 0.981627 },
InTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653427, 0.981627 },
OutTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653427, 0.981627 },
92200: { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653428, 0.981627 },
InTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653428, 0.981627 },
OutTan { -0.176023, -0.033976, 0.0653428, 0.981627 },
}
Scaling 6 {
Linear,
7000: { 1, 1, 1 },
7767: { 1, 1, 1 },
7800: { 0.0409784, 0.0409784, 0.0409784 },
11733: { 0.0409784, 0.0409784, 0.0409784 },
11767: { 1, 1, 1 },
12267: { 1, 1, 1 },
}
}

perhaps that will help a little
this are bones from repubs first version (a haven't testet the new one yet)
since yesterday I know that kdub has the rotation problem too
(unfortunately only the axis I tested was working)
or I made a mistake since I used global and lokal rotation
but the bonechain is working

C U Ced

:/
i need help with 2 problems, plz help any1 if u can

1. I seem to have a problem converting big files, when i try to convert simple file (like a box with 1 bone and 1 anim) it converts without a problem, but when i try big things(like a complex object with 18 bones and 5 helpers) it crashes max after converting.

i think it finishes converting though, because the file works as an mdx in warcraft

2. I Just can't get the textures to work :/
in the mdl file this is what i get as far as textures go:


Textures 1 {
Bitmap {
Image "",
ReplaceableId 1,
}
}
Materials 1 {
Material {
Layer {
FilterMode Transparent,
static TextureID 0,
}
}
}


can any1 help me with this? what am i doing wrong?


:////

Help me out here. When I try to run your script, it gives me an error. Attached is a picture. What's going on?

ok, it seems that what i said about bone chains was completely wrong. they work fine, its a problem with my exporter (much thx to kdub for figuring out what was wrong). This is mostly fixed and ill release a new version soon.
sump, with more complicated models, it can take much longer to export. for the textures, remove the whole ReplacableId 1, line and put the path to your texture in the quotation marks where it says Image "",
TiJiL, that is the first time ive seen that error and i dont know what is causing it. i will look into it and hopefully be able to fix it in the next version