I/Ogre - Cinema 4D Import/Export Plugin

[Spanki]

Hi folks,

I've been working on a new Import/Export plugin for Cinema 4D and have just posted the first release, which can be found at Spanki's Prop Shop.

The plugin reads and writes .mesh.xml and .skeleton.xml files (including skeletal animation), with the option of converting to binary format when Exporting, using the external converter program.

The plugin is being distributed as a commercial product, but a fully functional 30-Day Trial period is available by entering DEMO as a license key. I am also offering special Introductory Pricing for a limited time.

The original thread has some additional details and somewhat of a development log, but the most up to date information can be found in the included documentation and/or by just downloading the demo and kicking the tires .

EDIT: The links in this post (including the I/Ogre Product Page and User Manual) have images in them, but just so this thread has something different, here is Psionic 3D's free "Beast" figure, Imported into Cinema 4D with my up-coming MilkShape3D (.ms3d) file plugin, then Exported to Ogre .mesh/.skeleton format using the I/Ogre plugin and finally loaded into ajs' "Player Demo"...



...(note that I/Ogre doesn't currently Export any .material file - so I created a simple one by hand for the above example).

The original file had non-descriptive bone/joint names, so I renamed all of those. The original file also had separate mesh objects (submeshes) for each leg, the tongue, the eyes, etc., so I combined them all into a single mesh and re-weighted the joints before Exporting. Here's what the C4D Object manager looked like when I exported (most of the Joint branches are folded up to save room)...



...note that the (selected) Figure Export Tag is set up with specific root filenames (so it didn't use the figure's root-level object name "beast5x") and the appropriate links to the Skeleton Root Bone and Anim Clip Tag are filled in as well...



Cheers,

Keith

[Zero]

Hi
nice work you have done there

But one of the 3D-Artists from my team who wanted to try your plugin cant get it to work.
He use the 64bit ersion and gets everytime error and C4D when he want to use your plugin ...

Here you can see the Error Message, I hope you can help!


Zero

[Spanki]

Hi Zero,

Thanks for the report - but the image link is not working. Could you e-mail that image to me? typhoon [at] jetbroadband [dot] com

Thanks,

Keith

[Zero]

Ok
I have sended you teh e-mail!

Zero

[Spanki]

Got it - thanks!

Check your e-mail. I'd like to get him/her to try that debug version of the plugin and send me any new BugReport.txt file you might get so I can figure out where it's crashing.

Thanks,

Keith

[Spanki]

Thanks Zero - I think I finally found the problem.

Everyone,

The current v1.0 build has a bug when using the "All Visible Objects" option (assuming there's more than one root-level object in the scene). I have found/fixed the bug, but am also in the middle of adding new features, so I'll try to get the fix/new version uploaded later today. In the meantime, to work around this bug you can either:

- Use the "Selected Object Only" option instead of "All Visible Objects" or...
- don't have more than one root-level object in the scene Object Manager hierarchy

...sorry for the trouble,

Keith

[Spanki]

Sorry for the delay - right after my last post (literally), my monitor died on me. I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening researching how to best resolve the situation with the funds I didn't have to spend ~sigh~.

Anyway, water under the bridge... the new version is now available:

I/Ogre version 1.1 is now available in the downloads section at Spanki's Prop Shop. This update primarily fixes a crash bug when exporting multiple mesh/figure files, but also adds some new functionality. The details are below...

v1.1

• Bug Fix: Fixed a crash bug when exporting multiple meshes/figures at once.
• Added Invert X Axis and Invert Z Axis options to Import Options Dialog.
• Added Invert X Axis and Invert Z Axis options to Export Options Dialog.
• Added Swap Y/Z X Axis to Export Options Dialog (disabled for now).
• Increased floating point resolution in all output files.
• The above fix also fixed some zero vertex->bone weight values.

See the included/updated User Manual .pdf file for details.

This is a free update for all registered users.

[Spanki]

I/Ogre version 1.2 is now available in the downloads section of my site. This update adds a few new features, as well as some clean-up. The details are below...

v1.2

• New Feature: “Binary ↔ XML” menu plug-in added.
• New Feature: “Swap Y/Z Axis” is now Enabled as an Export Option.
• Presets: a few 'default' options were updated.
• Export: Resolved potential root bone parent issue when exporting (see the Release Notes section of the included PDF User Manual for details).
• Export: 'root bone' axis are now adjusted for global Cinema 4D adjustments (see the Release Notes section of the included PDF User Manual for details).
• Import: Submesh names are now more cleanly and clearly tied to the material being used on that mesh, when no submesh names exist to override the name.

See the included/updated User Manual .pdf file for details.

This is a free update for all registered users (free 30-day Trial available for everyone else).

[Spanki]

...Since I've basically had zero feedback on the plug-in (erm, aside from Zero's report, above - thanks again, Zero), the above will be the last update for a while, to give people a chance to use/try it and provide any feedback (as well as hopefully purchase a license if they find it useful). Obviously if I hear of any bugs, I'll make efforts to fix them ASAP, but so far, I have to assume it's working perfectly (sure it is! ), because none have been reported.

If you want to report any bugs or experiences or make suggestions for any future enhancements, please sign up for a free account and use the I/Ogre Support Forums at my site. I will also be monitoring this thread.

In the meantime, I plan to go back and finish up my MilkShape 3D (.ms3d) file plug-in .

Cheers,

Keith

[Spanki]

Time to tease... some changes/additions are coming...



...yep - a VALVe:Source engine .SMD file (Half-Life 2, "Orange Box" games, etc) Import option. After selecting a .smd file, the plugin determines whether it's a 'reference' .smd file (ie. includes mesh/rigging data) or an 'animation' .smd file (no mesh, just skeletal animation) and prompts with the appropriate dialog...



...after loading the 'reference' file, you'll end up with the same type of rigged figure setup that the Ogre .mesh + .skeleton Import give you...



...once you have that in your scene, you can add/append one or more animation .smd files, using the other dialog...



...and here's a shot of the "urban_reference" figure, from the VALVe:Source SDK, in mid "Run_Shoot_M4" animation...



...the .smd Exporter will be added after I tidy up some loose ends (I'll likely post a version with just the Importer in the meantime) and some other changes are coming as well - more details on next release.

This and other planned changes will be a 'free' upgrade to all registered users. I can't promise that the price-point will stay where it is (or how long it will), but/so if you find the plugin useful and want to get in while the Introductory Pricing is still in effect, now's a good time .

Cheers,

Keith

[Spanki]

I/Ogre version 1.3 is now available in the downloads section of my site. This update marks a change of focus for the plug-in...

While the original plug-in was written to only support the Ogre3D .mesh and .skeleton file formats, with this update, it now also supports importing VALVe:Source Engine “.smd” files (used by the Source SDK, which comes with and can be used to create mods for VALVe games), as well as importing MilkShape3D “.ms3d” files (Export modules are planned for both of those as well).

The new focus of the plug-in is providing a set of Game-Oriented Digital Content Creation Tools – something Cinema 4D is currently lacking. Because these formats are fairly specific in nature, they are often the best file-exchange formats to use when dealing with game-oriented content. The original plan was to provide these as separate plug-ins, but I have decided to go with the “swiss-army-knife” approach, for added value and convenience.

Other details are listed below...

v1.3

• New Feature: Can now Import VALVe:Source Engine .smd files (both reference/mesh and skeletal animation files - Export module coming soon).
• New Feature: Can now Import MilkShape3D binary .ms3d files (including mesh, skeleton, materials and skeletal animation - PC only, currently - Export module coming soon).
• Ogre-Import: Depending on exactly which options were set, uv-mapping was sometimes reversed (completely wrong) on every triangle – fixed.
• Fixed a few potential initialization issues, along with some general code clean-up.

See the included/updated User Manual .pdf file for details.

This is a free update for all registered users (free 30-day Trial available for everyone else).

[Sheba]

Hi Spanky,

are you planning to add exporting of materials in the nearer future? For me that might be an argument to buy your exporter

[Spanki]

Hi Spanky,

are you planning to add exporting of materials in the nearer future? For me that might be an argument to buy your exporter

Hi Sheba,

At this point, I haven't fully investigated Ogre materials to determine what might be 'useful' information to export. In other words, the .material files don't really bear any relation to Materials in Cinema 4D, aside from having the name of some texture file, so any feature like that would mostly just be a convenience feature, that regergitated (sp) data that the user typed in to start with (ie. Cinema 4D likely won't be much use in 'generating' materials/vertex shaders/etc).

matches81 had some useful suggestions related to this back in the other thread, but I hadn't had the time to look into it yet. If you have suggestions related to this as well, please let me know and I'll keep them in mind when I get to that work.

The current, short-term / immediate-future schedule is:

- implementing '.smd' file Export module.
- implementing '.ms3d' file Export module.

...I have some other additions in mind that I'm not ready to mention yet, but I'll re-evaluate the order everything else gets worked on after the above two items are taken care of.

Thanks,

Keith

[Spanki]

I/Ogre version 1.4 is now available in the downloads section at Spanki's Prop Shop.

This update adds VALVe:Source Engine .smd file Export capabilities (in addition to the Import module from the previous release).

Other details are listed below...

v1.4

• New Feature: Now Includes VALVe:Source Engine .smd File Export module. Be sure to read the notes section of the User Manual on this feature for some important details.
• Ogre-Export: Fixed memory leak when Exporting Ogre3D .mesh files (depending on some export options).
• SMD-Import: Fixed some issues related to Figure Tag updating (if you imported a second reference mesh, the Skeleton Root Bone link on the previous figure/document was being cleared by accident).
• General: some general clean-up of a few dialog/menu option strings/labels and some other internal maintenance.

See the included/updated User Manual .pdf file for details.

This is a free update for all registered users (free 30-day Trial available for everyone else).

[Spanki]

I/Ogre version 1.5 is now available in the downloads section of my site.

This update adds Export capabilities for MilkShape3D binary .ms3d files. In addition, both the .ms3d Import and Export modules are now available in the Mac plugin.

The other main addition to this version is some additional options for (and better implementation of) Animation / Keyframe Import and Export. Details below...

v1.5

MilkShape3D:

• New Feature: Now Includes MilkShape3D binary .ms3d File Export module.
• Mac plug-in: Both the Import and (new) Export modules have been ported to and are now available on the Mac platform. [NOTE: these have not been thoroughly tested, so please report any problems].
• Import: Previous versions of the plug-in ignored the “Document Frames Per Second” value on the Import Options Dialog - the value stored in the .ms3d file was used instead. This update let's you choose between using the value stored in the file or setting it manually.

Common:

• Keyframing:
  
  The Animation / Keyframe system (commonly used by all Import/Export modules) has been enhanced to generate and maintain more accurate/stable animations. In previous releases, the keyframe parser (when Importing) always applied a particular key-reduction method to the keys being read in, in an attempt to minimize the total number of keys used, without affecting the animation.
  
  Unfortunately, a side-effect of the method being used did in fact affect some animations (the details are a bit technical, but it depended on how the before/after tangents of the curves ended up being set up). The above-mentioned key-reduction has been disabled in this version – all imported keys are now kept and created in the C4D time-line. This should eliminate any odd bone 'drift' that you may have seen (on Imported files) before.
  
  On a related note, my previous suggestions/instructions for using IK and other methods for creating animations turned out to be misleading and/or incomplete (keep in mind that I am primarily a programmer and not personally an experienced animator).
  
  The above issue led to some new options that can be set on the Figure Export Tag...
  
  - “Bake Animation”: The Figure Export Tag now has an option/checkbox to allow baking keyframes. See the Export Preparation / Figure Export Tag section for details.
  
  - “Key Reduction”: This is an enhanced version of my original method, but is only used for Export (I'll try to back-fit the code as an Import option in a future update). See the Export Preparation / Figure Export Tag section for details.
• Animation Clip Tag: You can now create more than one of these on the same object at the same time (previously, you'd have to place them on separate objects).
• Vertex Weighting: Starting with this update, any bone/joint that influences a vertex by less than 1% (0.01 weighting) is now ignored by the various Export modules and the remaining joint weights are scaled up/down appropriately... the total weight from all joints influencing each vertex is scaled to 100%.
• Floating Point Precision: One of the earlier updates increased the floating point precision from 3 digits after the decimal to 8 digits for any text-based format files. With this update, that has been scaled back to 6 digits after the decimal (ie. 0.000001 (one one-millionth) resolution, which should be sufficient for most purposes and makes the output files smaller).

See the included/updated User Manual (.pdf file) for details.

This is a free update for all registered users (free 30-day Trial available for everyone else).

[Spanki]

In an effort to bring native game asset development tools to Cinema 4D at a price both hobbiests and professional developers can afford, I have decided to reduce the price of the I/Ogre plug-in from the already low $40.00, down to just $25.00 USD.

This decision was a tough one for me - if I could afford to give away these plug-ins for free, I'd do that, but it's how I (try to) make a living and put food on the table... I realize that these are tough times for everyone, so I hope this price-reduction will make the plug-in accessable to everyone who finds it useful.

Cheers,

Keith

[redhead]

Well this plugin looks VERY nice.
But I can't afford to buy it, $25 is almost almost price of an ordinary game in my country and I am a student... (and i think its a bit too much for a plugin, but I understand you make a living from that)
Still hoping for some Lite version only with mesh and basic animation export (import is not that important) for free. Hm?

[Spanki]

Sorry, but it's just not worth the time and effort I've put into this plugin to price it any lower. When I first started work on this, my plan was to charge $50.00 for just the Ogre3D modules. Since that time, I've cut the price in half, added two additional file-formats and generated a 70+ page manual. If it can't generate sales at this level, then I'll have to allocate my time to other projects (that's just the situation I'm in).

I realize that people want stuff for free whenever possible, but... $25.00 USD is a very low price for Cinema 4D plugins (the ones that aren't free, that is). Heck, my .obj Import/Export plugin sells for twice that much and it only supports a single file format (one that Cinema 4D already has built-in support for). Obviously only you can decide if the features/functionality the plugin provides is worth a few $$ (half-a-game, dinner-for-3-at-McDonalds, a-couple-6-packs, 2-bargain-bin-dvds, some-other-new-toy, or-whatever) to you - and I don't mean to cast any judgement with any of the above - sadly, everyone has their own financial situation / budget to deal with, just like I do.

Thanks for the feedback though,

Keith

[xadhoom]

Hi Spanki!

I completely agree with you. The price for your exporter is definitely very low on the market, especially regarding to the quality you provide.
I hope that your projects sell well enough so you can keep up contributing quality software to this community!

xad

[jacmoe]

I completely agree with you. The price for your exporter is definitely very low on the market, especially regarding to the quality you provide.

I agree on that!
The price is too low IMHO, when you look at the quality - and the price of Cinema 4D itself (it isn't exactly cheap).

[redhead]

Yeah, I know it's a low price for C4D plugin, but as I said for ME it is too much, I just like an idea of what is going on in this forum and whole Ogre stuff - people that are spending their free time making some progress on something, and then they just give it to us as it is, sharing ideas, developing things, thats why I chose Ogre..
Never mind, I will stick to Licorna's exporter (and try to make it better, I already made Phong tag and morph support).

Well, Spanki, you did a great job. Keep up on good work, I am sure there is someone who will appreciate it and buy it.

Cheers

[MartinBean]

I installed it, exported only a single cube with it and I already love it!

I will play with it a bit more... And if I still like it, I will buy it. The other exporter I use was really simple and for more complex items not usable...

Nice work Spanki!!

[MartinBean]

Is the exporting of a material being considered? Or at least a minimum material or at the very least the generation of the .mat file with some very basic filling(empty skeleton with the definition of one color or something like that)?

[Spanki]

Yes, I do plan to add at least some minimal form of .material file support at some point - I just need to do some research on the topic first and I am currently tied up on something else.

Thanks for the comments,

Keith

[azzolini]

Hi,
I am using your I/Ogre ,the registered one ( bought a few days ago).
I am able to import mesh and export as well but when i want to export skeleton a problem arise always.
For example if I import a Jaiqua.mesh and skeleton and then try to export I always get the message...
telling me that I am exportin a skeleton but the plugin failed to find 'Figure Export Tag'

Obiouvsly I set up the Figure Export tag and the Clip tag but I was never been able to export.

Where am I wrong?

In effect my intention would be 'only' to export simple translation\rotation\scaling animation
and I was trying to figure out the concept of exporting animation but as I sad ..I could not try.

Thank
Lorenzo