Maya B3D Exporter

Community Forums/Developer Stations/Maya B3D Exporter

JAW(Posted 2003) [#1]
Is anyone working on a B3D exporter for Maya? I remember someone saying they were using a tricky workaround to export stuff so I was also wondering; how hard is it to write a plugin? I was thinking of buying "Complete Maya Programming: An Extensive Guide to MEL and the C++ API" and trying to write one myself.....


JoshK(Posted 2003) [#2]
You can export to MS3D, then B3D.


Litobyte(Posted 2003) [#3]
JAW, would be very good to have such a plugin.
I think a very rough .b3d writer could be achieved only with MEL, but not sure about it.


jhocking(Posted 2003) [#4]
How do you export from Maya to ms3d? The only ms3d format I am aware of is Milkshape's file format.

You can export from Maya to DirectX format, then open that in Ultimate Unwrap and save to b3d. I'm not sure if this will work with the latest version of the DirectX format however; the import functionality for Ultimate Unwrap was developed for the DirectX 8 .x format.


MADJON76(Posted 2003) [#5]
yes, we need someone brilliant to code a Maya exporter for us.... any takers?


CopperCircle(Posted 2003) [#6]
You should use the DX9 Maya exporter, and then convert to B3d in UUnwrap3D. That will allow you to export animations and models.


JAW(Posted 2003) [#7]
Thanks. I will see how this works and publish my results once I finish this model...


wmaass(Posted 2003) [#8]
JAW let me know if it works for you because I have MAYA Complete 4.5 and the DX9 plugin won;t work -- says it was compiled with an older version of Maya.


FlameDuck(Posted 2003) [#9]
If anyone hasn't started already I'll be writting one this weekend. Please let me know how far you've gotten by then, it would be a shame if I had to "reinvent the wheel" so to speak.


jhocking(Posted 2003) [#10]
G'luck Flameduck. A b3d exporter for Maya would be really wonderful. Ever since the price drop I've been thinking about purchasing Maya; a b3d exporter would tip the scales.


ragtag(Posted 2003) [#11]
FlameDuck, that would be great. I would love to see a Maya>B3D converter. If you need someone to beta test it, let me know. :-)

Ragnar


JAW(Posted 2003) [#12]
Go for it Flameduck. I havn't had the time to attempt it yet. I need to focus on my art anyway :)


FlameDuck(Posted 2003) [#13]
Update: The modelers decided to go with 3DStudio MAX after all. Thus I no longer have access to Maya, or a reliable MEL compiler. Does anyone know if the "Personal learning edition" supports MEL, and to which degree? If it's anything like G-Max I'm guessing it can't be used to generate a B3D file.


podperson(Posted 2003) [#14]
MaxScript is limited to text file i/o. No clue about MEL but I wouldn't be surprised. In any event, text files are very easy to work with (if space and load-time inefficient) so I'm barracking for a B3D text specification (like the .X text spec, etc.) so that scripts in various 3D tools can generate B3Ds.


jhocking(Posted 2003) [#15]
Darn. Anyone else thinking of doing a b3d exporter for Maya?


FlameDuck(Posted 2003) [#16]
I'm barracking for a B3D text specification
There are a couple already. I was planning on using Peter Scheutz's XML implementation myself. I do believe that XML should be the "standard" format of B3D files until packed/compiled/converted (whichever buzzword takes your fancy) for inclusion in the final game.


Ricky Smith(Posted 2003) [#17]

XML should be the "standard" format of B3D files



Agree wholeheartedly - Many Thanks to Peter for these excellent routines - I've adopted this as my standard Blitz Text File format - it makes updating the file in real time much simpler


Tyler(Posted 2006) [#18]
Edit:Ah, posted 3 years ago. Alright, nevermind. If I were to make an exporter for Maya, would people prefer it be in XML format? or straight to b3d file?


Pete Carter(Posted 2006) [#19]
both would be good but i guess that most people would want a export straight to .b3d.
hows it going?


Tyler(Posted 2006) [#20]
Reading up on the XML export format, I found out that Maya doesn't support the kind of binary file writing that's required for B3D files directly, so ASCII (XML) is the only other option that I can think of.


mtnhome3d(Posted 2008) [#21]
this is kinda late but did anybody actually write an exporter? it would be MUCH appreciated!


Chaduke(Posted 2008) [#22]
What version of Maya do you have? If its 6, 6.5 or 7 you should be able to use the DirectX SDK .x exporter but you'll have to try some different settings to get it to work with Blitz3D.


gameshastra(Posted 2008) [#23]
Try with .smd Exporter, I succeeded with this. Now am writing .txt exporter for maya once its over i will give it to u.


Mortiis(Posted 2008) [#24]
Download Blender
Download b3d exporter for blender ( http://www.gandaldf.com/ )
Export to any format, import to blender and export to b3d there.


mtnhome3d(Posted 2008) [#25]
i don't want blender, i like my maya very much. plus its ui is readable and i can figure it out.


boomboom(Posted 2008) [#26]
yes that is not a solution Mortiis.

I curretly use Maya at work, and found that the best way to export was to use the uu3d plugin. of course then you need to buy uu3d, but if you have just paid for maya a few $ is nothing. :)


Mortiis(Posted 2008) [#27]
I didn't say use blender to model, I said use it to export b3d cause it's free. Just trying to help, suit yourself.


mtnhome3d(Posted 2008) [#28]
@ boomboom uu3d is what i'm thinking about using but am not sure about its animation export


boomboom(Posted 2008) [#29]
well give it a go, the demo allows you to import meshes, just not export them i believe, so you can see if they go from maya to uu3d ok.


Moraldi(Posted 2008) [#30]
@mtnhome3d: I own uu3d. I can export an animated model if you send me one just to make sure that it works


mtnhome3d(Posted 2008) [#31]
ok moraldi heres the file i want to test uu3d with.
http://mtnhome3d.com/Documents/dino.u3d it requires uu3d pro 3.0


Moraldi(Posted 2008) [#32]
I loaded the file successfully and I see a good animation ( texture(s) is missing ofc ) . I can export in a specified format and send it back to you. What do you want now?

Edit: Normals they are all fliped


mtnhome3d(Posted 2008) [#33]
ok try a b3d and the normals are ok i can fix them


Moraldi(Posted 2008) [#34]
Here it is:
http://www.moraldigames.com/Temp/dino.zip


mtnhome3d(Posted 2008) [#35]
thank you very much moraldi, it worked great and all i needed to do extra was call flip mesh