Getting the right Maya version

[sparhawk]

Yeah. Unfortunately it seems to be 4.0. I would have to install it to make sure, but I was looking in the installation files and there it says 4.0.

 

What exactly is the issue with M7? What doesn't work?

[BlackThief]

the conversion from mb to md5 doesn't work with maya 7. it's probably because of the dll, probably because of other reasons. there are several threads on d3world.org where quite a lot made the same experience, but when they tried it with maya 4.5, 5 or 6 it worked...

[sparhawk]

What are the exact steps to do this? I don't want to start reading tutorials just to learn this, so can you give me a short example of what I must do to reproduce the problem?

[BlackThief]

Id released a dll for several maya version (including 4.5, 5 and 6) with the SDK - you need to put this dll into your d3 directory. Then you have to write a .def for your model, that looks like this:

export fred {

mesh	models/maya/tavern_sign.mb -dest models/md5/environments/tavern_sign
anim	models/maya/tavern_sign.mb -dest models/md5/environments/tavern_sign
}

model env_tavern_sign {
mesh							models/md5/environments/tavern_sign.md5mesh
anim af_pose					models/md5/environments/tavern_sign.md5anim
}

 

when everything runs fine and d3 was able to "connect" to your maya installation and when the dll fits it should convert the maya binary into the md5 files.

 

 

when I'm trying to do this I get an error in the console Kfailure blablabla - everyone on d3world, who uses maya7 seems to get the same error, so I guess it's because the version

 

here's a link to one of the threads:

http://www.doom3world.org/phpbb2/viewtopic...hlight=kfailure

[sparhawk]

In that thread, you linked to, the last posting points to a Maya 7 import DLL. Did you already try this one?

I found a torrent for Maya 6, so I'm downloading this one. If you say that this DLL works, then I stop it, though.

[BlackThief]

yes - edit: no, didn't see the last post from today!

 

I'll test the new one....

 

as I read through it again, I noticed that post from squill:

i don't know which versions of the dll you all are using but i've been reading some time thru most of the topics on this because i found the same problem lately.

 

But i must say this only happens to me with the maya 7 version (facing hell dll) of the exportplugin.

 

I still use the maya 5 dll for now which works perfect. The "Object does not exist" & kfailure only appears when using this (maya 7) dll. Because it works for me with other versions using the same export methods.

 

I'll pm squill and ask him to upload maya5.

[BlackThief]

at least the dll seems to work now, though I still get an error:

"'D:\Games\Doom3\DarkMod\models\maya\tavern_sign.mb' : CreateMesh: No skinClusters found in this scene."

 

but that's probably because of my maya-noobness. something seems to be wrong with the skin, but I guess at least the dll works now.

[sparhawk]

This is the new one that works, or did you get a copy of Maya 5?

[Domarius]

Hey here's a link to a description of what skinclusters are, since you know a bit more about Maya than me BT, I'll let you read it and decide if the error is really a problem or not.

http://www.robthebloke.org/research/maya/mfnskinning.htm

 

Ah it seems to be related to skinning - a skincluster is the association between the bones and the mesh. If your sign doens't move, that probably isn't a problem then.

[Dram]

http://isohunt.com/torrents.php?ihq=maya&ts

 

look down the list and find the one you need

[BlackThief]

I really start to hate maya and all this export to md5 shit. I don't get any export errors in the console anymore, but it's still not working at all.

All I get is a 1kb md5mesh and a 6kb md5anim file which doesn't seem to contain anything at all. I'm not sure what's the problem again, since it doesn't even work with the original models from id. I imported the round_swinging_light into maya and tried to export it and I get exactly the same result as with my own models.

 

oh and btw I really can't understand why maya is such a popular and expensive programm. imho the whole interface is absolute bullshit, if it'd be possible I'd rather user lightwave to export our models, eventhough the rigging tools are the worst parts of lightwave.

[Dram]

It is possible as far as I know. In fact I think it's easier to export to md5 from lightwve, though don't hold me to that. I know milkshape has a maya exporter or importer of some sort so perhaps we can import the maya file and export it as lwo then change it etc in lightwave.

[BlackThief]

I just found that thread about the lightwave to md5 converter. hope that this one works...

[Dram]

*Fingers crosssed*

[sparhawk]

Don't know. WhenI looked at Maya I liked it a lot. Very intuitive and flexible. Can't say the same about Lightwave, but then I never bothered to learn it. Now I'm with Blender all the way, and I'm quite happy with it. Only thing is the annoyance with the materials for Doom 3.

[BlackThief]

woot! finally a small success - first time I got the tavern sign into md5 format!

 

I don't know why, but some of the original defs from id point to maya binary (including the tutorial I was using) and some point to maya ascii files. Now I simply saved the scene as maya ascii and it works

However I still have to work on the rig, since the default smooth bind may work for organic models, but not for a sign hanging on a chain...

 

here's a screen from the md5 viewer - woot!!!

[Dram]

WOOT!! So close....

[Domarius]

What's going on? Was that Maya 7 that did that?

[BlackThief]

yep, it works now

 

anyone any experience with articulated figures, or whatever ragdolls are called in d3? ish?

[BlackThief]

this is really getting on my nerves again - can anyone tell me, why this damn af-editor isn't able to write an .af-file???? the console always gives me:

WARNING: idFileSystem::OSPathToRelativePath failed on D:\Games\doom3\darkmod\af\env_tavern_sign.af

[Dram]

this is really getting on my nerves again - can anyone tell me, why this damn af-editor isn't able to write an .af-file???? the console always gives me:

 

I had same problem with trying to create new particle files.

 

What I did was I saved it to a doom3/base directory and it worked, then I just cut & paste to DM.

[BlackThief]

thanks dram - that works now

 

I'm proud to present my first ragdoll - of course it doesn't work properly, but at least I've got something that behaves like a ragdoll and it's ingame I also learned that the bones strucutre has to follow the object really closely in order to have a working ragdoll - you can see that on the screenshot. I've got only one chain of bones and thus the sign behaves rather weird. (ignore the texture - I just pointed to the chair material, since I haven't done a texture for the sign yet)

[SneaksieDave]

I can't make out what's going on in the picture much, but it sure seems cool!

[Dram]

Good going BT!

 

Almost there eh?

 

I would've posted earlier, but I had to reinstall windows due to the infamous SpyFalcon virus....clever bastards I'll tell you...