LW/Unity Tips and Tricks

[GraphXs]

I would like to start some minor tips and tricks with working in a LW/Unity pipeline.

I'm sure some of you might know these already, but just some things I'm discovering working between the two.



Unity doesn't see the top of the Hierarchy name (a Null)

For some reason the "topnode" Null doesn't show up in Unity as the Null name. It is the name given to the FBX file. My work around is just add another "topenode" Null then the one below will show it will show up in Unity.

(Update) The topnode does show up if you do export camera and lights(weird)

Cameras and Lights only show as unity nulls Looks like it only takes points and distant as far as types (but in Unity they are not lights or cameras, just empty unity nulls)

No weights required to deform mesh in Unity. The LW default skinning falloff transfers fine in Unity.

Z Axis is opposite in Unity. If you postion something on the postive Z it will be on the negative Z in Unity.

Nulls do not show up if they are not apart of the hierarchy of an object. Even if they are children of an object they are a no show in unity. (unless an object is a child)

Items cannot have a scale of "zero" for animation, the animation won't work correctly in Unity.

Unity scale FBX default is 0.01 (I usually change it to 1.0 to match 1 meter in LW)

[GraphXs]

10. For multiple UV's (FBX export to Unity) to show here are the steps:

For a single object:

1) All UV's should use the same name
2) Use different surface names for the parts: head, body, etc.
3) Add the UV to the color channel (no maps required, just the UV)
4)Export FBX out of layout if you want to keep the object layer names
5) Change the FBX Object setting to material name and the "head", "body" names show up in Unity.
4) IF you are using a Shared/combined UV, it will only work with the (legacy) Lightmap channel in Unity and won't show up in Unity.

[adk]

Cheers GraphXs :thumbsup: some really good info here

[GraphXs]

Thanks, If I discover more pipeline stuff I will share it. I want LW and Unity to have a great pipeline.

[GraphXs]

Morphs from LW to Unity

http://35.vincent.newtek.com/showthread.php?t=120941

[GraphXs]

LW to Unity Skinned/parent object mixed.

On a recent project I'm working on I have a mixed object that has some of the parts skinned and rigged parented to items that are just objects. I ran into an issue when porting into Unity where the skinned item was not in the correct world space to it's parent item.
What I discovered is if the skin item parent pivot is in a world space location unity ignores this. The work around is the parent item pivot needs to be at 0,0,0. Then all is good in Unity!

[MarcusM]

You can use many different UV's in object to export as FBX to Unity. Each layer must have polygons with different UV. And in Unity is the best set up make materials from object materials, not from texture names. :thumbsup:

[GraphXs]

Another thing to note is don't use the pivots positions in modeler for the mixed skin and object hierarchys. Layout will look in correct if u zeroed out the pivots because it rembers the modeler pivots position. To correct zero out the pivots on the object side.

[SubDProxy]

Great Stuff thanks! I have been working in Lightwave to Unity 3D at work for some months now and I have been discovering these issues as well.

Thanks again, please keep them coming!

Glen

[U#N]

We were beginning to lose faith in human intellect,
thank you all who participated in this post;

Maybe there is some hope to all these
import/export issues.

LIGHTWAVE - PHOTOSHOP
LIGHTWAVE - UNITY
LIGHTWAVE - VISUAL STUDIOS (C++) (C#)

Using (.fbx) files or (.obj) files to make (.x) files.

We hope to hear more from you on this LIGHTWAVE - UNITY topic!!!

[SubDProxy]

We just figured out today when doing a mass export of models that the FBX200900 Exporter for Lightwave doesn't work with Unity 3.5.1. We had to reconfigure our script to work with FBX201200 for the models to come in correctly.

Not a big deal but just in case someone wonders why there models aren't coming in properly. Just check you exporter version.

Glen