Blender Cell Fracture to SFM - Vertex Animations??

[Pte Jack]

I have seen some pretty amazing stuff done with vertex animations out of Maya and have been told that both SFM and Dota2 support it.

I am wondering if it s possilbe to export vertex animations (ie cell fracture object) from Blender using BLeST without having to assign bones to every shard and animating by hand or via SFMPhys (if recreating the scenario is even possible)?

For example...

I have a mug that I broke into 50 shards using the Cell Fracture tool in Blender. I then recorded the mug exploding using the Blender Game Engine. The result is a vertex animation but as far as I can tell, BLeST doesn't see this type of animation; no bones move.

I am hoping that there is someway of using BLeST to export that animation to a DMX/SMD that can be used as an animation (or a sequence) in SFM.

http://youtu.be/bYwFYpbAZF4

If anyone knows of a way to do this or can recommend a tutorial/video showing how to do this from Blender using BLeST (without having to resort to Maya), it would be really great!!! I have a ton of ideas, but this is holding me back at the moment.

Thanks

Pte Jack

[Zappy]

Oh, Source supports vertex animation. It's called "shape keys" or "flexes" in Source, though.

[Artfunkel]

Although Source does support shape keys, it doesn't support full-on vertex animation. All you can do is move verts in a straight line between two positions.

One way or another you're going to need to rig your mesh up with bones and animate them.

[Pte Jack]

Hmmm. @ Artfunkel...
Yup, I know that I can do that and was thinking about trying to do just that using SFMPhys.

But then I showed the mug animation to Rantis and he informed me that bake vertex animations are possible in SFM (as well as Dota2, but trying it in any other Source engine will crash the engine).

In fact I believe the latest version of MESA now has a button for exporting baked Mesh (Vertex) animations to SMD and also creates both the VTA and the qci for the animation. (I just can't find the dag page I saw it on again)

But, this, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZZ8xH_nvX0 (done by Cra0kalo), this tutorial http://facepunch.com/showthread.php?t=1252740 (that I thought was done by narry) and the wing segment starting at :38 of this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snRc_yQTK7U&list=UUtZwhdkGL9Hfg5a-iqRWTPQ talk about or are baked vertex animations; (not SFMPhys or boned animation effects)

This is what sparked this conversation and I was wondering if it might be an aspect you might know about how to do now using the current BLeST or be a feature you might be considering or working on for a future release.

Thanks

[Artfunkel]

This is news to me! I'm looking into it.

[Pte Jack]

Thanks Artfunkel, I was of the same opinion that it wasn't possible and had started to bone everything up for animating. But if you can work the magic that you do, this would be fantastic and a magnificent add on to your already most excellent tool.

[Artfunkel]

Making progress![i.imgur.com]

[Pte Jack]

Oh wow, most excellent. I can provide my mug animation blend file with the cell fracture animation if you would like to try it as you work through this... Just let me know.

(Now for something completely STUPID. Everytime I look at that cloth picture I try to spin it as if I were using it in Blender to look at it)

[Artfunkel]

Here's a beta release, let me know if anything could be improved.

http://steamreview.org/BlenderSourceTools/release/blender_source_tools_2.2.0_beta.zip

[Pte Jack]

Ok, This is intriguing, but I have a couple of question because I am confused.

Im my case aI have an object that has 50 fragments. Cell fracture converts these to indivdual objects with origins at the center of each object. BLeST sees these as individual DMX/SMDs. I assume I have to add the vertex animation for each object and this (like its Maya counterpart) only works with the SMD format... This is not a problem, and I see that BLeST adds an icon beside the SMD when the the VA is added (kewl).

Confusion points.

Do I have to create a QC Segment for each object as well, if so, I end up with a Control has already been created error when i compile the qc.. or do I have to rename each control...

If I try to create a QC Segment after doing the export I find that only the SMD selected at the time of generation is referenced. (There is only 1 vcaanim_VertexAnim.smd and one VertexAnim.vta file created) The size of these files suggest that it is only 1 object that has been recorded and the files created.

hmm, I am wondering if I have to rename the VertexAnim reference under the Vertex Animation Tool for Each Object so a vca!!.smd and a va!.vta is created for each as well?? (If this is the case, is there someway to have the tool do this automatically as the objects are added (ie vcaanim_smd_objName.smd and va_smd_objname.vta?))


Not working for me, but I'll keep at it... I'm getting various errors, hmmm, I think I'm doing it wrong.

Seems to add new SMDs to the list, (doubling the SMD count everytime I try. some with Animations listed, some without. Using Blender 2.70a, I'll try by falling back to 2.69b)

[Artfunkel]

You should Group all the fractured objects together. Unfortunately exporting vertex animations for groups isn't working, so bear with me on that.

[Artfunkel]

Download the beta again and things should work.

If new items appear after an export, you are probably running Blender in debug mode 2 or higher. Reduce the value with Ctrl+Alt+D.

[Pte Jack]

Hmmm, getting there. Fantastic work BTW. I really can't believe you were able to do this so quickly and wish I had your programming talent. Got the update and I'm not seeing the adding smds problem anymore... and thanks for the group fragments info.

So, I grouped the animated shards as you suggested, but when I export it just becomes a clump, so I'm going assume I still have to bone each shard in order to keep the integrity of the mug? (I'll give that a try... and maybe I should read the entire post you made, especially the part about group animations not available yet... lol)

Apologize being a pain, but this is a giant step forward and will really ba a benefit to the community.

[Artfunkel]

I can export a cell fractured object without any issues now, without any bones anywhere. Can you upload your blend[www.pasteall.org] for me to take a look at please?

[Pte Jack]

hmmm, ok, that exactly what I tried to do... This Mug thing has been giving me probs from the get go, right from Blender switching all my UV around to this now... I think I'll redo the whole project. It may have to do with the way I applied the solidify modifier to the mug in the first place. Let me play a bit with it and see what happens (besides, I think I've pooched my original Blend File when I attempted the VA the first time. Was so excited to try and get this to work I actually played with my original and forgot to back it up. Thanks, eh!!! LOL) But. I really appreciate your offer and if I continue to have probs, I'll have you look at it. It should be simple enough... I'm actually basing a guide on using your tools to import multiple types of models into Blender for conversion and export to Valve Model Source files for conversion to SFM...

I'm hoping to add this functionality to the guide ( http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=245723825 )

[Pte Jack]

I think I know what my problem was... I tried to use the animation to create the initial model... face-palm, recompiling the project again, this time using the model smds as the model base and adding the animation smds as the sequence.... DOH!!!