I tried Collada to start with, before moving to MD2, but found it was less than ideal for anything beyond really basic animation. The exact same animation sequence in MD2 was 2Mb in size, in DAE it was almost 30Mb and took a lot longer to parse. Obviously it compressed well when published to SWF, but not well enough, and the parsing time was still there.
I'm beginning to think that finding a way to save an AnimationLibrary to disk, so you load the model and then load that (rather than parse it) would be a much more efficient way to handle it re: start-up times, but would of course add extra filesize. Cheers, Rich On 6 June 2010 04:37, Revalis <[email protected]> wrote: > Hey savage, didn't know if you were dead set on MD2s, but if you are > still looking at avenues to take to get models into Away3D from Max, > my suggestion would be ColladaMAX (.DAE) Max exports directly to dae, > so you don't have to go through the headache of Milkshape... and using > SkinAnimation, you can control any number of pre-defined animation > loops you setup in Max. > > I posted some code here on the google groups a while back with a > custom animation class for manipulating Away3D's SkinAnimation class. > Feel free to grab it and use it: > > http://revalis.blogspot.com/2009/12/customanimation-class-preview.html > > or > > > http://groups.google.com/group/away3d-dev/browse_thread/thread/b9bfab1467641610?hl=en > > > > > On Jun 5, 2:00 pm, Fabrice3D <[email protected]> wrote: > > Not yet.. > > > > Sent from an iPhone without Flash > > > > On Jun 5, 2010, at 21:47, savagelook <[email protected]> > > wrote: > > > > > > > > > Thanks for the direction so far. I'm just about to start playing with > > > milkshape now. > > > > > I'm also interested in those who use prefab as well. How does it play > > > into your modeling process? When you export from prefab as AS, does > > > that include animation? > > > > > On Jun 5, 4:52 am, Michael Iv <[email protected]> wrote: > > >> Worth to give a try to your idea > > > > >> Sent from my iPhone > > > > >> On Jun 5, 2010, at 12:56 AM, Richard Davey <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > >>> My only thought is when the parser runs, right before it commits to > > >>> the array I could add code to clean all non ASCII chars from it. > > > > >>> The bug is with milkshape, not away3d, but this would work. > > > > >>> One other thing I found is to never use numbers in animation labels. > > >>> That totally screws the parser as it thinks it has found a frame > > >>> number! > > > > >>> Cheers > > > > >>> Rich > > > > >>> Sent from my iPhone > > > > >>> On 4 Jun 2010, at 19:02, Michael Iv <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > >>>> Yeah, I am still looking for a way to get rid of those characters > > >>>> from animation labels in milkshape. > > > > >>>> Sent from my iPhone > > > > >>>> On Jun 4, 2010, at 6:46 PM, Richard Davey <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > >>>>> Hi, > > > > >>>>> The only format I've ever had reliable results in re: animations > > >>>>> in Away3D is MD2. > > > > >>>>> Getting from Max to MD2 isn't fun or easy though. There is a > > >>>>> plugin called QTip which will almost do it, but has some weird > > >>>>> texture issues in Max 2010. > > > > >>>>> There is a Max to Milkshape export, which works really well. > > >>>>> Milkshape can then use an md2.qc file for MD2 export, so you can > > >>>>> label the animations and the Away3D MD2 parser will pick these up. > > > > >>>>> Note that I've had no end of trouble with this.. I believe the > > >>>>> problem is Milkshape itself. As it seems to add random corrupted > > >>>>> characters to the end of SOME animation labels, which Away3D then > > >>>>> thinks are part of the label name. Very very annoying, and I've > > >>>>> not yet found a fix. > > > > >>>>> Once the animations are in Away3D they're very easy to use, just > > >>>>> reference them from the AnimationLibrary associated with the > > >>>>> model. > > > > >>>>> Another problem I have is that it's really hard to duplicate a > > >>>>> loaded model with its animation data intact. You can clone the > > >>>>> mesh easily, and apply a new texture, so the models look different > > >>>>> - but clone doesn't include the animation library. If you assign > > >>>>> the cloned model the same animation library, then running an > > >>>>> animation on the first makes both models animate the same. Ideally > > >>>>> I need to find a way to easily clone a model AND get a unique > > >>>>> animation library back for it. You can do this by parsing the MD2 > > >>>>> file twice, but as parsing takes a LONG time with a lot of frames, > > >>>>> this is less than ideal. > > > > >>>>> Good luck. You're going to need it! > > > > >>>>> Cheers, > > > > >>>>> Rich > > > > >>>>> On 4 June 2010 16:09, savagelook <[email protected]> > > >>>>> wrote: > > >>>>> So if I was creating models and animation in 3dsmax or maya, > > >>>>> what is > > >>>>> the most common/supported/powerful pipeline for getting those > > >>>>> models > > >>>>> and animations into Away3d? I've read the animation tutorial and > > >>>>> looked at a bunch of examples. I'm looking for the Away3d pros to > > >>>>> tell me what tools they use to achieve the above. Think Final > > >>>>> Fantasy > > >>>>> 8 battle scenes: low poly models with a handful of preset > > >>>>> animations > > >>>>> that are performed when an action is selected. > > > > >>>>> Into what format do you export your models and animations > > >>>>> (COLLADA, > > >>>>> md2, 3ds, etc...)? How do you get them into Away3d in that > > >>>>> format? > > >>>>> How are the animations then used in away3d? Where exactly does > > >>>>> prefab > > >>>>> come into play? > > > > >>>>> I'm looking to possibly start a new game project with a friend of > > >>>>> mine > > >>>>> and I want to start down a well trodden path since neither one > > >>>>> of us > > >>>>> is great with 3d modeling and animation. It would be great if I > > >>>>> could > > >>>>> avoid some gotchas and headaches down the road by following in the > > >>>>> footsteps of others who already had success. Thanks a lot guys. > > > > >>>>> -- > > >>>>>http://www.photonstorm.com > > >>>>> We sparkle more than vampires- Hide quoted text - > > > > - Show quoted text - -- http://www.photonstorm.com We sparkle more than vampires
