Struggling to export FBX files

[coentertainer]

I'm new to this forum so forgive me if I'm posting in the wrong place or asking a question that has already been answered elsewhere (I have spent the last hour searching Lost Marble and the rest of the internet).
I'm trying to export my character as an FBX file and use it in Unity (as detailed in this video https://goo.gl/3qB4Vy). 2 problems are occurring.
1.) Instead of exporting all the different actions as their own separate little clips (or whatever you call preprogrammed actions in Unity) it only exports the mainline animation.
and the second much bigger problem I really hope you guys can help me with:
2.) The only animation that's being exported is the bone movement, not the binding of the character to those bones. I end up with a still picture of my character with the wireframe bones animating under it but not affecting the character. In other words if I couldn't see the bones the ''animation'' would just be a still image of the character in his original pose. I thought the problem might be Unity so I viewed the animation in Anime Studio using the ''FBX preview mode'' option and the problem still occurs (bones move, character is unaffected). So my question (or at least part 2) doesn't have anything to do with Unity, just Anime Studio (Pro 11.2 in case that's important). To be clear when I view the mainline animation or the separate actions animations in regular non-FBX-preview mode the binding is there and the full character animates.
Anyone know why this is happening?

[Lukas]

I am also currently learning Unity and figuring this out. More documentation would definately be nice.

Maybe these help:

viewtopic.php?f=18&t=25985
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RR-He406qc

[coentertainer]

That's actually the video I included in my post, one of only three videos on youtube about FBX files in Anime Studio (all three of which cover the same material). Essentially I want to achieve what is shown in these videos but when I repeat the steps shown I end up with the two problems in my original post. No idea why...

[synthsin75]

If the problem shows in FBX Preview Mode then you are trying to use features that cannot be exported from AS to Unity, because of differences in how they work. See the user manual for what features are supported.

[Lukas]

That's actually the video I included in my post, one of only three videos on youtube about FBX files in Anime Studio (all three of which cover the same material). Essentially I want to achieve what is shown in these videos but when I repeat the steps shown I end up with the two problems in my original post. No idea why...

Hmm, that's weird. If I follow the videos instructions it works just like in the video, both on OS X El Capitan and windows 10.

There's still a lot of things that could be imported in a better way though.

[Lukas]

1.) Instead of exporting all the different actions as their own separate little clips (or whatever you call preprogrammed actions in Unity) it only exports the mainline animation.

I am getting multiple actions, but for whatever reason, sometimes only 2 out of 3. And just now, I had a file with 4 actions, and 3 of them imported correctly, but the fourth one was identical to one other animation (except for the name)...

Fishy. I'll report all this when I'm more confident of what I'm talking about.

[coentertainer]

If the problem shows in FBX Preview Mode then you are trying to use features that cannot be exported from AS to Unity, because of differences in how they work. See the user manual for what features are supported.

Thank you synthsin75, I feel foolish for not having turned to the manual before posting. I now know that FBX files support flexi-binding and no other type of binding (I was using point binding and curves and all sorts so I guess I will have to go the frame by frame route for exporting the sprite).

[coentertainer]

[/quote]

Fishy. I'll report all this when I'm more confident of what I'm talking about.[/quote]

Sound's like a plan Lukas. By the way I had a quick look at your stuff Lukas. Absolutely amazing! That head turn girl you posted on December 1st, was that drawn and shaded inside AS or elsewhere? I love Utrecht by the way, my cousin actually lives in Bilthoven.

[Lukas]

Thanks, the girlhead was actually a test completely done in Photoshop. I don't really like how the texture is in there though, it was embedded in the brush, but the texture is on exactly the same spot in each frame, making it look weird.

Yeah, Utrecht is a sweet spot for sure

About not getting any actions imported. Make sure your actions are in the topmost layer. It says here only those are being exported.

If you find any tricks on how to combine ASP and Unity, don't forget to post them on the forum! I don't think there's that many people using them both together yet.

[JeroenKoffeman]

Hey Lukas,

We are currently using Unity and ASP. It's a great feature!

Here's a list of tips from our experience, some things may be obvious to some but I will post them anyway.

1.All layerbinding should be done directly under the main bone layer. If you put layers inside a folder and you bind these layers individually, this will not work with the fbx exporter.

2.Fbx exporter doesn't take the 'Set Origin' Tool into account. The center pivot of the toplayer in Anime Studio will become the pivot in Unity. In order to set the pivot point to be at the feet of your character, reposition your bones and sublayers so that the feet will be in the center of the bonelayer.

3.Always choose to layer bind instead of flexibind if you bind a layer to just a single bone. This will reduce the number of triangles in your mesh, as they do not need to be skinned meshes.

4. Make sure you import the textures in Unity with power of 2, (to reduce size), and thick the box: alpha is transparency. Set the shader to Sprite->Default. (Im not sure if the importfbx.cs does this for you)

5. We ended up avoiding switchlayers and visibility keyframes, because they are translated to super small scale keyframes by the exporter, resulting in nan-errors. Maybe someone has a solution for this? Ideally we would be able to pass some visibility keyframe data with our fbx file, for unity to read and convert to visibility keyframes in unity.

[JeroenKoffeman]

And we have to following unresolved issues with animations:

1. Small jittering in the feet of characters with Ik-bones.

2. Jittering of a bone that was set to: Independent angle, however other animations with the same bone worked fine. When we turned off 'independent angle' the jittering was gone.

3. One of our animations, a jump of a character (where several ik-targets are moving at the same time) we get extreme jittering in the unity editor. In unity preview, the animation looks fine, but as soon as we play the animation in editor, it starts to jitter. We REALLY don't understand.

4.On import, for some reason we have to cut 1 or 2 frames of each animation in the beginning, and cut a random amount of frames after the animation end.

[Lukas]

Thanks Jeroen!

Have you tried anything with updating character/animation that's already being used in a Unity scene?

For example, if you've got a character with a walkcycle, can you add a runcycle and extra item, a hat for example. And overwrite a FBX file without breaking the Unity project?

[JeroenKoffeman]

Hey Lukas, unfortunately we cannot change anything in the rig without breaking the old FBX file.

But we are able to change/add animations. The rig has to remaing absolutely the same for it not to break.

[Lukas]

Good to know!

Unity is very unflexible when it comes to changing anything that's already animated...Such a shame, because it really gets in the way of the creative process.