Hi,
I know this is an old post, but I thought I’d comment as it keeps popping up in Google searches for even unrelated 3D character import/export issues and questions.
First off, I’ve been able to realize very smooth Quidam Studio to Unity flow with Blender in between. I am very new to all three, but I’m a very fast learner :roll: … uh huh…
Quidam Studio v. 2.3
Blender 2.48a
Unity latest as of today.
Quidam Studio is quite pricey, but it is worth it in the incredibly intuitive interface. The big downside is that the basic content included (models) require a per model license to use in your game, though if you have a reasonable budget and are likely to gain income from your project, the pricing is extremely reasonable from an ROI point of view IMHO.
Quidam Studio, however, has good import features (obj format meshes and bvh format skeletons), and apparently very good auto skinning and weight painting features. In other words you take your mesh, a standard mocap bvh skeleton, mix them in Quidam and wala! you can use the entirety of Quidam’s neat features (minus perhaps the LOD and mesh combining for clothes) with your own content. So the question is, does N-Sided try to apply the license requirement to your own original content which you passed through Quidam, or only to N-Sided original content? Questions questions…
Anyway, just quickly, to get the standard Quidam content into Unity it is easy. You just create your character with the Quidam tools as you wish. Then export as Collada 1.4. The only essential option is “merge meshes” which is found on the third tab of the export options. You can play with the units and scale options on the first tab. I recommend turning off the internal scale check box and turning on cm to meters check box. This does not give the right size in blender still (too small) but otherwise you get a gigantic sized model in blender.
Next, you simply import the collada file in Blender, File>Import>Collada 1.4. The character imports almost perfectly, but rotated on the z axis so it is facing to the right. Just rotate back (hold ctrl to snap). Then you find it becomes just a bit off center so again translate with ctrl key to get it exactly centered. Remember to do those operations on the Armature object which you see sticking out through the mesh and not the mesh itself. The mesh follows the Armature (which is the Quidam bones exported). Now you can scale to the size appropriate for your needs, again scale the armature.
Finally, you can use Blenders perfectly adequate animation functions and IK constraints and all that stuff to animate your character.
Then simply save in the native blender format somewhere in the Assets folder of your Unity project. Start unity and it will automagically import the character. If you made more than one animation for your character (along a single time line, that seems important), then right click on your asset in the Project pane of Unity and open ‘Import Settings’, then a window and at the bottom you can split the time line into discreet animations.
Wala! you have your character.
Note that this process says nothing about number of polys, so this results in a very high poly (15,000+) model, but this animates fine in a simple test scene on my Pen D 2.8 Ghz, nVidia 8800 machine…perhaps not a good idea if you want to distribute to low end. But Quidam has a solution: you can export a low poly mesh (4000-6000 range depending on which base model you use) by changing a subdivision option in Quidam before you export (just read the manual, it is a mouse click). This only works, I assume, with N-Sided content.
So, the problems mentioned above by Polytropoi, these can, according to the Quidam manual, be solved in the following way:
- Create your skeleton first in whatever 3d program you use or use the one you already created in that program and export in .bvh format
- If you want to use mocap animations, just import the standard mocap skeleton into Quidam and auto skin your mesh to it, then brush up the weight painting to taste. Weight painting is so intuitive and cool in Quidam, you won’t need to be afraid of it anymore.
- Create your own mesh, or export the Quidam mesh, tweak it first, and reimport to Quidam if you want to optimize the model before you sculpt in Quidam. When sculpting, watch which subdivision mode you use so you don’t add/subtract polys in your mesh.
In closing: unless you own Maya or some other heavy lifting equipment, Quidam will greatly speed up the pipeline IMHO, and you don’t need advanced modeling skills or poly modeling and rigging skills which the low priced character modeling options require you to have (milk shape, fragmotion etc with their slightly antique interfaces). If you do have Maya, 3D Studio or any of that caliber, you don’t need Quidam so much except to quickly sculpt human meshes for testing or something. Quidam really does behave like you are playing with clay and acts as an inexperienced person would expect it too.
However, if you want to get the most out of Quidam and not (again, need to check this) pay model licenses, you are still better off knowing how to create or import/export a skeleton that suits your purpose and model your own mesh or get a free one. One option to explore perhaps is the possibility of using the MakeHuman mesh? I wonder what the license on that one is.
Anyway, I am still exploring Quidam Studio so I will post more when I get more advanced.[/b]
