Animation playing but not bound to mesh

[dji]

Hello everyone,

I have an animated skeletal mesh (your usual biped character) that I've successfully exported from 3DSMax (following the ActorX tutorial).

Into the editor:
- I've imported the mesh.psk and I can see that all the bones are presents
- I created a new animset and imported the mesh.psa and I have all the sequences I've made

So far so good, but when I try to play any of the animations, only the bones are moving, not the mesh. I suppose there's a problem with bone weigth but I can't see what I've done wrong...

Here's a few intel about the mesh:
- the characters is divided into 7 parts and each part is a skinned editable polys with a XForm modifier
- there's a morph on the body part

Any help/tips would be appreciated!!

Thanks

[Henrik]

the mesh bone names don't match the animation bone names if that is happening.

[Henrik]

alternatively you haven't skinned the mesh to the skeleton properly.

[geodav]

use a single mesh with a skin modifer

[dji]

"the mesh bone names don't match the animation bone names if that is happening. "

That could explain it. However I export everything at the same time, I don't change anything between the mesh and animation export so I can't see how it can happen...

"alternatively you haven't skinned the mesh to the skeleton properly"

Well the animation runs well in 3DSMax and I've already managed to export the mesh into the Ogre3D format and played all animations correctly in a game prototype. I think the mesh is usable in his current state so there must something that the exporter dislikes (still I have no errors during the export).

"use a single mesh with a skin modifer"

I can try that but this requires some rework and I think it's not a practical solution... ideally I'd like not to! But since I'm not very familiar yet with UDK, maybe it's how it should be done. Some parts are supposed to be changeable in the game so I guess i could merge everything but these part and add them in code...I'll look into it.


Thank you for the answers

[geodav]

ok i'll try and clear it up,
first use a single mesh, export this and the anims, with this you can also create you physic asset
second you can export your parts, sounds like you want to do a UT3 type system in which do them in that order

[dji]

ok, I'll try that way then. I'll let you know if it works

[dji]

Hello again,

I still haven't found a solution! I tried merging the meshes together but the skinning has to be re-done. So before doing that I've decided to compare my character with the UT3 Male Character. Like my characters it has multiples meshes....but it exports fine and his animations are playing correctly in the editor!

So here's a list of differences I've noticed:

- When I show the Actox "Scene Info" popup, I get these stats with my character:

• Number of physique mesh: 0
• Total geometric objects:23
• Bones in main skeleton: 16

The UT3Male has 8 physique mesh...but I don't really know what these "physique mesh" are refering to!

- The hierarchy of my character is pretty straitghforward compared to the UT3Male:


- I use simple bones, not a biped. Could this be the reason ??? It would be weird not to be able to use simple max bones! Plus, changing to a biped would means to re-do all the anims of all the characters...

- there's no notable difference in the skin attributes

- when I try to export the mesh without selecting "all textured" in the actorx settings, I get this warning:
"no valid triangle skin digested (mesh may lack proper mapping or valid linkups)."
I'm sure this is the big clue but I've search the doc and didn't find any advice n what to do if we get this error...

I'm trying to find out what's going on so I can tell the artist (I'm not the one doing the characters) what he has to change to make it work. Meanwhile we're locked...

I hope someone has an idea

Thanks!

[SidV]

First off, max bones working just fine in UDK, so that couldnt be the problem.

no valid triangle skin digested: check if you accedentaly put a texture on any of your bones. if so remove them(or just uncheck the "all textured" checkbox)

Number of physique mesh: Do you have any modifier (like meshsmooth or something) above your skin/physique modifier? Make sure skin is on top of the modifier stack.

[dji]

no valid triangle skin digested: check if you accedentaly put a texture on any of your bones. if so remove them(or just uncheck the "all textured" checkbox)

I'll check that if there isn't any texture on a bone. However I have the warning precisely when I try to export with the "all textured" checkbox is unchecked ...

Number of physique mesh: Do you have any modifier (like meshsmooth or something) above your skin/physique modifier? Make sure skin is on top of the modifier stack.

Yes, there's a XForm modifier on very top of the stack. We added it because it was needed for Ogre but I think it's a good idea to remove it.

Thanks for the tips, I hope it will work

[dji]

Removing the XForm modifier was the correct solution! Thank you SidV