Blender: Better Collada (DAE) Exporter

[J0linar]

Hey there, came across the Godot Engine, those guys made a alternative Collada Exporter,

at first glance it seems much better compared to the one that comes stock with Blender itself.

The tests in T3D i did so far, all worked without issues,

one of the best pros seems to be that when you ReImport your Collada(.DAE) Model back into Blender,

you get your Mesh the Way you exported it (you get Quads and no Tris, makin the ReImported Mesh editable

again, therefore no quality loss when it comes to geometry)

You can grab the Blender addon here:

http://www.godotengine.org/projects/godot-engine/documents

or Direct Download Link:

http://godotengine.org/builds/alpha/2.0/20151030/Godot_v2.0_alpha_20151030_better_collada.zip

How To Install it?!:

1. Open User Preferences (Ctrl+Alt+U) and under Add-ons, click Install from File. Then navigate to the file you downloaded and select it.

2. It should now appear in the window and you can tick the checkbox in the upper right to enable it.

3. If you would like to have the add-on enabled every time you start Blender, click Save User Settings at the bottom.

Would like to hear your experiences with this Alternative Addon for Blender.

HF and happy Blending :D

[Duion]

Is there any advantage? The quad and tris thing is just because you did not uncheck the "triangulate" options on export.

[Julius]

Recent (?) improvements (as of version 2.76b) also made the import of .dae files into blender quite bit better, the default Torque soldier seems to import with a functional rig fine now.

Just the animations are still impossible to import as they are in separate files. I even tried to copy&paste the relevant sections of the collada files by hand in a text-editor, but no luck :(

Is there anyone who has a .dae or .fbx etc. that actually includes all the animations etc. in one file?

[Duion]

Just forget the soldier, it is wasted time. If you want to do characters and animations you should learn how to do it from scratch, otherwise you will never get very far.

[Duion]

So far we have not heard of one reason why this exporter is better than the default one.

[rlranft]

[mention]Duion[/mention] So don't use it. Your opinion is noted.

[L3zak]

So far we have not heard of one reason why this exporter is better than the default one.

 

Multiple animation exporting/importing is much easier with this one. Each animation in blender keep as a different action, when exporting check "export animation" and "all actions". After importing to T3D animations will be separated.

[Duion]

Ah OK, that sounds useful. Anyone tested it yet?

[L3zak]

Yes, it works like a charm. Blender:

http://i.imgur.com/SsWLgVV.png

and:

http://i.imgur.com/c63HLRl.png

[Steve_Yorkshire]

Nice find @J0linar :)

[TorqueFan]

@Jolinar

Man thank you! This exporter right here just saved me so much time!

I had a very case-specific issue importing certain meshes attached to a rig from Blender to Torque. The problem was the sub-meshes had multiple modifiers in the stack ( i.e. mirror, armature, etc. ) and upon import into Torque some of the meshes could distort when animating.

Anyhow, with this tool I was able to export the Armature data separately and all of the modifier data was properly preserved!! Looking at hooking in 100's of animations across several meshes, this is a must have for me right now! Thank you so much for posting!

[deathbravo]

404

http://godotengine.org/download

[JeffR]

Not sure what problem you're seeing deathbravo, but that page loads for me, though I grabbed the exporter by downloading the project from the github page, so if the page still isn't loading for you, you can try that.

And yeah, I recently gave this a real look and it works perfectly. Good find!

[deathbravo]

i am not sure.

both of the links in the first post of this thread give me 'The requested page cannot be found';

then I google and got the link I posted.

maybe I have bad luck, since the garagegames' forum gives me 'EXCEPTION: (index.php).........'.

[Jason Campbell]

I also am getting a Page not Found page. Anyway I got it from the github page and I can't seem to install it. It says "Multiple Addons using the same name found"

Any help would be appreciated.

[SqHd]

Hey Jason: Maybe a previous version is sitting in your Blender addons folder. Check the folder option to view hidden files and follow this path:

C:\Users\(your account)\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.77\scripts\addons

Once in there look for a folder called "io_scene_dae".

Also, you can check your blender preferences "add-ons" tab; just search for "better" and see if it comes up.

And here's a DB link to the Better Collada Exporter zip file:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/xkwcz8jjt7lojtt/Godot_v2.0.1_stable_better_collada.zip?dl=0

Choose the "install from file" option in the "add-ons" tab in Blender preferences.

[Jason Campbell]

@SqHd

Thanks for the working link, got it working too.

[SqHd]

@Jason Campbell

You're welcome. Happy to help.