Import OBJ then export FBX with Texture...??

I did not have an option to load any obj files, just by virtue of clicking on the script makes V6 crash.. V7 does nothing, but it does lock parts of the GUI options up.. So I will have to forget about using older scripts.. Unless someone makes a current version of JAVASCRIPT!. The crash is not down to the workload, since nothing is being added into Cheetah. Its the script version itself that causes the crash.

I actually used a very old version of Poser to achieve the lip-synching. I have V4 with Mimic Pro, which I managed to install on a Windows notebook in compatibility mode.. V10 and 11 Poser have many issues. Partially V10, is no longer compatible with the current Flash version. I really do not know they created their software relying on an almost obsolete software to support their GUI.. Other software on my Mac needed me to update Flash, so that killed V10 off. There is a lot of anger on the internet about that. So since I needed lip-synching, I purchased the V11 update.. But V11 is not great and Mac Mimic will not work with it so I used Poser V4..

I have tried to install Daz Studio onto my Mac but it will not work.. Perhaps is a 64bit issue or an OSX issue, I do not know.. I cannot update my OSX since most of my software will only work with 32bit...

I was going to purchase Carrera Pro with Mimic Pro with a big discount for Education, but she told me that she cannot guarantee it will work on Mojave. I would have thought it would be OK, so I might buy it anyway... Shame there is not trial option..

I can open a Poser V4 fils in V11 fine and it all works well. But its the export to FBX which is the issue.. The rigging animations work fine, but not the lip/mouth morphing.. So that brings be back to my idea of exporting a sequence of obj's, which is easy, and creating the FBX that way where the lip moments should then work.. I can add the audio after.. But its the finding software that can easily import a sequence of obj's and export as an FBX which is the obstacle.. I am not the only person who has tried to do this. Its been done in the past and if you do an internets search there is a demand for this feature.. My friend who works for Cutting Edge, which is the biggest post production media company in the southern hemisphere told me that she has used the import 3D obj sequence many times for short animations needed in TV advertising.. But they do things differently now using Maya..

I am not going to hold my breath that Simlab Composer may add an import sequence option to create the Action objects.. Doing it this way, I would not even need the FBX.. Perhaps the file size would be too big for it the model to work correctly in a Virtual Reality.. But I can retopologize the jobs to try to reduce the polygon count..

I can add a Web Viewer within a Virtual Reality Tour, so I might have to settle for a talking video in a VR..

IF, the file size after importing a sequence into Simlab Composer is doable/manageable, that would open up other opportunities in regards to 3D Interactive PDF's and WebGL's.. Not sure if a talking character would work in the 3D PDF, but I would try..

With regards to 2D image sequencing.. I have a cartoonist friend who exports the tweeting animations in Vector to create layered animations.. So there is also a need for 2D export in some cases. With the Vector, there is no alpha channel and since the graphic is Vector, the files size is very small.. Its a very similar process I used to use with Flash.. I would export the morphed shape tween shapes out of AI, and import them as a sequence into Flash. With Flash, I only had to import one graphic and it would ask me if I need to import the entire sequence.. Its was great!!

Thank you for your suggestions..
 
Well, the original script is from 2007 ... Just as an aside, Martin made some (probably necessary) changes in Cheetah that make older scripts crash. Somebody would have to change specifically that script (and sorry, I'm not into scripting, so I can't help you there).

Daz Studio is probably the answer to your problems (the only easy one I can think of), and I still use High Sierra. There are two versions, 32bit and 64bit, you should try the 64 (if it doesn't install automatically). (If the system asks you anything about allowing Studio about Mouses or so, you should answer with yes). Another option could be to do it on your Laptop under Windows.

I don't know if Studio is able to open poser-files that old (v4 must be from 2003 or so?); I don't even know that version, nor if they were any changes since then in the file format. So, worst case, you'd have to open it in v11, save, and then load into studio.

But actually V11 should be able to save the whole animation as fbx with the option "baked morphs". As I don't have Poser 11, I can't say for sure, just looked that one up myself (there doesn't seem to be a possibility to export with 'active morphs'). Daz Studio on the other hand does export all used morphs automatically (it's far from self-explaining how to export all available morphs).

Did you try export with baked morphs?

Otherwise you'd need studio. There I know that fbx export can include morphs (even non-active ones but it's not in any way self-explaining how to do that. Up to yesterday I thought that was not possible, but I do use it about once or twice in half a year or so).

With baked morphs in Poser 11 (if it works) or Daz Studio all your problems would be literally solved in 5 minutes.

Good luck
 
Yes, I have tried Baked.. Its ticked by default.. I thought that even if it did not play in the Autodesk FBX player, it still might play in Simlab Composer. After an animated FBX is added, the new feature in Composer, allows me to play the animation to test it before adding an action to play in within a VR.. But its not to be.. It was actually one of my last test before posting here so see if Cheetah can do it.. The binary option is set by default too. Pulling at straws I guess. Thanks for the suggestions..
 

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Again, I see I am not the only crazy persons looking for an import obj sequence solution... Check this forum out... https://forum.smithmicro.com/topic/1875/obj-sequences/5
I tried to create a script file with .py suffix, which is a Python script, but even many of the default scripts in Poser 11 do not show, which is very strange.. I need to find out which app I can use write and save a .py file. I should just be able to use a plan text editor.. Perhaps it has to be 'save as' in a particular software to become readable in Poser.. I tried Dreamweaver but perhaps not.
 
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Python Scripts: Any texteditor should do (Dreamweaver should work, too). Older poser versions at least had a window (somewhere) where you could write scripts directly into.

About the rest: No, I'm not pulling at straws, as this export from poser was one of the first things you tried yourself.

But thinking about it, I don't really believe that the lip-sync really works with morphs, rather with deformers (called magnets in poser and daz studio), and I don't know as what that should be exported.

Looking at your export window I see one possible problem, fbx 2019, which can't be read by all 3d apps (I'm not sure if it would work in Cheetah for example), but I don't think that this has much to do with the deformers not exported. But I'm guessing here (not seeing if it's magnets or morphs that actually are saved from poser). So you could try to save the animation from poser 11 to fbx 2014 or 2012. If that doesn't work, try collada, load that into another 3d app like Cheetah and export fbx from there if the deformers are imported.

You see, it's not about pulling at straws. Actually it wouldn't even be a problem to create an fbx animation from your objs. One would have to load each obj (already time consuming), create 218 morphs and then time the morphs where for each frame of your animation you have one morph at 100 % and everything else at zero (each frame a key). But that would be an unreasonable amount of work for something that could be literally done in 5 minutes with Daz Studio. Of course this could be automated with a script, but as you didn't find it by now, I sincerely doubt that it already exits. You would have to write it yourself in the app of your choice (meaning even a bigger amount of work because you'd have to learn that first. Doing this right might prevent you from going out of memory, though, which with absolute certainty would happen with an obj-sequence-animation that's long enough).

If it even doesn't work in Daz Studio, in no format available there, and nobody in the daz forums can tell you how to export those magnets (as deformers or morphs), only then you should try again with the obj-sequences.

You see, the obj-sequence as an animation format is only useful in apps that can't animate the usual way and work with 3d data only per frame anyways. In 'real' 3d apps, be that Cheetah, Blender, Maya, Cinema4d or whatever, it's not useful because of the already mentioned polygon-count. This is why you have so much trouble at finding a solution anywhere for this and why I said it's a "stupid format". Alone from your rather short animation here you'll get almost 3,5 mio polys which is already very much. With a human model you'd probably end up with more polys and therefore more memory usage than your computer can handle.

So I really would try to do all this with daz studio (in the worst case with that mimic plugin for 20 bucks).

Good luck anyways
 
You are probably right about magnets, I have seen that feature in Poser. I am only really using the term Morphing loosely since I assumed it was morphing. In that case, morphing might well work in a FBX, but Magnets are not.. I wonder if DAZ 3D is using Magnets since its using the same Mimic software. I have tried to install DAZ studios 32 bit and 64, but for some reason it will not install.. I used to have DAZ 32bit, but I removed it a long time ago, but that was a different older Mac, however its the same Time Machine copy over from Old to New..

I appreciate your insights. I had the bright idea of using a set of sequences, but perhaps not such a bright idea.. I was not expecting it to be so hard. As soon as I saw the new feature released in Simlab Composer, where FBX animations can be added into a VR, I thought about talking toons.. But I guess my idea was doomed from the start.. I think it might be time to give up.. Not without trying..
 
Even magnets should work, actually in an fbx. DAZ 3D has it's own deformers - what I don't know if it really translates the magnets from poser into its own deformers (but they should). The one thing to find it out is just to try it ;).

Like I said, I don't know Daz Studio very well, as I only open it once every few months to load, change (usually creating some face morph in another software to get that "dazness" out of it), pose and export a figure (I don't know enough about anatomy to create a believable human figure and for something (or rather -body) in the background it's not worth the try). So I can't really help you there (and I don't want to learn that software as I find it rather unagreable and don't have the wish to use very much of prefabricated content anyway (the exception are trees)). But in this case it could worth it and you could use it in the future for such things.

So, in your case, I wouldn't give up, just try another approach (and if nothing works, you could, instead of lip-syncing, export the emoticon guy with al morphs and animate him in whatever software you like (for example Cheetah), he has some morphs for vocals. The children want be so hard on you if the lips of a toon aren't moving 100 % correctly :) ).
 
My statement "Pulling at straws I guess" was really aimed at my actions...:cautious: But my straw box is about empty now.. To be honest, I really love sequence images. I have made some awesome media using this method.. I guess you could call it a method for those do don't know any better :LOL:
I added an Add-on into Blender to export an animation as a u3d. Even this would work since Simlab Composer can open that media format/content.. I thought I was on a winner.. However, the Add-on states that I need to upgrade to 2.8X.. I am using the very latest version.. So I have no idea why its stats that.. I also tried Bforartists too, which in my opinion is better than Blender.. But same thing.. It says I need to update. In case you do not know, the u3d format is used as the 3D interactive content in a 3D PDF.. I am hanging out on an update to Blender etc, to see it that sparks the Add-on into working..
 
My advice still would be Daz Studio.

Doing it manually ... you'd suffer for a few hours (I don't know if you hate repetitive stuff as much as I do). Loading all those objs, creating, morphs and animate it again would be really, really boring but it should work in any software (just try out before you do all the things if the software exports fbx with the morphs and test it in simlab).

Or getting a lip-sync-plugin for blender (I found on the quick something called "rhubarb" (https://github.com/scaredyfish/blender-rhubarb-lipsync), but that would be again a lot of work because you had to create the poses for the different vowels and konsonants (you could export them from poser as objs, load and creating a pose (which I guess is some sort of morph). Sorry, I don't use blender (and I didn't even like bforartists which is just another GUI for Blender, not always on the newest version, though.. Blender is just not made for me).

About image-sequences. No problem with them, as long as it's 2d. Any movie is nothing more than an image-sequence, in most cases just put into a single file to make the handling easier. Only inside 3d apps it's no good because of all the hassle (and by the way, it's no shame and no problem not to know something or to try out something that doesn't pan out in the end).
 
Ya, I downloaded rhubarb from GitHub.. It all seem to be more hassle than it was worth.. I have never used Blender or bforartists. Many features and great for free, but I do not think I would buy it.. Besides, for education I have access to much better.. Like Cinema 4D.. I am trying to learn that... Its very professional software. Lots of high end support.. The Dr., moderator was excellent in providing a proof of concept that an animated 3D sequence as a FBX does actually work and the file size was not too big.. He did state that there used to be a script to export a 3D Sequence, but it was not available anymore.. So he showed me on a video how to do it, but oh man, sooo many steps.. He really knows his stuff.

If I only had one or two to do, I would use his method but I have 30 students to create.. I was going to make videos but our school has 5 new VR headsets, so why not create VR they can relate to the media output.. I would hate to fail in this, but I have tried very hard to find a solution with very limited 3D skills and software knowledge. Oh well.. Perhaps I will stumble on a solution..

Thank for all your support with my very issue related task.. a task I really thought would be easy.. :rolleyes::rolleyes:
 
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Well, excitement followed but, OH BUGGER!!.. I followed this great tutorial for Maya,
and managed to load the import OBJ sequence GUI. Very easy, even I can do it.. I was so excited when the GUI showed up on the stage. My sequence came in very quickly, it even animated.. I thought I had done it. However, even after exporting as an FBX animation, flowing the internet instructions, no animation is added into the FBX.. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: Well, now I know it works, I need to find out why.. Real shame that his little GUI add-on is not available in Cheetah. But I guess its not worth making since its not something many users here would use..
 
Did you select all objects (i. e. all smileys) for export? (if you exported only the base mash, then there is no animation).

Or do you have 219 objects sitting on top of each other?

If it's something else, I can't help you because I don't really have experience with Maya (can't remember of a user in here who does use Maya on a regular basis).
 
Its really strange.. I only added 10 to test.. I do select all.. I then choose the FBX animation option.. But only one frame exports.. It was really quite a surprise to see the object export/import GUI appear using just script... I must be missing a step.. The texture is not in the animation in the main window but it appears when I add the FBX in Simlab Composer.. Maya has more buttons than a space ship.. I only know of software that can export from sequence as a 2D animation..

I tried to install DAZ Studio as you suggested but it just won't install.. I used to have it but I removed it.. Perhaps I need to totally clean everything from the old installation.
 
The texture is probably not saved in the fbx (both options exists, though, but default and more usual would be to just include a path to the texture files). And I'm really not sure if you're missing a step or if the script doesn't work correct or if you have to do it at midnight with full moon chanting to ancient gods long forgotten ... In other words, I have no clue, except that this space ship is not made for object-sequences.

By the way, it's normal to be overwhelmed by the huge amount of buttons and tabs of any major 3d app (especially as most of them open windows with even more buttons and parameters). I do use Modo, and I'm sincerely convinced that there is nobody alive who really understands all the possibilities hidden in that software. It's probably the same in the other big ones). All this is everything else then beginnerfrinedly. So let me give you 2 tips not related to your actual problem:
1. The most intuitive 3d app I know is Cheetah 3d, with quite a lot less whistles and bells than the bigger (and more expensive ones). So it can be a good idea to start in Cheetah which you already have.
2. As soon as you have a rough concept you can look into other 3d software, but in the end they are all difficult to master. Which one you do prefer is depending on what you want to do (for animation Maya should be best in class) and your personal preferences. Blender for example is simply not made for me, while others never will find their way into Modo. Houdini is a bit dry (imho) because you seem to do almost everything in nodes (very technical all that) but, so they say, nothing better for vfx. Each one has it's strengths and it's weaknesses, and certain ways to do things. So I'd recommend to test them out, to see how you feel in it, how easy it is for you to understand the concepts and so on (they have all free trials. But you can only evualate them if you know what to do ... Therefore I mentioned Cheetah as a good starting point into the world of 3d).

About DAZ Studio: There must be some error message or whatever ... It's possible that you have under system settings, security only allowed the installation of programs from apple's app store. It has to be app-store and verified developers (or something with that meaning. I don't have an english OS). If that's set, it should try to install the app with a message if it's verified, with a warning, if it's not.

If that's not the problem, you'll have to ask in the daz forum for help.

(If it is or rather was the problem, sorry that I didn't think of that before).
 
I agree that Modo is very good.. I loved using the trail .. It works really well, so I purchased a one year education licence. But their education licensing is still too expensive, so schools will not buy it.. I tried to tell Modo this, and they said they would look into it, but nothing happened.. Greed really. Most students that use the software only get to use it once a week for 1 hour.. Teachers use it more since they need to learn how to use the basics.. There is no point in buying it when Autodesk provides all of its software to teachers and students for free. So I play about with Mudbox.. Even the younger students love to use it, since it looks like a lump of clay.. and.. NO MESS!.. I even got Cinema 4D for free. That is so nice of them. Its not a cheap looking software. In fact it awesome. And their support was excellent too.. I will check it out more during Term break. Or the next CoVid lockdown.. :sick::sick::sick:

I also like Cheetah, it has few overwhelming tools, but what there is are very functional.. It has most of the tools anyone would need and it has very high end build. Meaning it talks to high end software and processes.. Probably not said that right but I know what I mean.. Basically, its professional but it does not have a professional price..

One good thing about starting this post, are the spider searches will point many others that might need sequence obj options, to find this post and in tern check out Cheetah.. Ha.. More so if it was possible to import and export obj sequences. :D:D

Poser is very frustrating. Why would they add scripts by default that do not show in the GUI.. Probably since they have not checked after each update, consequently the scripts have become obsolete.. That is why the import sequence script I found does not show. BUT.. scripts did not show in Cheetah V6 either, where they should have.. Until I updated to V7 and they they all showed up.

Since Maya does import the obj's, I will try to find out why the exported FBX does not animate. It might be a stilly thing I am missing..
 
Over these past few weeks, I have searched the internet for obj sequence options. I really cannot believe the amount of people asking for this same features. The software they are using include all what we have discussed using here and more.. The issue is, many of the post are old and many of the plugin, add-ons or scripts are out of date. Yet, I keep on searching :rolleyes::rolleyes::cautious::cautious:
 
I have it sooo close... I have the sequence in Bforartists, I can play the animation, it has its texture, I can render the animation, but it suggest that the rendered animation is auto saved into a folder yet there is nothing in it.. I can save as a dae and a single frame opens with texture. But as soon as I try to save as a FBX, nothing exports. Not even one single frame.. I think I have wasted enough time using Blender and Bforartists. No wonder they are free..

If I add a single obj into Bforartists, add the texture and export as a FBX, it works.. So it has to be the fact that it cannot export the sequence animation.. :mad::mad: It cannot even export a movie from a sequence. No idea why..

Since you use Modo, its been a long time since I have used it, does it import a obj sequence and export the FBX..??

If I do not solve the issue by the start of Term 4, that's it.. I have to use video.. Real shame we cannot use the schools VR headsets..
 
A while ago I had the idea to export the BVH Motion script from Poser and add it to a single OBJ final in Blender. However, Blender does not accept the Poser BVH Motion script.. I just tried again.. I should have know Blender would have issues.. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

Did you know you can add a Mixamo animation into Cheetah, with all the bones.. But the animation is lost.. If BVA Motion could be added into an object added, you can then play with the BVA Motion scrip to make it your own, using the BVA as a starting point..

To be honest, I find what is normally very simply things very hard to do in Cheetah, which is probable why I have not adopted using it much. I often close the app out of frustration.. A simple thing like Resolution size of image is hard to find the settings. I have done it in the past, but who knows where that is.. I know it defaults at 640X480, but I cannot find that anywhere in the GUI to suggest where I can increase it.. It needs to be in Settings.. I can see the option in Output in V6, so perhaps V7 trail does not have this option since I cannot find it..
 
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Oh eek.. That took me a long time to find... I think Cheetah needs to do better than that.. I clicked on the Cheetah render icon and found it, thank you.. But I would never have guessed that... It needs to be in the Prefences. Or a right click Render settings tab...
 
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