There's a lot of energy going into a fix for bump mapping, but developers aren't sure yet about the impact of the new code.
Ton Roosendaal writes:
1) Blender 2.56 work
- The new bump patch still requires end-user level reviews, preferably on production renders. We like to find out if it can efficiently replace the patch from august 2009 without breaking visual appearance, but just improving it. There's been a fix in the original patch for compliant scaling of procedural bump. See also the original proposal.
- There's a new regression .zip available for download [note: a regression test is used to make sure old functionality still works correctly after a software update - Bart].
2) Other projects
- Jeroen Bakker announces that he'll do a release of Blender-aid this week, supporting directory move/rename and scripting. He also is nearly done with final proposal for the Compositor OpenCL project.
- Campbell made a basic FBX import script, he's seeking for someone to work on this.(Note, export script is already there!)
- We also have will make a shortlist of missing import/exporters.
-Ton-
14 Comments
A FBX importer, great!
I think Importer/exporter quality is extremly important to make users come to Blender. I'm a 3dsmax user, and I want to introduce blender in my workflow, but I will go step by step. So I will need to interchange :
Model : Obj does the work
Material : I'm not sure it is really useful, since it depends of the renderer. Maybe just diffuse texture
Animation : Point cache (PC2) would be extremly appreciated. Curve interpolation is too different from software to sofware. Maybe baking one key per frame.
Camera : FBX or Collada could do it.
Great, regression test file!
VRML (.wrl) import for me please! And a SolidWorks importer would be the icing on the cake, bridging the gap between cold industrial design and beautiful Blender presentation.
Not sure if this will ever happen, but SolidWorks to blender -> can't think of a better way to combine open source with existing cad....
But more realistically... perhaps rather IGES / STEP files. SolidWorks is .... too specific. IGES and STEP is 'more general'.. or even ACIS SAT files...
Anywhooo... thanks to all developers for their time. We can't tell you how much we appreciate all the hard work :)
Seems like it's going well. But i miss good bevel tools in 2.5 badly. Is the API freezed by now?
I agree with dddjef, one of the most important features of any 3d app has to be the importers/exporters. The ones i want the most to be fully supported are Alembic, COLLADA and FBX.
Especially Alembic would be a very welcome addition for its use in vfx.
fbx-importer sounds great!
@Reaction & 3sie3wiel: How does STL work for you guys? (Is it implemented in 2.5x yet? Haven't checked). This is currently the best CAD-to-blender file/data transfer format option. One must first make a single multi-body part file of any assemblies that are desired prior to exporting to STL from your CAD app. Usually not a problem, but still an extra step. PM me @ BA if more info/discussion wanted...
Agree, tho, that STEP or IGES would be peachy... just not likely. (Unless... someone's interested in leveraging Open CASCADE to add the functionality?!)
@Rio
I've forgotten Alembic. But this solution seems to be a bit static. I haven't found any exporter / importer for 3dsmax, maya or either houdini...
any news about this?
Wasn't there a GSoC project aiming at implementing full COLLADA support?
What about Space Navigator support? This is the only graphics tool in the universe that does not support it.
Thanks
DJ
Hello did someone try clone texture painting with alpha? premultiply doesnt help black border around visible texture remains on finall texture :/
"We also have will make a shortlist of missing import/exporters."
Typo there... ;)
My best wishes with exporters, they are key for game engines and to get into other industries workflows.. FBX and collada are absolutely key, so, deep sincere kudos..!
Compositor OpenCL ?
Seems like project Mango is already starting to develop ...