Exporting Marketplace Acquired Skeletal Mesh and Animation for Refining in Blender? Is there workflow for this?

bhuether · May 15, 2024, 12:30pm

Hi, I have seen info about exporting Manny, but in my case I have a 4 legged robot animal that I bought on marketplace for UE.

I animated in UE, but I realized that I would prefer to do the animation work in Blender if possible.

I just don’t know what procedure would be needed. For starters I chose the skeletal mesh and chose Asset Actons->Export and exported FBX, leaving everything as is. Same for the animation sequence file.

I imported these in Blender, and see:

Now, as far as the asset as it is in UE, here are some details. Here is what I see when opening skeletal mesh:

Here is whyat I see when opening the walk animation sequence:

Here are the three materials used:

There are two texture files as well, for diffuse and normal.

The way I animated in UE, was I dragged the animatoin sequence into Sequencer, converted to FK Rig, and edited manually. The result is:

So, how to proceed? Lots to digest. In Blender, I see a lot is imported, but I don’t see how to link up the animation data, so that I can actually have this animation work.

I have used Rigify in Blender, but not sure how that applies here, or whether there is a way to import such that the rigging is already set up.

Hoping someone has idea for how to work on this animation in Blender.

thanks!

Enter_Reality · May 15, 2024, 12:37pm

Unless you’re modifying each single animation with Sequencer, I suggest you to bulke export all the animation sequences ( right click on the anim sequences > Asset Action > Bulk export and untick everything except local time ), then you can import the animations in Blender.
I’m not a blender user, but at least in Maya, if you simply import/drag&drop the animation in the viewport where you also have the skeletal mesh in bind pose, the skeleton will be updated by having keyframes.
If instead you want to import the animation and apply that to your control rig inside Blender, I guess that the best solution would be to either rig it using a rigging system that allows you to also import and bake animations onto the control rig, or build the entire thing yourself.

alena434 · May 18, 2024, 6:48am

Yes, there is a workflow for exporting a skeletal mesh and animation from a marketplace to refine in Blender. Here’s a simple step-by-step guide:

Export from Marketplace (e.g., Unreal Engine):

Open your project in Unreal Engine.
Select the skeletal mesh and animation you want to export.
Right-click and choose “Asset Actions” > “Export.”
Save the file in FBX format.

Import into Blender:

Open Blender.
Go to File > Import > FBX (.fbx).
Find and select the FBX file you exported.
Click “Import FBX.”

Refine in Blender:

Once imported, you can edit the mesh and animations as needed.
Use Blender’s tools to make any necessary changes or improvements.

Export from Blender:

After refining, export the updated mesh and animation.
Go to File > Export > FBX (.fbx).
Adjust export settings to match your needs, then click “Export FBX.”

Import Back to Marketplace (e.g., Unreal Engine):

Open Unreal Engine.
Go to Content Browser, right-click, and select “Import.”
Choose the updated FBX file from Blender.
Verify the imported mesh and animation to ensure everything looks correct.

This workflow helps you refine marketplace assets using Blender before bringing them back into your project.

bhuether · May 19, 2024, 12:01pm

Hi, thanks for the replies.

Here is an example of what I am doing:

This was based on advice on blender forum

where someone said

"You have 2 files from UE, one the mesh and the other the animation…

Import your Mesh…select the armature…
Import your animation ( use same settings )

You now have two rigs on screen… delete the animation rig you just imported or hide it in the outliner …

Go to Dope sheet ( your mesh armature should be still selected if not make sure it is selected)
Change to the Action editor ( in the Dope sheet )
Go to the center drop-down and select the action that is in there
"

My screenshot shows me doing this, but at the moment where I add the action, the mesh and bones disappear.

This is for importing, say, the walk cycle that is in UE for this robot cat.

What I was trying to do was export the control rig animation, since what I did in UE was place the walk cycle sequence in Sequencer, convert it to FK control rig, then edited everything manually from there.

But if I export the control rig as fbx it just results in separate animation assets importing into blender for every bone. Wondering if there is better way to export control rig animation?

thanks!