When I’m exporting a skeletal mesh from UE5 as FBX, and then importing it into Blender some parts of the skeletal mesh are missing in LoD 0 and 1, while in LoD 2,3 and 4 are fine.
It’s those 2 pieces of clothing in the front, and also there is a piece in the back missing also.
This test was done on Paragon Greystone Novaborn. Paragons are more complex and good place to learn some things.
Do I need to change something in UE before exporting or I have to do something in Blender?
//Edit1:
I also tried Kallari Rogue and there the skeletal mesh is missing the cloak which is made of 3 slots. The hood is using the same material, but that one is showing in Blender, but this time the elements are missing from all LoDs.
Hi there,
First of all, just to check, do you want to work with each LOD mesh? If not, the best workflow is to save your LOD information as a data asset, similarly to what is done with Metahuman. This is done in the Skeletal Mesh editor. Then, during the export window, uncheck Export Level of Detail.
In this test, I want to remove the sword and the shield from each of the skeletal meshes, and keep everything else. Which from what I see, it is easy in Blender (especially with Kallari which has the weapon inside the hand), as they both have a separate vertex group. But the problem is with the missing clothing.
Thank you for clarifying. I also recall that you need to disable cloth physics before exporting. That might be the cause for the missing cloth for certain characters. In your case, there is no need to export all LOD meshes, just the base LOD0 mesh, remove the weapons, and import back to UE. Use the LODSettings data asset to rebuild your character’s LOD.
Even if I export only LOD0, the clothing is still missing, so I want to give a try your suggestion, but how can I disable the physics? Inside clothing section for physics it has none. I’m really a beginner to Unreal Engine, my programming knowledge is useful with backend not with this kind of stuff, so any help does help me a lot now and in the future when I encounter the same situations, so really thank you!
Make sure to check this window for every character mesh that has either hair or cloth physics. Most of the Paragon human characters have both installed. When, importing back, you can copy and re-install the cloth settings from the original mesh. Use the button “Add Clothing” and select the original mesh from the list.
In Kallari Rogue case where the cloak was missing from all LOD’s, by doing what you said, the cloak is now showing in Blender. Unfortunately with Greystone Novaborn where the clothing was missing only from LOD0 and 1, but showing in LOD2,3,4, it is still not working.
After adding cloth settings from the original mesh, you may need to re-apply the cloth settings, by selecting the cloth mesh, right click and “apply clothing data…”
It’s hard to see what might be causing the problem with Greystone. Try to import all LOD meshes to see if the cloth will be restored at LOD0. It might be a design mistake.
That solved the problem with the physics. It tricked me a bit, because inside the Viewport of an Actor with that skeletal mesh the clothing were still straight, but inside the game they are fine. Maybe in that Viewport the gravity isn’t enabled or something.
As for Greystone it is a bit weird as they don’t work only on 2 of the LOD’s, and the important one LOD0, but work on 3 of them (last ones).
It didn’t. I checked in Blender LOD2 where it appears, and got the name of the vertex group (thigh_twist_01_l) of one of the pieces that doesn’t appear, and in LOD0 there is that vertex group, and it does contain the leg but not the clothing.
It also doesn’t create a material slot for them in Unreal Engine (there are 3 pieces, the 2 in front and one in back), but in Blender there are all of them in material section.
I know Blender and UE require a specific workflow for making things work. Have you tested the official Blender-UE addon? Let me see if I can find the link.
Also, are you able to test with Maya?
I tried that plugin, but when I was exporting from Blender to UE, it created skeletons again and physics assets, so I’ll stick to export/import for now. Also I didn’t managed to make it export a single skeletal mesh with all the LODs, instead of it creating separate ones for each, and for each skeletons and physics assets.
No need. I duplicated the materials for those missing parts, and not just simply created instances, and after that, they appeared in Blender as well (which I deleted them after I imported them as I used the original materials). So right now everything seems to work as I want.
Thank you for your help.
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