I have been trying to just import a basic character with a rig into a project to mess around with. i got the asset to import correctly before i rigged it, but it didnt have the smoothing channels.
I changed my settings in Maya 2024 to include the smoothing channels after checking the Include > Geometry > Smoothing Groups box in the Maya interface. Unchecking this box has not changed the outcome. It still imports as just a cube to UE5.
I think it probably has something to do with the rig i have, or the export settings from Maya, but I have no idea where to start looking and trying to google the problem has been less than helpful.
what format are you exporting as (FBX is “preferred”)
can you re-import your exported model back into Maya? (in a separate scene using the import system)
can you open your file in say Windows Model Viewer (“3D viewer” in the Open with)
I am not completely familiar with Maya directly, but after a bit of looking:
are you sure you selected the Mesh in addition to the Armature Hierarchy?
I imported the file back into Maya, it is doing the same thing. There is only a head.
You were right about the skeletal mesh not being selected. I fixed that, and now it is a head with a mesh underneath it.
I guess this makes sense since i just extruded the rest of the body parts from the head, but I still don’t know why it chooses to cut out the rest of the body.
just the way that Maya chose to do things.
in Blender (99% feature parity just different workflow with more support for non-NVidia GPUs) we nest/Parent the Mesh inside the Armature (this has better fail safes when binding the vertices to the rig, and more strict weight painting)
if you “Hide” everything besides the Mesh and the Rig/Armature in the Scene before export then do “Select All” it should avoid the situation in the future.
