B2U - Blender to Unity Custom Exporter/Importer

Hy guys! For more than two years we developed a in-house solution for all our export/import problems using blender and Unity, now it's mature enough and we think it can be very useful to you guys too. So check this out.

What is it?
B2U is a custom exporter for Blender (www.blender.org) and importer for Unity that provide a faster streamlined way to export your assets or full scenes from blender to Unity.







What it's not?
It's not a new FBX exporter/ importer. Actually it uses the blender fbx exporter and the unity fbx importer. It's just expand it with custom files that keep more information than the default process can. Also our exporter/importer process all data and corrections on the fly.

How to use?
Use B2U is very easy, just let us handle all the mess, click export and it's done. You can export a single asset, a full library or even a full scene with support to instantiated prefabs and static batch, just with 1 click.

Who are you?
Cogumelo Softworks (www.cogumelosoftworks.com) is a small Brazilian company incubated in the INT - ( National Institute of Technology ) and we develop interactive presentations for military, engineering and Scientific Visualization. Also for the last year we are one of the top sellers of BlenderMarket (www.blendermarket.com) with two commercial plugins for blender. MotionTool (Node based procedural animation tool ) and BakeTool ( Bake Helper to Blender Internal and Cycles render ).

Hep to make the right tool for you!
Now we want to listen to you. What features do you guys think are more important? What do you guys need for B2U to be adequate for your projects? We are full of ideas but your feedback now is more important to us.

Bye!

 

Can the plugin work at runtime, or is it only meant for use in the editor? (i.e. does it use the AssetImporter system, or rather, construct it from the ground/file-contents up?)

P.S. There are some grammar mistakes in the last few sentences. The wording should be: "Now we want to listen to you; before we put it in the asset store, what features do you guys think are more important? What do you guys need for B2U to be adequate for your projects?"

 

@Venryx : Since we work on top the Unity Importer it don't work at runtime. Actually the scene importer can but it's not implemented at this time. It would be a nice feature to have? We changed the sentence to be more clear. Thanks.

 

Yeah, runtime support is nice for games with modding systems. Most games don't have that, though, so for most developers, the editor-only usage is perfectly fine. (I was mostly just asking out of curiosity, as I haven't seen many good runtime importers--which makes sense, since they're a lot more work having to build export, parsing, and reconstruction systems from scratch (I made one myself, so I know))

 

Hello,
Sometimes I need to modify FBX , and when I import a fbx into blender I lost uvmapping, is your pluggin solve this issue ?

 

Hi @menfou
We don't have this kind of problem with the build-in process but if you are having this problem probably B2U can't fix it to you since we are build on top the FBX importer from blender and the FBX exporter from Unity. Anyway this should not happen, when you import a fbx file in blender. Are you using the last blender version? Try to export using the FBX Binary file format next time and see if it fix the problem

Also, we update our first page with a "What it's not?" section. Things can be more clear about how it works.

 

Looks great! Definitely could use this. It might be too hard to do but being able to set the different LODs for the models would be nice.

 

Hi @Andrew_atl : Sure we can take a look on it and see what we can do. It can be a good feature to have for sure. Blender aready have some LOD settings for BGE, we will check how much we can use it. Thanks!

 

Updates:
Static Parameter now is set on prefab importer phase not in the "Scene importer" so now it work with the "Prefab Only" export mode. Also added support to set Tag and Layer per object in Blender, they are set on importer too.


Rules:

• If you set a unknown layer for the object Unity will set it to "Default"
• if you set a unknown tag for the object Unity will set it to "Untagged"

 

Updates:

• Autofixes for material:
  • Remove all unused sockets before export
  • Abort the export process if some object don't have materials. It force to have valid materials and you don't have more "No Name" materials messing in Unity project.
• Reports:
  • Now we have a report system that shows what happened with the export process.

This is a example of successful export without any fix


This is a example of successful export fixing non used socket materials


This is a aborted export process cause one object don't have a material.


The Full Panel:

 

Last Updates:

Added set Colliders for prefabs in Blender


Now Settings are Per Prefab and Per Object
Rule: Per Object Settings overwrite per prefab settings in Scene Importer

• Static : Per Prefab and Per Object
• Layer : Per Prefab and Per Object
• Tag : Per Prefab and Per Object
• Collider : Per Prefab
• Export : Per Object

Better Camera Support

• New FOV correction
• Rotations now fixed ( One limitation is to keep the horizon line )

New Reports:

• Check if the path is valid:

Suggestions are welcome
Bye!

 

Sounds fantastic. It's great that it was mature enough almost a month ago, because I would pay good money for this asset right now.

 

Hi Staffan!
We are just refining it right now, our prevision is to release it until January 15th.
If you have some suggestions please let us know too.
Greetings

 

Where we need help about the job of Blender 2 Unity is Animated objects specially with Humans or Humanoid Rig using in my case, The Addon Rigify, who help us a lot for animate. For example if you automate or help in the process of export and import with the names of the bones and making more easy the task of making more compatible Mecanim with Rigify.

 

It is possible to import a whole scene with objects instances in Unity and import one lightmap for the whole scene ?

 

@zenGarden. Yep, it's possible!

We are now working in a better support to cameras and lights, we could not release it on the date we planed but we are close now.

 

I am looking forward to this. Is this the only place you are posting? I had not seen anything on Google+ but it would be great to see updates there or on YouTube comments.

 

As an avid blender user, I'm pretty excited about this plugin.

 

Until it comes with full lightmap scene export to Unity , i don' t need the plugin.

 

This sounds great! I can see this working well with your Bake Tool. When is it coming out?

 

Any news. How will this work with your blender baking addon?

 

This would be awesome, when is this arriving?

 

Hi!
Sorry for be a bit quiet about it, we are very happy to see that there's so many people interested on use it. In the last two months we had been a very busy with some projects but we made a nice round of tests in a more heterogeneous group of systems and we found 3 showstopper problems to solve before release:

• We need a more streamlined design and better UI for the full scene import. Prefabs are finished though.
• We need to translate our code for C# ASAP, today we use javascript and it's not that good to release it in js.
• It doesn't work right now with MacOS only Windows. We want to fix it before release but we don't have any Mac to test so it can take a while or we just give up about MacOS in the first release.

We will keep working on these problems during May and see how things goes, we need too a good release time cause once we release it we want to make sure we will be available to provide all support that you guys need with doubts and other problems.

@Skolstvo: Sure you can use it with BakeTool but you will need custom shaders since Unity don't support external maps inside it render pipeline AFAIK. We use Cycles and BakeTool in all our works here in our Company.

If anyone is interested BakeTool is our Blender solution for Cycles and BI render bake.
https://cgcookiemarkets.com/all-products/baketool/

Regards!

 

@CogumeloSoft

That simply isn't true. You just have to assign lightmaps via script. Just set the lightmaps with LightmapData

 

Hi @Sklstvo.
Good to know, will take a look on that
Thanks!

 

HI there,

Just wondering how this is coming along and when release might be looking likely? Do you have any info on what version of the FBX format you're supporting? I'm also wondering how you'll be dealing with the axis, rotation and scale corrections, will you be fixing those things on the blender side so that the fixes are locked in to the FBX format? or will it more be during the import process that the FBX's are patched up?

Thanks

 

Hi yakandco,
We support the default 7.4 binary FBX exported from blender 2.76/2.77. We are making all the transform corrections for rotation, position and scale. Those fixes works with a combination of FBX export config and in our own meta data exported with the fbx files. We don't touch inside the original export script in blender we just add functions on top of it with our own exporter. The import process in Unity deals with all the corrections based on those information.

We have some nice progress last month and now all our code is in C# \o/
Also we fixed many bugs and started to code a more streamlined UI for the importer but not finished yet.

Last 6 months was very busy here with some projects ( and for me particularly with my master degree) but i hope things come faster now.
Bye!

 

@CogumeloSoft Where i can find your addon please ? it's look like awesome and if it's possible i would like to try it. THX and good job

 

Hi jbrulet,
It's yet in development and not released. Keep in touch for more news soon.
Bye!

 

Is this exciting/useful addon still being developed? Any plans to post on BlenderMarket?

 

Hi.
We got a lot of works here in after July and although this include the use of B2U and it have a lot of improvements at this time we don't think it's stable enough to release yet. We plan to release it with Blender 2.79 the last Blender version before the 2.8.
When it's finished we probably will release in Blender Market and Unity Asset Store.

 

Hi!
Thanks for those that followed here the development during the last years. We think it's mature enough now and it's released in Blendermarket. The Unity asset store version is in "Pending Review" and likely will be released soon.
We are changing the development to the Assets Forum now, any doubts or suggestions just let us know.
https://forum.unity.com/threads/b2u-blender-to-unity-prefab-and-scene-exporter.499499/

Bye!

 

It's released in Unity Asset Store!!!
https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/#!/content/100772

 

This seems to be very interesting may be you need to put it on time limited sale to get enough sale and reviews.

 

Hi @CogumeloSoft
Do you have a video tutorial showing how to setup colliders in Blender for the plugin import the prefab instances ?

 

Hi @zenGarden
You can select the Collider option at the object settings in B2U Panel.

 

I mean can the plugin import colliders volumes setup in Blender ?
How to setup up colliders (names, conventions) in Blender if it is possible ?

 

Hi zenGarden. Sorry we were on vacation.
The colliders are automaticly generated by the "Collider Setting" based on Unity Components: Box Collider, Capsule Collider, Mesh Collider etc that are attached to the object. It's different from setup objects to work as Colliders/Triggers witch we don't support yet.

 

I just bought this at Blender Market, but cant set up an account there, (keeps saying my usernames are invalid) nor can I find a way to communicate. Will I be able to get updates in the future?

 

Hi NeOmega!
Since you brought from BlenderMarket you need to contact us from there. Call us with a inbox message in blendermarket or you can contact us by e-mail contato@cogumelosoftworks.com

 

Hi!
I think that you all know about Blender 2.8 project. We're watching close all updates in blender 2.8 to ensure we could port B2U to it ASAP.
That include support to EEVEE as Material Preview instead of Cycles and support to the Future Animation Export System.

While Blender 2.8 is not released we're working in minor improvements for the next release planed to next week:

• Better support to Unity 2018.1
• Rework the Color Interface to Support RGBA
• Fix typo in "Default Layer"
• Rework the PBR Node to use the Standard (Roughness Setup)

 

Hi!
took a bit more time than expected but we just released B2U v1.2

Here’s the final list of features and fixes:

v1.2
- Better support to Unity 2018.1
- Force External Materials (Legacy Mode) on Import Models
- Rework the Color Interface to Support RGBA
- Fix typo in “Default Layer”
- Fix Bugs copying “Non Packed” Textures of Blender
- Fix Bugs exporting “Unlit Texture” Materials
- Rework the PBR Node to use the Standard (Roughness Setup)
- UV Repeat Bug seems fixed in Blender 2.79b and Unity 2018.1


Bye!

 

B2U Today and Future
Hi! By this time you should know that blender and unity are getting major updates in the next quarter. Unity is planed to release a next version with long requested new prefab system and Blender 2.8 is around the corner.
Here’s what we are working on today for the next version (1.3) and what we plan to implement for B2U 1.4

B2U 1.3 Current WIP Log - To be released in October 2018

• Will be compatible with Blender 2.79b and Unity 2018.2
• The Material system are being rework to add a new easier Workflow based on the Principled Shader
• You can yet make custom material setups using the B2U interface nodes.
• Many Bug fixes.

B2U 1.4 - Released after Blender 2.8

• Will be compatible with Blender 2.8x and Unity 2018.3
• Will support Unity’s prefab system
• Groups to Prefabs will be replaced with Collections to Prefabs
• New Export Collection mode
• Eevee Materials based on Principled Shader will be compatible with the Material Export
• Initial Animation Export support (Non Characters)
• Setup LOD models inside Blender

If you guys have any suggestion to include in those versions please contact us.
Bye!

 

Hi! Some updates in the development.
Since Unity 2018.3 is really near to be released we choose to postpone the 1.3 version until it release and included already many features only planed to 1.4 such nested prefabs and new group system. This is now how we plan to release next the future versions.

B2U 1.3 - To be released days after Unity 2018.3

• Support to Unity 2018.3 (older versions will not work)
• Support to new Unity’s Prefab System. Groups are using nested prefabs!
• Rework in the Material System. Now much more streamlined workflow and added support to principled shaders. No custom node groups required anymore.
• Colors are now exported as Gamma Corrected producing closer results.
• Many Fixes and Bug Corrections.

B2U 1.4 To be released with Blender 2.8 (Stable)

• Full Support to EEVEE materials
• Collections support instead Groups. Include Nested Collections as Nested Prefabs
• Setup LOD models inside Blender
• Initial Animation Export support (Non Characters)
  
  

 

Where is the download?

 

As promised B2U 1.3 is here with many improvements!

• Support to Unity 2018.3 (older versions was deprecated due many changes in Unity)
• New documentation website: http://cogumelosoftworks.com/b2udocs
• Implements the new Unity’s Prefab system. Now Scenes and Groups implement nested prefabs!
• Auto Reimport Scene and Groups instanciated
• B2U Material Export was redone from the ground up to a much better and easy to use system!
• Colors are now exported as Hex sRGB (Gamma Corrected)
• Fixed many bugs and general cleanup the code

We are now focusing in Blender 2.8 version and some video tutorials. If you have any doubts about the new export material system please check the new documentation website
Bye!

 

We found a showstopper bug in group data export. The v1.31 is a hotfix for that and is already released in Blendermarket. for those that purchase in Unity Store it's under review and will be available soon.
Thanks Güray for report.

 

Any date for the release of 1.4 for Blender 2.80 released yesterday ?

 

Any news for the 1.4 update for B2U ?...

 

News on B2U 1.4 for blender 2.8
We’re working on it with prevision to be released this month. Keep in touch for more news about it