Scale from maya to unity.

Quick question.

What scale should I have my scene in in maya?

I then save to .mb

And when i do that at what scale should i import it in in unity editor?

I ask these questions because certain shaders dont seem to function right at certain scales.

I was under the impression that meters was what it should be at in maya even though maya starts at cm. At meters some things dont seem to work correctly.

For instance the lightmapped reflection shader and script dont function correctly...

Also this might affect ssao.

Thanks for the help.

 

You should set the "Scale Factor" in Unity's import setting to be "realistic"... so for instance your male model should be around 2 meters in Unity (1 unit in Unity equals 1 meter).

This is usually only important with regards to Physics... Shaders shouldn't be affected by scale unless they have hard coded values (the lightmap reflective shader and script combo might).

 

Does that mean i should switch my size settings in maya to meters.. size it up according to meters in maya and then import it with a 1.0 scale factor in unitys importer?

Also another question sort of relating to scale. Is there a way to switch the camera speed in the unity editor?

 

If you hold down shift while moving around in the Editor it goes a lot faster if that is what you are referring to?

I have searched for modeling scale info before and from the answers I have read it don't seem to matter what scale you make them in Maya (or any modeling program) and the scale factor don't matter either as long as it is "realistic" within Unity...so it can be 1, .1, .01, don't matter.

If I am wrong, someone feel free to correct me.

 

Exactly, it doesn't matter the scale in Maya etc, as long as the import Scale Factor is set to make it the proper scale in Unity.

 

well in terms of camera speed i mean my camera is just moving too fast without the shift being held down. I want to close up on certain things in a really tight compartment in a vehicle and im having trouble just navigating it.

 

Instead of moving around in Perspective mode, have you tried instead going into overhead, left, ect mode by clicking on the Y (or whatever view you want) axis? I usually have better results going that route....I don't make many adjustments in Perspective mode. Maybe you already do that, I don't know. I know of no way to slow the camera down however, sorry.

For instance, in the overhead viewport view, select the object, hit F to focus on and center it, scroll in and it will be a perfect close up of the object that fills a good portion of your view.

 

well yea of course i use all the camera modes, thats how you position stuff. But if your in a small room with pipes and electronics with lots of polygons... alls your going to see from those camera angles is wireframe meshes... You cant tell one thing from another...

Thats why you need to be in perspective and actually in it lookn around... problem is if you hit move forward u jump out of it at an instant...

 

The camera does move quite quickly but sounds like the model came in much too small.

The problem with the Unity editor is that there is no size information such as 3d coordinates at your current mouse cursor position.

You could however simply create a cube object - which is 1x1x1 metres by default - and compare that to the size of any imported assets.

 

Yea thats what i did already... it just moves to fast. Hopefuly we get control over how fast the camera moves... a number multiplier at the bottom of the screen would be enough.. I think thats hwo crytek does it.

 

If you want to get to somthing quickly simply select it and hit the "f" key and while painting terrian the same idea works simply hit "f" and the camera zooms to the area the mouse is touching. CryTek's control over the camera speed is a nice feature though but to make a full game with that (not a mod) your gonna have to pay in the upper 6 figures. In fact they wont even discus price with you untill you sign an NDA. If you want slower controle over the movement of your camera in the scene try using the mouse with the alt key instead of the WASD keys.

 

well im not touting crytek over unity, im just saying would be nice to have... f key works to zoom the bounds of the object... not a specific spot on the object... i hit the mouse wheel and it goes through it... maya keys are what im forced to use... but maya keys are still hard to get around when your in a tight compartment... thats why fps mode is such a big help, still would be even better if we can control the speed for control.

Im just saying i hope they add that for unity 3.

 

Unity uses most of the same navigation hot keys as Maya. I've brought up being able to adjust the First Person Fly-through speed before, but I don't think it will make it into 3.0.

 

As in zooming?

Hit the translate ("Move the selected objects") button and hold down the right mouse button - use WASD and the mouse movement to fly around instead. At least that's what I do as the zoom can do some funny things.

 

Also, if it hasn't been brought up, is that you can get some pretty accurate precision when selecting the View Tool (the icon shaped like a hand). The way I have started getting into some tight spots is to zoom in and then click and drag the screen to the righ/left/up/down to get those spots where it seems the view always seems to go past when using the keyboard to move around. And Right Clicking allows you to zoom in and out when moving the mouse left and right.

Maybe you already do that and still have a problem...I have found it to work like a charm though since the camera doesn't "jump" what seems to be a specific amount when zoomed in really close, it allows very fine control over where you are positioned.

 

yea i do all this stuff, but still cant argue a much easier way would simply be to adjust the move speed. Right now the fps controls simply push me through geometry cause im too close.

 

yes there need to be options to change all defaults in unity - including scale values for mesh importing.

The maya scale default should be 1.0 not 0.01 (cm style) as previously noted - surely maya artists build in meters for game levels. Even if I correct that I have found that models an artist has made a 1000m in size come in at 100m in size even though all scales are 1 - which makes no sense...

 

I believe Unity is at the .1 scale. Same XSI.

If we consider Maya the "Standard" just arbitrarily all apps go this way:

Standard Scale
Maya
MotionBuilder
Mudbox
3D Max
Unreal Engine

1/10th (.1) scale

XSI
Unity

.01 Scale
Houdini
Blender
LightWave

All apps fall into this one way or another.

It is good to make note of this if you are doing a lot of importing and exporting between apps.