iClone3 Max Plug-in Quick Guide  

Install the Plug-in

Quick Steps

UI Overview

File Types

Model and Material

Animation

Non-Human Character

Bounding Mesh

Sky

Head Morph

Install the Plug-in

Quick Steps

UI Overview

The exporter interfaces are divided into the following groups:

Export Content group: 

Auto Generate: Use a default image as the thumbnail.
Assign Thumbnail Images: Specify a thumbnail image to be used within iClone to identify your content.

No Limit: Allow the texture to be whatever size you have created.
Maximum Texture Size: Limit the maximum size of the texture maps you have placed on the objects.

File Types

You may create and export these iClone3 contents from 3ds Max:



Standard Character:

iClone3 supports G1, G2 and the newest G3 characters. These Standard Characters are created by the production pipeline and specific rules and are full-featured. You can apply motions, facial animations, switch body parts, modify head shapes, assign Personas to iClone Standard Characters. Please refer to the white paper “Creating and Exporting Characters for iClone” chapter for more details on character creation.

They are character models skinned to RL bones but not following the production pipeline completely. Non-Standard Characters have limited features.
The following table lists the available features of different type of iClone3 Characters.  

	Standard Character	Non-Standard Character	Non-Human Character
Persona	○	○	○
Adjust Proportion	○	○	○
Apply Motion	○	○	○
Edit Motion	○	○	○
Body Part Switch	○
Add Accessory	○	○	○
Edit Face	○
Facial Animation	○
Hand Gesture	○	○
Skin Texture	○
Cloth Texture	○

^NEW Character Animation

Now you can create character animation in 3ds Max then export the animation as iClone3 Motion clip.
The skeleton to be animated can be either RL Bones or Character Studio Bip Skeleton. Since Bip Skeleton is well rigged and easier to animate, we recommend you use it to create iClone Motion. See Character Studio session for more details

None-Human Characters are characters that skinned to any skeletons or bones other than iClone standard RL Bones. The skeletons can be constructed with hierarchical mesh models, standard bone system or dummies, in any bone structure like a horse, a bird or even a dragon. See None-Human Character session for more details.

iClone3 Skies are domes or hemisphere models enclosing the whole scene. Skies have their special setting related to lighting and fog effects.
See Sky session for more details.

You can create custom head morph models by editing the shape of the head base model.
See Head Morph session for more details.

　

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Model and Material

This session describes supported model and material format you can create in 3ds Max then export for iClone3.

Mesh Model

The exporter can process all kind of mesh models including primitives, polygon meshes, quad meshes and triangle meshes. However, they will be all converted into triangle faces in iClone model format. It's always a good practice to convert the model into Editable Mesh or Editable Poly before exporting.

Material  

iClone3 support the following material parameters and map types:

Material Type	Basic Parameters	Maps
Standard Material   Multi/Sub-Object   Blend Material  (4 maximum)	Ambient Color   Diffuse Color   Specular Color   Self Illumination   Opacity   Specular Level   Glossiness   2-sided	Diffuse Color   NEW Specular Level   Glossiness (for Glow effect) Opacity   Bump/Normal Reflection Multiple Map Channel (4 maximum)

In the image below, the corresponding settings in 3ds Max Material Editor are highlighted.

　  

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Animation

In addition to transform and UV animations supported by iClone2, the new exporter can export material animations edited in 3ds Max.  
The following table shows the supported animation types.

Type	Parameter
Transform Animation	Rotation
	Translate
	Scale
NEW Material Animation   (Props & Accessory only)	Ambient color
	Diffuse color
	Specular color
	Shininess
	Shininess strength
	Self Illumination
	Opacity
	Opacity falloff
	Map Amount
UVW Map Animation   (Props & Accessory only)	UVW Data

The material animation sample shown below can be found in the Sample File folder.



Note: The length of the material animation is the same as animation keys set in 3ds Max.  To make it longer, copy and paste material keys along the timeline as long as you need. 　 "Character Animation", "Non-Human Character", "Accessory" and "Props" are content types which may contain animation data.
When one of them is selected, the animation export option panel is expanded. There are two option groups

Export Option

All: Export both the Model & Animation data, disabled in this Beta version.
Geometry Only: Export the model data only.
Animation Only: Export only the animation files by the clip list definition.

Animation Clip:

This is where you define the animation clips to be exported.



Name: The name typed here will be the file name of the exported prop/accessory animation file (*.iAnimn) or character motion file (*..iMotion).
Range: The “From” and “To” field defines the frame range of the specific clip.
Clip List: List all the clips will be exported.
Add: When finished defining the clip name, range and type, click this button to add the clip into Clip List.
Update: If you want to edit the definition of a clip, double click the clip in Clip List, the settings will bring back to the options above. Reedit the settings and click "Update" button, the new settings will be updated in Clip List.
Remove: Remove the selected clip from Clip List.
Save: Save the Clip List definition as an ASCII file.
Load: Load an external Clip List definition file.

Import Animation 

To Import Character & Non-Human Character motions, go to Motion Modify panel, press Import button to import the motion file.



Or go to timeline, expand Character Perform track, right-click on the track, select Import from the pop-up menu to locate and load the motion file.


To Import Prop or Accessory animations, go to timeline, expand Perform track, right-click on the track, select Import from the pop-up menu to locate and load the animation file.

    　

^NEW Animation Key Optimization

The exporter will sample the animation frame by frame without key optimization. This keeps the animation intact to the original but the price is generating oversized animation data, especially when the animation curves are mostly linear. Animation key optimization can remove the unnecessary keys and also keep the result as close to the original as possible. To optimize the exported animation data, check the Optimize option to activate Animation Key Optimization while exporting.



To modify the optimization parameters, click the Optimize button to open the Optimization Options dialog box.

Sample Rate: Set the sample interval for sampling animation keys. The more the interval frames, the less key will be sampled for difference analysis. Threshold: Set threshold value for R (Rotation), T (Translation), S (Scale) and P (other Parameters, like material animation keys) difference analysis. The larger the threshold value, the less key will be reserved. Setting the threshold 0 will remove only the keys along linear animation curves and preserve the animation result. 

　

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^NEW Non-Human Character   

None-Human Characters are characters that skinned to any skeletons or bones other than iClone standard RL Bones. You may Rig the character with any bone structure constructed with 3DS Max bone system, hierarchical mesh object, even helpers like dummies. Notice: Never use mirror to make the opposite bones of a Non-Human Character. It will scramble iClone3's IK & Mirror mechanism. Once the character model is ready and exported as an iClone3 Character file (*.iAvatar), you still need an ini file to provide more character information for iClon3 to make it a None-Human Character. Here is the content of the ini file:

[Bone] RootName=RootBone    // The name of the character root bone LengthBone = 0             // Define the bone axis, 0 = X, 1 = Y,  2 = Z  [IKTypeMap]                // Define Types of IK control RootBone=1,0               // For the root bone and fixed bones, give the value 1,0 Pelvis=1,0                                 Spine01=1,7                      // For the other animatable bones, give the value 1,7 ... [IKConstraint]                // Set rotation constrain for the bones. This setting takes effect when the "Constrain" option in iClone3 Edit Motion Layer panel is on. Bip01=(0,0)(0,0)(0,0)    // The format is: Bone Name = (X min. angle, X max. angle)(Y min. angle, Y max. angle)(Z min. angle, Z max. angle) Pelvis=(-5,5)(0,0)(-5,5)  // The initial angles of the constrains are the bone angles of the skin pose of the character   Spine01=(-10,10)(-60,60)(-40,40) ... [MirrorBone]                // Define the opposite bones so the "Mirror" option can take effect while editing motion layer. L Clavicle=R Clavicle L UpperArm=R UpperArm L Forearm=R Forearm L Hand=R Hand

Only the [Bone] part is must. The IK & Mirror function will be just disabled if [IKTypeMap], [IKConstraint], or [MirrorBone] definitions are not given. Name the ini file the same name as your character (e.g. if the character file is Dragon.iAvatar, the ini file shall be Dragon.ini ), and put it in the same folder of the character file. When the None-Human Character is loaded in iClone3, the ini will be parsed and embedded with the character. You can find a sample ini file (CS_Character.ini) for None-Human Character in the Sample File folder. 　

Convert Character Studio BIP skeleton into iClone3 None-Human Character

Since iClone3 doesn't support Character Studio Skeleton directly, to make a None-Human Character from a BIP rigged character, you have to convert the BIP skeleton into a max bones first.   Before you start, please go to Autodesk  FBX page to get the latest version of  FBX exporter and install it. Note: Please use the version 2006.11.2 which you can find in FBX "Plug-in and Converter Archives" pages. Here are the conversion steps:   1. Load the BIP rigged character in 3ds Max.

   

This monster model is downloaded from 3DRT free download Page. 2. Choose "Export" from File menu. 3. Select Autodesk FBX file type, press "Save" button.



4. Use the following setting. Export the FBX file containing the model and all animations.



5. Reset 3ds Max, Choose "Import" from File menu, and select Autodesk FBX file type. 6. Use the following setting for importing the FBX file.



7. Now the BIP bones are converted into Dummy bones.



8. To export it as a Non-Human character, choose "Export" from File menu, select Non-Human character file type. 9. Select Geometry Only in Export Option and press OK button to export the rigged model.  10. Execute Export again, this time select Animation Only edit Clip List as describe above, then press OK button to export the motion clip files. These motion flies can be imported and applied to this specific character in iClone3 with Motion Modify panel. 11. Prepare the ini file for this Non-Human character. The sample ini file (CS_Character.ini) is ready for any Character Studio BIP character with skeleton root BIP01. Just rename it the same name as the Non-Human character file and put them in the same folder. 12. Run iClone3, go to Avatar Modify, import the Non-Human character. 



13. Go to Motion Modify, press Import button to import the motion clip files, or press Edit Motion Layer button to start motion editing.   

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^NEW Bounding Mesh

Bounding meshes are mesh surfaces which define the boundary of a model for alignment and collision detection. They are usually a simpler version to the target model, e.g. a box bounding mesh for a car model. In iClone3, bounding meshes of Props are for collision detection, and those of Terrains are for both collision detection and terrain following.  To assign a bounding to a prop or a terrain model, follow the name convention below

Object Name_Boundingmesh  

For example, the bounding mesh model of an object name "Terrain" should be name "Terrain_Boundingmesh"



Terrain bounding mesh is always invisible in iClone3.



To examine Prop bounding mesh, switch the Display into Bounding mesh mode.



In this example, the bounding mesh is a simple sphere enclosing the Teapot.



Note: If you don't provide bounding meshes while creating Terrains, iClone3 will use the mesh of Terrain itself for alignment and collision detection. In the case of Prop, iClone3 will generate a bounding box for the Prop without bounding meshes assigned.  　

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^NEW Sky

Create an iClone3 Sky is simple. Here is one of the procedures: 1. Run 3ds Max. Create a GeoSphere at the origin (0,0,0), set Radius 5000, Segments 4.



2. Add Normal Modifier to flip normals.



3. Apply a panorama sky map to diffuse map slot, set Self-illumination 100.



4. Choose "Export" from File menu, select Sky file type and export it to the Custom Sky folder.
    C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\Reallusion\Custom\iClone 3 Custom\Sky 5. Run iClone3, go to Sky Content Manager Custom tab, apply and check the Sky.

　

You can find a sample sky model in the Sample File folder. 　

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^NEW Head Morph

To Create a custom Head Morph, do the following: 1. Load the head base max file Head_Base.max from the Sample File folder. The head base is a Editable Poly model.



2. Switch to Sub-Object editing mode. You may use any polygon modeling tool to modify the head shape. But keep the following things in mind: 
    (1) Don't modify the pivot of the head. 
    (1) Don't add or delete any vertex, just edit the shape.
    (2) Keep the shape and position neck section loop as close as the base model.



3. Choose "Export" from File menu, select Head Morph file type and export the model. 4. Run iClone3, go to Face Modify, select Head category then import the Custom morph model you just exported. Drag the Weight slider to check how it works.