iClone4 Plug-in for 3ds Max Quick Guide  

Supported 3ds Max Versions

Install the Plug-in

Quick Steps

UI Overview

File Types

Model and Material

Animation

Non-Human Character

Bounding Mesh

Sky

Head Morph


Supported 3ds Max Versions New

iClone4 Plug-in supports the following 3ds Max versions:
3ds Max R8

3ds Max R9 32&64 bit
3ds Max 2008 32&64 bit
3ds Max 2009 32&64 bit
3ds Max 2010 32&64 bit

Install the Plug-in Updated

  1. Run iClone4 Plug-in for 3ds Max.exe and follow the installation instruction.
  2. When installation is finished, the plug-in is installed into all the 3ds Max versions in your system.
  3. You may keep the previous iClone plug-in versions in the same 3ds Max version.
  4. Please  keep in mind that iClone data exported with iClone4 plug-in can only be used for iClone4.X or later versions. Therefore, if you want to create contents for iClone 3.X or even iClone 2.X, we highly recommend you to use previous versions.


Quick Steps

To export iClone4 data from 3ds Max, do the following: 

1. Have the model/scene ready in 3ds Max.
2. From the File Menu, choose ¡§Export¡¨.
3. Change the file type to ¡§iClone4 File¡¨. Click "Save" button and the Reallusion iClone Panel shows.
4. Select a file type and set the exporting details.
5. Click "OK" button to export the content.
6. Import and check the content in iClone4.


UI Overview



The exporter is divided into the following sections:

Export Content group: 
For selecting file types, assigning the file name and the destination folder. There are also options for data optimization, exporting Character Studio BIP animations and hand gestures. See Optimization and Character Studio sessions for more details.
Information group:
This is where you can mark your work. This author information will be embedded into the content file for later retrieving .
Thumbnail 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.
Texture Size group:
No Limit: Allow the texture to be any size.
Maximum Texture Size: Limit the maximum size of the texture maps, so it won't exceed the size you have defined.
File Type Specific Option:
Specify a file type that you are exporting. File types may include Geometry, Animation or even both. These may include "Character Animation", "Non-Human Character", "Accessory" and "Props". See Animation session for more details.

Note: These exporting settings will be kept when you save a max file.


File Types

You may create and export these iClone4 contents from 3ds Max.



Standard Character: Updated

¡@

iClone4 supports G2 and G3 characters. These Standard Characters are created by the production pipeline with specific rules and are full-featured. You can apply motions, facial animations, switch body parts, modify head shapes, and assign Personas to iClone Standard Characters.
iClone4 plug-in can export G2 and G3 Standard Characters and will check the data validity (e.g. missing models or incorrect naming) while exporting.
Please refer to the whitepaper ¡§Creating and Exporting Characters for iClone¡¨ for more details on character creation.

Note: G1 Character can no longer be exported with iClone4 plug-in, please use previous versions to export G1 characters.

Non-Standard Character: 

Non-Standard Characters have limited features.They are the character models skinned to RL bones but does not following the production pipeline completely.
¡@
The following table lists the available features of different types of iClone4 Characters.
¡@ Standard Character   Non-Standard Character  Non-Human Character  
Persona   ¡³ ¡³ ¡³
Adjust Proportion   ¡³ ¡³ ¡³
Apply Motion   ¡³ ¡³ ¡³
Edit Motion   ¡³ ¡³ ¡³
Body Part Switch   ¡³ ¡@ ¡@
Add Accessory   ¡³ ¡³ ¡³
Edit Face   ¡³ ¡@ ¡@
Facial Animation   ¡³ ¡@ ¡@
Hand Gesture  ¡³ ¡³ ¡@
Skin Texture   ¡³ ¡³  ¡³
Cloth Texture   ¡³ ¡@ ¡@

Character Animation
You can create character animation in 3ds Max then export the animation as iClone4 Motion clip.
The skeleton can be either RL Bones or Character Studio Bip Skeleton. Since Bip Skeleton is well rigged and easier to animate, we highly recommend you use Bip Skeleton to create iClone Motion. Please refer to Character Studio for more information.

Non-Human Character

Non-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 structures like a horse, a bird or even a dragon. Please refer to Non-Human Character
for more information.

Accessory Updated
An accessory can be attached to any bones of an iClone Character and saved with the character as part of the outfit.
There are several ways to export accessories:
  1. Exporting only the accessory model without any characters in the scene. This exports accessories with or without embedded animation according to the exporting options. Since there is no accessory-bone position information for you to select, the accessory will be attached to the right hand of the character by default.

  2. Exporting characters with accessory models linked to character bones. The accessories will be exported together with the character and can be added to the Content Manager or attached to other characters. This exports only static accessories.

  3. With accessory models linked to character bones, select file type "Accessory" for exporting. This can export accessories with embedded animation clips and also keep the accessory-bone position information. When the accessories are applied to the character, they will be positioned exactly to the same position as they are in 3ds Max.
Props
In addition to the stills Props & LiveProps in iClone2, the new iProps (interactive Props) are introduced. iProps are props that have interactive behaviors, like doors can open, chairs can be sat on, or cars that can be gotten into and driven. Similar to how Persona defines the character behaviors, the interactivities of iProps are defined with Dramascripts.
Please visit iCloneWiki to know more about iProps and Dramascript.
Terrain
Terrains are special mesh surfaces which characters can walk on, props can move along, trees & grass can be planted on. You may assign a simpler model as a ¡§bounding mesh¡¨ for a complex terrain to help speed up the rendering performance. Bounding meshes can also be used to define the impenetrable wall in a scene like shown in the following figures. See Bounding Mesh session for more information.


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



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



Model and Material

This section describes supported model and material format you can create in 3ds Max then export for iClone4.

Mesh Model

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

Material  

iClone4 supports 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
Specular Color  
Glossiness (for Glow effect)
Opacity  
Bump/Normal
Reflection

Multiple Map Channel (4 maximum)

Coordinate Offset & Tiling

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

 


Animation

iClone4 Plug-in can export transform, UV and material animations edited in 3ds Max.  
The following table shows the supported animation types.

Type

Parameter

Transform Animation

Rotation

Translate

Scale

 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

Transform animations and UV animations are exported as animation clips which can either be a embedded data or a separated file of the model files. 
Material animation is consists of material keys and can be modified in iClone4.

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 the 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 expands.

There are two option groups:

Export Option



All: Export the model with animation clips embedded within. This option is enabled when the file type is either Prop or Accessory.
Geometry Only: Exports only the model.
Animation Only: Exports only the animation files indicating in the following clip list.

Animation Clip:

This is where you define the animation clips to export.



Name: Double-click the "Name" field to edit the clip name. The name typed in here will be the file name of the exported prop/accessory animation file (*.iAnimation) or character motion file (*.iMotion).
From/To: The ¡§From¡¨ and ¡§To¡¨ fields define the range of the specific clip. Double-click the fields to modify the frame number.

New: Add a new clip to the list with default settings.
Remove: Remove the selected clip from the 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.

   
To apply the embedded animation clips, right-click on the prop or the accessory for the Right-click Menu, move the cursor to Perform entry and select one of the embedded animation clips. Or go to timeline, expand Perform track, right-click on the track, move the cursor to Perform entry and select the clip to apply. 

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 exporting animation data, check the Optimize option to activate Animation Key Optimization when exporting.



To modify the optimization parameters, press on 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 it will need to sample for various analysis. 
Threshold:
Set threshold value for R (Rotation), T (Translation), S (Scale) and P (other Parameters, like material animation keys) for various analysis. The larger the threshold value, the less key will need to reserve. Setting the threshold to 0 will remove only the keys along the linear animation curves and preserve the animation result. 


Non-Human Character   

Non-Human Characters are the characters that are 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. 

Note: 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 iClone4 Character file (*.iAvatar), you still need an *.ini file to provide more character information for iClone4 to make it a Non-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 controls
RootBone=1,0               // For the root bone and fixed bones, give the value 1,0
Pelvis=1,0                                
Spine01=1,7                      // For the other animation bones, give the value 1,7
...

[IKConstraint]                // Set rotation constrain of the bones. This setting takes effect when the "Constrain" option in iClone4 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 a must. The IK & Mirror function will be disabled if [IKTypeMap], [IKConstraint], or [MirrorBone] definitions are not given. Name the ini file name the same as your character (e.g. if the character file is Dragon.iAvatar, the ini file should be Dragon.ini ), and put it in the same folder of the character file. When the Non-Human Character is loaded in iClone4, the ini will be parsed and embedded with the character. You can find a sample of the ini file (CS_Character.ini) for Non-Human Character in the Sample File folder.

Convert Character Studio BIP skeleton into iClone3 Non-Human Character

Since iClone4 doesn't support Character Studio Skeleton directly, to make a Non-Human Character from a BIP rigged character, you have to convert the BIP skeleton into 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, you can find it 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 the 3DRT free download Page. 

2. Choose "Export" from File menu. 

3. Select Autodesk FBX as the file type, press the "Save" button.



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



5. Reset 3ds Max, Choose "Import" from File menu, and select Autodesk FBX file type. 

6. Use the following settings 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 as the file type. 

9. Select Geometry Only in the "Export" Option and press the OK button to export the rigged model.  

10. Execute Export again, this time select Animation Only and 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 iClone4 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 iClone4, 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.   


Bounding Mesh  

Bounding meshes are mesh surfaces which define the boundary of a model for alignment and collision detection. They are usually simpler versions of the target models, e.g. a box bounding mesh for a car model. In iClone4, 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 format below:

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



Terrain bounding mesh is always invisible in iClone4.



To examine Prop bounding mesh, switch the Display to 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, iClone4 will use the mesh of Terrain itself for alignment and collision detection. In the case of Prop, iClone4 will generate a bounding box for the Prop without bounding meshes assigned.

Sky  

Creating an iClone4 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 as the file type and export it to the Custom Sky folder.
    C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\Reallusion\Custom\iClone 4 Custom\Sky 

5. Run iClone4, go to Sky > Custom Content Manager, apply and active Sky.



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


Head Morph Updated

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 an Editable Poly model.

Note: The head meshes in iClone3 and iClone4 are different. Only the Faces created in iClone4 can be morphed in iClone4.



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 the File menu, select Head Morph file type and export the model. 

4. Run iClone4, go to Face Modify, select Head category then import the Custom morph model you have just exported. Drag the Weight slider to check how it works.