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FlowScape

Let Nature Flow from your Brush · By PixelForest

Exportation to another software

A topic by Zaynox created Oct 29, 2019 Views: 7,667 Replies: 41
Viewing posts 5 to 24 of 24 · Previous page · First page

Just to add my voice to the cry for scene export. I would love that, Sure I can create similar wonderful scenes in 3d packages . I mainly use Carrara Pro which has great landscape / Flora creation and shading tools  but Flowscape is so much faster. I want to put 3d characters  [Daz}  into  an exported  flowscape scene and animate them. I could perhaps animate with a green screen background and overlay on a flowscape video  BUT I think it would look exactly that - an overlay !  IMPORTING  an animated  character to Flowscape might work if format was  .fbx .  I don't see Flowscape as a game. Its a Scene Creation tool. I agree with others that whilst your intended  target audience was not those without 3d software knowledge [ yes I see kids having a lot of fun with this - I should qualify this because there are lots of kids using Unity and Unreal ]  I believe it has great potential in an animation pipeline.  I'm not programmer so of course have no idea of the effort needed to implement these dreams !! Maybe take up  the offer from HonorZMD to assist dev and  testing

I'm using Iclone 7 from Reallusion, I can guaranty lots of us will be buying your software.  Same for Blender, I'm making my landscapes with it but it takes a very long time.

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If it convinces the developer .... i too would love to have an export version .... this would make this software truly amazing ... and you could really sell it for much more then.

If we can't have an export option, maybe the option to have multiple imports would be possible? I do my character modeling in Daz3D (which can get hideously expensive), and then export them into FlowScape... 

BUT! If I want to have multiple figures in a scene (or even other props/scenic pieces) I have to set them up in Daz (guessing at their locations & heights relative to a central point), and then export them to a format FlowScape can import. This can create a problem with file sizes and crashing my laptop (which isn't really up to spec for top-end 3D work).

However, I do LOVE FlowScape, and appreciate that adding features takes time, especially to keep the entire project stable.

You certainly can import multiple objects into FlowScape and place them anywhere.
The "import"ant thing is to make sure the origin of the object is at the centre of the object  and the scale (height)  are relatively small.
I use Vue to create and export models and Blender to set the origin.
The Ortho mode (O) in FlowScape is the best way to arrange multiple objects.

Your software looks great! I am disappointed that you have no .FBX export. The time you could save setting up a environment for 3d animated film shots would be nice.   I would pay 5 times the amount your asking for it now just to have that export option . Just like so many others here.   will be keeping a eye on this program.   

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I pay a month sub to E-on Vue for software that helps generate environments, I have used programs like terragen which is quite expensive and complicated to use but its soul purpose is to create environments that you can export to unreal or to maya for movies. old programs like Mojoworld, Cornacopia and bryce where pretty simple programs to get up and running but very few had adapted to modern times. I bought blender plugins to help me generate environments, I have been looking for a simple editor that I can quickly mock up an environment and this one caught my eye but as soon as I found out I cannot export to other 3d apps I was a little disappointed. I would recommend taking a quick look into see how complex it is if is to complex I understand . but if you do go down this route I would for now stay clear of Autodesk FBX format because the change it quite often and it would make it more of a hassle to update.  good luck I will be following it to see what happens

Would be amazing to see an OBJ, FBX or Alembic exporter, Flowscape is the perfect sketch book  and more refinement would be soooo great...

Agree with the Export request. :)

As a 3D artist (I can do all the things and stuff), being able to export my "FlowScape Doodles" (because that's what they are; 3D painting and rendering while sipping on some good whisky or rum, listening to some ambient-chill music and just getting lost in the creative process...with no real ultimate goal in mind). So put me down for an Export feature! 

Export to OBJ is an easy development, but the OBJ file would be insanely huge, especially with vegetation, etc. The FBX format handle instances,  so that would be a perfect fit to export to game engines like Unity... But that means using the FBX SDK, and that's not as easy as it sounds... 

Right here! Another person who would use the export feature, or at least some sort of bridge between programs like daz, blender, maya.

(15 edits)

I joined just to add my 2 cents worth :)

I agree that an export feature would be good and  was looking at FlowScape with that in mind. I use Blender and Unreal 4, but any software that is easy to use and shortens the development pipeline is worth a look. If FlowScape allowed me to export meshes (models) and textures to those programs it would get the thumbs up from me. Blender may do it better and Unreal allows heightmaps to be imported, but in the end its about ease of creation, time involved and the quality of the finished product.

P.S. I should add that Unreal 4 does not use meshes for landscapes (they take up too much memory). It stores heightmap data in textures, which is why you can import a .png or .raw heightmap file into the level. This uses about 1/6th of the memory of a static mesh. I point this out just so we are talking about the same thing when looking at an "export" feature and to draw attention to the fact that an .fbx export feature would not be that useful for the actual landscape (just the models) if you were looking at it from a 3D development tool perspective. 

P.P.S You probably guessed, writing this a I think of something (messy). However, another tit-bit. Unreal 5 is due to be released in 2021 and the dev's are making much of a new feature "Nanite" that will allow models to be imported  (presumably in .fbx or .obj) from 3D software (e.g. ZBrush) with 100's of millions of polys and with no LOD's, baking or impact on performance. Basically, each poly can be the size of a single pixel!! So who knows, this may change the 3D "landscape" (no pun intended) :) Epic has released a video of an Unreal 5 demo running on PlayStation 5 on its web-site for those interested. It goes into detail about the "Nanite" geometry, as well as the new lighting and physics, of Unreal 5 all of which is great news for for creators of large detailed landscapes.

P.P.P.S Sorry, back again, but this comment is mainly for FlowScape. Unreal "datasmith" plugins let users import a host of files from various 3D programs (3D Max, Sketchup, Revit, CAD, Autodesk, etc). Epic has released these plugins for free - here's the link: https://docs.unrealengine.com/en-US/Engine/Content/Importing/Datasmith/index.html I don't know how this fits (really beyond my expertise), but I have used the Sketchup version of the plugin and it does a pretty good job of importing the entire scene (including meshes, materials and textures) into the Unreal engine. If FlowScape was thinking about export capability this may be worth a peek. 

I think I need software that can build 3d scenes quickly and easily so I need to export the function

If you allow users to export their worlds to 3D model files/scenes this would be the number one application for quickly creating worlds for VR worlds such as VRChat and Neos. I would buy this app on the spot for double the price if I knew I could export the world to Neos so that I can actually be in the world while in VR.

Please consider this and be sure to advertise it! There's a huge market demand right now for tools to quickly and easily make worlds for VR.

Adding another voice + vote for an export option.  :)

All these other 3D software options like Blender/Max/Maya or C4D have their strengths and weaknesses but *non* have the ease of use to create these fantastic worlds you can create with FlowScape. I think the developer underestimates the volume of users who would jump at this application if/when they learn it has an export function. 

yep needs an exporters . all the kinds of exports. Like obj,3ds,dae,collota, and so much more. This is a wonderful program and I am looking forwards to the further development of your program.

I just bought Flowscape tonight and I am very pleased and displeased at the same time. I purely bought this program to import environments from Flowscape into other programs, specifically Daz3D. It was implied this was possible on the Flowscape website. I was very pleased to find how easy the program was to operate but exceptionally displeased when I found that exporting was not native to the program. Why? This program should not exist without export capability. I don't want to have to mash my actors and setting together with a screenshot of what should be a 3d environment. I expect an export option within a fortnight or a full refund. I have spoken.

Hiya!

Well, it's been over a year. No export. :( That's ok, still a WONDERFUL program to play with! :)

HOWEVER... ;) ...the whole "polygon count / file size" argument is now moot in regards to Unreal Engine 5. If I can have a scene consisting of several BILLION polygons, all with full textures and real-time global illumination.... exporting a scene from Flowscape is a no brainer.

Just do that and let everyone else deal with exporting from UE5 to whatever they want (UE5 is free). I could, if so inclined, export from FS, import to UE5, then export from UE5 into .fbx, for example.

So...I guess the balls back in Flowscapes court again. ;)

I believe the issues lies much more with copyrights than anything. As a developer, you can purchase 3D models to use in your commercial game. However, only to be used within that software. The dev has most likely bought some or many of the assets being used in Flowscape, which each comes with different copyrights. 

People often sell a small set of game engine ready for about 20-50$ or more. You can't honestly expect to have all those assets to use within you own unity/unreal projects for 15$. 

And why does 3D models, rigged and ready to be used in game projects costs as much? Because it takes hours to make. 

I suggest looking into tutorials for open-source softwares for 3D-modeling like Blender. There's also many free textures to use online. 

Saving as a unreal editable map would be sufficient :)

Looks great though. Congrats.

Hello. A little reminder here that a lot of us love what you have been making here with this, and we DO want an export feature. It's nice that characters can be imported into Flowscape, but that does not serve my needs (so I actually have not spent much time using Flowscape). I still recommend it to others as a potential tool for creating backdrops or whatnot, but I also make a point to be clear that you have been refusing to add an export feature with the excuse that not enough people are interested in it, despite it being requested a lot. I'm not sure what your real reason is for not adding an export feature, but you can tell us. We love what you've made here and want to use it more!

Viewing posts 5 to 24 of 24 · Previous page · First page