Giants I3D Exporter Explained

Explanation of what everything in Giants I3D Exporter does

Giants I3D Exporter location

Every now and then there is questions about where the I3D Exporter is located in the "Properties Panel" in the 3D viewport. If this side bar is hidden you can simply click on "n" and it will appear.

Location of Giants I3D Exporter in Blender


Attribute	Explanation
IndexPath	Will show you the index path for the active selected object and this index path will also be the same in Giants Editor
Node Name	Is the name of the current active selected object
Node Id	Is for generating i3dMappings for your objects, select a object, check the box and click on "Use node Name" (can also write a custom name if you want) IMPORTANT: To be able to export the i3dMappings you would also need to add a XML file to the "XML config. Files" panel
Export, Attributes, Tools, Material	Seperate panels for different use cases

Top Section of the exporter panel

Giants I3D Exporter panel top section

IndexPath

Will show you the index path for the active selected object and this index path will also be the same in Giants Editor

Node Name

Is the name of the current active selected object

Node Id

Is for generating i3dMappings for your objects, select a object, check the box and click on "Use node Name" (can also write a custom name if you want) IMPORTANT: To be able to export the i3dMappings you would also need to add a XML file to the "XML config. Files" panel

Export, Attributes, Tools, Material

Seperate panels for different use cases

Export Panel

This is the panel where all the export settings are located

Giants I3D Exporter. Export Panel

Export Options

Animation

When animation is enabled the exporter will export the animation data in the blender scene

Shapes

If this is unchecked all your shapes (meshes) will be exported as transform groups

Lights

If this is unchecked all your lights will be exported as transform groups

Locked Group

If you check this it will lock the root element of every hierarchy. Perhaps you don't know what this is, it make most sense to use this when for example creating buildings for a map. When the locked group is enabled and the hierarchy in Giants Editor is "closed" you can click on any child object in the viewport and it will select the locked group (root object).

User Attributes

When this is checked the user attribute data will be exported

Nurbs Curves

When this is checked it will export the curves to i3d as nurbs curves, if its not checked it will export curves as transform groups

Binary Files

When this is checked the I3D Exporter will run a operation to save the i3d to binary format, so you don't have to manually do this later

Shape Export Subparts

Panel related to shape/mesh data

Normals

Export Normals if checked (should always be checked)

Vertex Colors

Export Vertex Colors if checked

Merge Groups

Export merge groups if checked (if you have any)

UVs

Will export the object UV layer(s) if checked

Skin Weights

Will Export bones (armatures) and vertex groups if checked

Miscellaneous

Verbose

Will print information to the system console (location: Window --> Toggle System Console)

Apply Modifiers

Applies modifiers if checked

Game Location

This is the place you set the location of your game install (for example: D:\steam\steamapps\common\Farming Simulator 22\)

If this is not set you will not be able to export

XML config. Files

Here you can add the xml file for the vehicle you are currently working on and when you export to i3d the content of the <i3dMappings> will be updated with the new i3dMappings you have added in Blender

Output File

Here you can either choose to export to a custom location or you can enable "Use Blender Filename" this will export to the same lcoation as the blender file.

Export Buttons

Export All

This will export everything in the whole blender scene (except for objects and its children with suffix _ignore)

Export Selected

Export selected will export all the selected objects in the scene. Note: Its currently a bit broken, when you have empty object type, it will duplicate the hiearchy in the i3d file.

Update XML

This will update the <i3dMappings> in the xml file you have added and will not export the objects in the scene