Expanding Data Asset Pipeline Documentation Section to include various Blender workflow - Discussion

CeyaSpaceCowboy · July 19, 2023, 12:44am

Ive added an issue to the documentation repo proposing we better outline the blender workflows that can be used to make our development life easier and maybe possible better work with artists as well. Please read the issue to understand what I mean and then let me know what you think. Im happy to spearhead the effort and start collection the various wisdoms and flows you all use in your games for documentation.

github.com/panda3d/panda3d-docs

Expanding Data Asset Pipeline Section to include various Blender workflows.

opened 12:41AM - 19 Jul 23 UTC

csevier

Starting a discussion here. Correct me if I am wrong, but, it would seem lik…e most of us use blender as essentially both our content creation and level editors (scene editor if you will). I think it would be beneficial to add sections to the documentation covering the various techniques of how do the major things a panda3d game needs. Not necessarily a how to use blender, but, a how to use blender as a level/asset editor specifically for panda3d. And do this in a way that it relates to individual data/formats and their exporters in the ecosystem. For example, lets say I want to add collisions nodes. How might one go about adding collision nodes, in blender, then have them exported as eggs and what that will do in engine. etc. Like with the blend2bam. If you want invisible collision geometry, that would require either a specially name collection or special flag on export. Or things like, how does one add a tag that will lead to being queried data in engine. These things arent really front and center but are pretty important because some stuff just simply cant be done as easy in code! Happy to help start this process of collecting wisdom and writing it down. Let me know what you think.

CeyaSpaceCowboy · July 19, 2023, 12:47am

This can include things like tags, collisions, does it work with rigidbodies, materials, shading, data format gotchas etc. If I am simply missing something in the docs or more info, educate me. But, if its not in the docs, maybe it should be. I think this would help newcomers stay.