Scaling issues in maya

[tehfailsafe]

Starting to learn Maya coming from C4D and having some troubles setting scale correctly, nothing seems to work quite right. I did have some initial trouble with C4D when I first started working with octane but I eventually got it right. With maya I can't seem to get there...

1. Maya > settings/preferences > units = centimeter
2. Octane > account prefs > OBJ mesh import > centimeters to meters. Quit octane.
3. Maya - make room sized box in maya, w: 1200 cm, h:300 cm, d:900cm
4. Maya - make camera, move inside room, delete a wall to let some light in (started out making windows but wanted to go faster for tests)
5. Export using script.


My camera ends up not in the right place, it's really far away looking at a "tiny" box.
Sometimes I also get those "incorrect scale" circles. Sometimes I cannot move the camera inside the box, moving the camera forward gets "stuck" somehow and can't move forward anymore, but also can't get closer to the box.

Also, my camera is TINY in the top left front views. Is it all an issue of maya scale? I setup to be cm, make a 100 cm square box, make a camera and the camera from the other views looks like an dot. It doesn't affect the view from looking from the camera, but it seems like a giveaway that something is up.

I get even wierder results if I try to set units to meters in Maya and meters to meters in Octane... Lots of those scale issue circles and the AO looks like wireframe for the edges.


What am I missing?

[bazuka]

hi tehfailsafe

i had to remove scale procedure from exporter coz of probl people had with animated/character object

so its best for u to make ur scene in real scale, and proper dimensions for octane

maybe ill come out with something with new octane rls, but for now i dont have solution for scaling thing, coz maya uses default obj exporter where u cant control the output scale size, the "only" solution that i see at this point is to make a custom obj exporter, but that will take some time...

i know i didnt make u happy with the answers but thats how it is...

cheers

[tehfailsafe]

I don't understand the answer.

I AM making the object to real world scale * I think *.
A good sized living room in meters might be something like 3 meters tall ceiling, 9 meters wide and 12 meters deep, right?
There is 100 centimeters in a meter, so that room is 300 cm tall, 900 cm wide, and 1200 cm deep, right?
With maya units set to centimeters and octane set to "centimeters to meters" it should make an accurate real world room, right?

If I set those settings in Maya, hit export, I am getting mistakes. The only way I can seem to make it work well seems to be making the room 30 cm tall, 90 cm wide, and 120 cm deep... But that either means I'm really misunderstanding math at a basic level, or I'm doing something wrong in my process...

Since I'm 99.999% sure 90 cm tall is only like 36 inches I'm betting it's something wrong with my process.
But I don't know what to change to correct it? I don't want to make 3 foot tall buildings just cause it exports better

[face]

Can you post a testcube that have the issue in Octane?
I don´t have Maya but i would test it.

face

[bazuka]

u can do it like this then (but its a same thing)

export ur scene as .obj from maya, open octane and load that obj

try to do the same thing with c4d, export same box 1x1x1 as obj and also import in octane and compare them

let me know what did u get...

[tehfailsafe]

Attached some screenshots of step by step of using "Meters to Meters" in octane and centimeter scale in both apps. C4D looks normal, Maya looks wierd. If I change "Centimeters to meters" in octane the camera from maya will not export and I can't see the object so I have no idea if that should work if the camera was exporting correctly.

C4D Settings:

C4D export - viewed in Octane:

C4D export - zoomed out in octane from the top-down:

Maya settings:

Maya export in Octane:

Maya export - zoomed out in octane from the top-down:

Here's snippets from the .objs from the two different export plugins.

From C4D:
Looks like it translated to Meters even though I didn't ask it to in the export settings.

# Cube.1
v -4.5 -1.5 6
v -4.5 1.5 6
v 4.5 -1.5 6 etc

From maya:
Showing the correct CM scale, but "meters to meters" is making it 900m x 300m x 1200m...

g default
v -450.713660 -148.346094 604.066702
v 449.286340 -148.346094 604.066702
v -450.713660 151.653906 604.066702


What's up with the float number crazyness? Also, if I try to put octane to "centimeters to meters" mode, it doesn't export the camera correctly and I can't navigate to see the object.

[tehfailsafe]

Also, zipped everything up ( obj, ocs, mb, and mtl ) if anyone wants to take a look at what I might be doing wrong?

[face]

It looks that Maya use the units only internal and not for export.
It´s the same in Softimage with the difference that i don´t have cm, meters and so on.
One unit is one Softimage unit.
But when i export your cube from SI with 900x300x1200 it works in Octane without artefacts...

Maybe you can try to start Octane, load the obj, it should than be in the middle, and zoom out.
I think then you haven´t artefacts.

face

Edit:
My mistake, SI export as -0.450714 -0.148346 0.604067
Will check again...

[tehfailsafe]

So after much more playing and looking at obj files, the settings for unit scale in maya don't change the exported obj values, they are always in cm. This happens with the regular export too, not the plugin.

So it would seem octane always has to be set for "centimeters to meters".
However if I set the maya units to anything but meters, the scale is correct but the camera is in the wrong positions. I'm not sure why this happens...


Also, the camera focus is weird, even when i get the camera in the correct position the scene is always very blurry until I use the AF eyedropper to click an object. Is that normal?

Maya units: centimeters

Maya units: inches

Maya units: feet.

Maya units: meters

the meters one is correct, but extremely blurry until I AF pick one of the walls. How can I fix the focus distance? It looks like it is set to extremely close to the camera.

[face]

Thats because the cm to meter setting in Octane is only for the data in the obj-file.
Camera data will exported with the commandline.
I think that the setting in Octane isn´t for use with the exporters but when you import the obj direct into Octane.

For the exporters Octane should have a option that all incoming data will scaled...

face