Sorry for bumping the thread, but that "random vertices' normals rotating on flexes" bug has appeared again, in slightly different form than last time.


Last time it rotated normals of fixed amount of vertices in same random places of every flex. It happened randomly at exporting, so it wasn't that annoying (and catchable i guess).

Now, quite recently it started to rotate normals of those vertices, which are moved by flex. It happens on every export I made, independently of what model I try to export.
example: http://imgur.com/6vtXjqI (slighty nsfw i think).

It happens only on .smd/.vta

I've tried to:
- export model on another computer with same .blend file - same result on compiled model.
- export model on another computer imported from .dmx and .fbx file - same result
(both on clean version of Blender 2.72b with addon version 2.3.0 and 2.3.1)
- recreate model vert by vert, face by face plus all shapekeys (thanks to Snap function and F2 addon) - it still rotates normals, but in different directions than on original model

I'm not sure anymore, if there's some 'hidden' transformations going on before addon touches the model, or if it's studiomdl doing some magic, or addon fails to do something... or my pc is haunted and tells me to drop .smd format and forces me to use .dmx :/


I can send .smd/.vta, compiled model or .blend file if needed.

EDIT: I've tried to dig in exporter's code myself, but the only line of code that somehow affected flexes was
After commenting that line, when activating one flex, normals rotates on nearly every vertex possible giving quite nice looking pattern(example: http://i.imgur.com/mLEYTUw.png )

Also, after importing .smd/.vta back to Blender (can't find any other program allowing importing .vta), I get "Warning: 317 VTA vertices (0%) were not matched to a mesh vertex! An object with a vertex group has been created to show where the VTA file's vertices are."
Those "Unmatched vertices" seems to be in correct places when comparing against mesh...

I've reuploaded that zip for ya
https://www.dropbox.com/s/qlh9bmpli9w8vsy/blender_source_tools_2.3.0.zip?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pkfvqr40ie25f0/bst_2_3_0_repack.zip?dl=0 (repacked just in case original zip still doesn't work)

1. it could be nice to have some kind of limiter/normalizer on it. But, if it's not possible, then okay. The only way left will be to strategically weightpaint the mesh, so 'subsurf' wont smooth vertex groups too far ._.

2. hmmm... strange... now it's working... idk how that happened then... ._.
"quad only" is only required by $subd. it's kinda new discovery from facepunch
It allows to subdivide models within Source.

I have spent about month overall to remove/collapse/kill all tris/ngons, i didn't test it yet :v

3. verts rotates slighty on every single flex, but it is most visible on all of flexes active
http://imgur.com/yP0qdEp http://imgur.com/LrCWhIE
it only happens on smd - no matter if subdivided or not, dmx is not affected by that(at least on non-subdivided mesh, i can't compile higher one, because of bones per vert limit)
I can send you smd/vta or compiled model if you need it

I wasn't sure if post this as bug or feature request, make thread for each single one or put them together, but here we go.

I made character in Blender and successfully exported via your's exporter.
But, sometimes, after compiling SMD/VTA and applying all flexes at once(in HLMV or SFM, it doesn't matter), some random vertices rotate their normals. It happened to me twice and only on 2.x (maybe on 1.9.x or 1.10.x too, but I'm not sure) after removing some verts on model glithced all shapekeys redoing them using "Shape Propagate" and snapping verts manually to a working copy. I can't remember if rotating normals is possible in Blender.
EDIT 2015-01-18: 'Trianguate modifier' needs to be set at either 'Fixed' or 'Fixed alternative' quad method to avoid bug.


At some point I wanted to try DMX but exporter produces some errors when I try to export with not applied but active "subsurf" modifier.

1. Exporter throws "x verts on 'mesh_name' have over 3 weight links". On SMD export, that warning/error never shows up, even if non-subdiv mesh never go over that limit.
From what I tested, this is because of how subdivision surface modifier "smooths" weight maps over new vertices. SMD exporter somehow limits max "weight links" to 3, while on DMX it shovels all weight data through.
EDIT 2015-01-18: 'Weight Link Cull Threshold' was added 2.2 to fix this problem

2. I wanted to try the '$subd' QC command at some point, but it needs quad only mesh. Exported DMX with ends up being triangulated. The only way to prevent this(at least for now), is to apply subsurf, which I don't want to.

I am currently using exporter version 2.2.0beta from this thread
here's model with problems http://www.pasteall.org/blend/30828 (qc should be included, in text editor)

...gosh, my Engrish is bad :V
EDIT 2015-01-18: edited to add all solutions found in thread