Dear Cal3D Developers and Users:
I have a character that was made in Blender. His body mesh I have separated into many smaller pieces, so that the Cal3D library can work with them one at time; all of the body pieces are parented to a skeleton, one skeleton. All of this has been done in Blender.
When I export this character using the Blender to Cal3D exporter 2, the one with the larger interface that has the option of exporting to Soya, I have problems. In the beginning, he kept being on his back in Crystal Space, but I disabled "rotate_x_axis" option in the Cal3D description file and that problem was fixed. Now, he appears perfect when my application first loads, but as soon as one the animations that I made for him in Blender turns on, his mesh stretches and contorts. For instance, I gave him a test animation in which he just lifts his right arm from his side directly up and to his right until his hand is level with his shoulders. This rotation is done in Blender's pose mode and the bone is rotating around it's Z axis. In Crystal Space his arm bone seems to dislocate from his shoulder only to translate forward some and to his right. My skeleton is moderately complicated, but I still don't know why it is coming apart. Have you heard of any other instances of bone dislocation? I think that is what is happening; the other explanation would be that the invisible bone is rotating around it's X axis while it is level with his shoulders the whole time. Then, it would mean that the arm mesh is not following it correctly, for it doesn't rotate.
Another test animation lifts his arm forward until it's level with his shoulders in front of him. This rotation is done around the bone's X axis and it actually rotates the bone without dislocating it. The only problem with this animation is that it's reversed, for his hand starts at his shoulders and moves down to his side. Now that to think about it, I believe that all my animations have been playing reversed. Do you know why that might occur?
I need know if the axis orientation of my Blender model is completely correct for Crystal Space aslong as I use the "export to Soya" option in the exporter. It seems to be correct, for my character's bones rotate around the right axis, they just don't stay in their sockets. I also thought that my Crystal Space version, which is 1.2rc1, may not be upgrade enough to handle the Cal3D exporter that I have. My Cal3D exporter and libraries are the newest I can get without using subversion. Please tell me if everyone else with newer Crystal Space versions are having no trouble when using exported Blender models.
Sincerely,
Stewy P. of the Eridanus Project