This recipe continues the previous one, although from this point you can begin using the provided content where noted in the steps. Where before we exported content, now we're going to import it into UDK and set up the character content there.
Importing SkeletalMesh content and animations in UDK:
.PSK
and .PSA
files you exported already. If you didn't use ActorX, you can use the provided asset Packt_Character.PSK
in UDKGameContentPackt
.If you don't plan to build a comprehensive set of animated moves, you can Create A Copy of the CH_AnimHuman.Anims.K_AnimHuman_BaseMale set and put it to YOURFOLDER.Anims.YOURSET, and then simply open it and choose File | Import PSA to load any additional or replacement animations into it. Likewise, if you don't want to make an AnimTree, you can edit the default human AnimTree so your animations are swapped in place of the existing ones.
Skeletal Mesh Simplygon LOD generation vs ProOptimiser and SkinWrap in 3ds Max
In this recipe we imported our model. Part of setting up the model is controlling how it performs in game, including creating LODs (Level of Detail variants which show lighter models further away and the detailed model only close up).
For automatic SkeletalMesh polygon reduction an option added to UDK betas starting from July 2011, is Simplygon , a third-party utility that efficiently decimates the mesh into lower polygon counts. Doing this is useful for getting quick Level Of Detail variants. It works with both StaticMesh and SkeletalMesh assets.
Starting with a StaticMesh, highlight an asset in the browser and double-click it to open the Static Mesh Editor. Below the Properties panel there's a Mesh Simplification panel and you can generate an LOD with a distance setting from the camera and a percentage to reduce the model by. The changes you make remain open for further tweaking. It would make sense to assign new LODs before starting to actually reduce the polygons using the slider. Do so through the Mesh | Generate LOD menu command at the top of the Mesh Editor.
For a SkeletalMesh, generating new LODs is the same, through the Mesh | Generate menu command at the top of the AnimSet Editor. For polygon reduction the control process is found in the Properties panel, under the tab Mesh Simplification shown next.
Simplygon works similarly to ProOptimiser, a 3ds Max modifier. For a SkeletalMesh, it may prove best to use ProOptimiser (with Keep Textures and Keep UV Boundaries turned on) and then use the Skin Wrap modifier to carry the original model's skin weights across, because you can then further tweak the skinning if needed. Once done, export it as FBX and then in UDK use the AnimSet Editor's tool File | Import LOD.
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