How object and camera rotations work in Dimension?

[andreAnjos]

Hi all,

I hope you can help with something that I've been wrecking my brains for a while. 🙂

I need to export Camera and objects to Cinema 4D from Dimension and at the minute the only export format we have is OBJ. Which as far as I know does not take the camera information with the file. (Please tell me if I'm wrong).

So I found a workaround where we place a specific "camera" cube that matches the position and rotation of the scene camera.

The position works perfectly fine, but there is no way of matching the rotation.

So, how does Dimension calculates the rotation of the camera in 3D space and how can we copy those values accurately into an object, please?

This would be great to know and perhaps help other users.

Thank you in advance!

Andre

[Ares Hovhannesyan]

As I have tryied there is difference when you are exporting 3d file from Dimension in case you are exporting selected object or whole scene.

Try this 2 possibilities and see if this can help in case importing into Camera 4D. 

Also try to add camera bookmarks when exporting obj.

[andreAnjos]

Hi Ares,

Thank you for coming back to me!

Unfortunately, I've tried both exports selected or scene and still no luck. Even if I bookmark the camera.

So not sure what else I can do.

Thanks for your help! 🙂

[Ussnorway]

1. you are correct that Obj does NOT include camera... Fbx does allow for camera but [at this time] Dimesnion does not export camera except for inside Dn file types which unfortunately the dev team has not got working correct yet i.e, they are busted and should not be used!
2. Cinema 4D is very old software that few people still use... a work around, for the full system [not the free light demo] is to export the background image Dimension makes when building its lights from your background image and use that to rebuild your lights \ camera angles in C4D... its a pain but it works

p.s, how Dimension builds its lights is not public sorry

[andreAnjos]

Hi Ussnorway,

Thanks for coming back to me!

1. Definitely needs implementing as its crucial for 3D pipelines.

2. I'm not sure what you mean about building the lights from my background image. Can you clarify or is there something you can point me to read please?

Thanks again!

[Ares Hovhannesyan]

I think Ussnorway mean image based lights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image-based_lighting

Please also review https://helpx.adobe.com/dimension/using/lighting.html#:~:text=Dimension%20is%20a%20design%20tool,lig....

When Dimension Matches background image it build image based light also. You can choose free 3 modes from matched image.  After matching you can edit that tlights from Properties panel 

[andreAnjos]

Hi Ares,

Thanks for clarifying!

[Ussnorway]

Definitely needs implementing as its crucial for 3D pipelines.

I don't think so but I'm not a fan of Fbx in general because it doesn't have a standard or am I even the right person to talk too... you can vote for making Dimension more like Autodesk here

https://feedback.adobedimension.com/forums/552559-adobe-dimension-feature-requests/suggestions/31941...

[andreAnjos]

Hi Ussnorway,

I don't really care what the format is in this instance, to be honest. My objective is to get the camera and object data.

The point of exporting assets is that you pass them along in a pipeline. A camera should be part of that process.

Perhaps Adobe will fix it soon! 🙂

Thanks for your help!