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Blender 2.8 might be dropping Collada support

Hector Lee

Hector Lee

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112
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singapore
Hey guys,

Does seems to be quite a bit of bad news here. Was reading through the blog on the Blender Foundation site and found the project dev notes for the Blender 2.8 meeting and right at the bottom of the article they mention that they are seriously considering dropping the OpenCollada library which allows of collada export. There's no mention if the decision has been made since then, the post was made in November 2015. And if there are plans to replace it with something else to maintain the ability to export to collada in future versions. Here's the post.

https://code.blender.org/2015/11/the-2-8-project-for-developers/

Just an FYI for those who didn't know about this and wondering what are your thoughts about it.

I've found another collada library that can be used in Blender called 'Better Collada Exporter for Blender'. It installs fine in Blender but has fewer features during the export such as being able to choose which UVMap to export, exporting UV and/or Material textures. I've only just installed it last night and tried exporting once only so there's much more to learn about it. I've attached a screenshot of all the export options.

BetterColladaExporterSettings.JPG
 
Hi Hector,

Thanks for the heads-up, though I never use Collada. What do you use it for?

Cheers, Daan
 
I export my scenery models from blender as collada then import those to MCX for placement.

I understand that I could use Blender2FSX to export mdl or x files but I found those needing me to do some more manual work with my texture files. Could be wrong cause I haven't used it in awhile.

The current collada exporter will convert and copy my psd files which I map directly in blender to png upon export and MCX will read and convert to bmp/dds.

To be honest I haven't spent much time with Blender2FSX but the few times I used it I felt the workflow didn't suit my scenery design workflow that well cause of the need to manage guid and names in Blender. I model the whole airport in one blender file but export smaller sections so have separate bgl files. While I think that would require me to switch the guid when I export different parts. I haven't gotten around to doing animations in my scenery so I haven't explored animations with Blender2FSX.

The current collada exporter is a little temperamental when it comes to export uv maps at times but I was hoping for it to be fixed rather than thrown out the window.
 
Well I guess we won't update in such an eventuallity. I mean I'm still running Blender 2.76, which was the latest release about a year or so ago I think, and it works like a charm, no need to update it. The onliest things I've had compatibility issues with were the HTML exporter (doesn't work with my 'old' version) and pritty much all add-on render engines, non of which work for me. But since I've got a numbre of addons installed (e.g. Blender2FSX) and I wouldn't remember for the life of me what settings I use on a day-to-day basis I'm just not updating, won't make my models any less I think.
 
I think not updating would probably be the best option. In the professional world, most software are rarely updated anyway. That's why companies like Autodesk and Adobe are forced to switched to a subscription model to keep the cash flow there. I know companies that were still using Photoshop CS2 because it already did everything they needed.

Although I really wish that there was a official P3D sdk for Blender. Blender is definitely a more than capable software for 'software mods'. Trying to avoid the taboo word, 'game'.
 
I think not updating would probably be the best option. In the professional world, most software are rarely updated anyway. That's why companies like Autodesk and Adobe are forced to switched to a subscription model to keep the cash flow there. I know companies that were still using Photoshop CS2 because it already did everything they needed.

Although I really wish that there was a official P3D sdk for Blender. Blender is definitely a more than capable software for 'software mods'. Trying to avoid the taboo word, 'game'.
 
Yep, not updating might be the best. Some users have experienced problems with 2.75+ versions, I believe. In fact, the main usage for us is texture baking, animations and modelling. Well, that's pretty straightforward even in older versions.
 
Why would they want to drop the most common 3d interchange format after .3ds and .max?

<- is genuinely confused, as a DAZ3D and Poser user, who also pokes at Marvellous Designer on occasion, all of which is done via Collada...
 
The article lists the reason as due to the size of the library and lack of maintainers.

It's also known to be a buggy exporter. I don't think it's their intention to not try to support it at all but rather to find another library for it.

There are some good stuff said about the Better Collada Exporter but personally there are some UV mapping features missing for me to fully switch over to it.
 
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