Model files can contain a variety of data, such as meshes, animation rigs and clips, materials and textures. Your file might not contain all of these elements, but you can follow any portion of the workflow that you need to:
For guidelines on how to export Humanoid animation from your 3D modeling software, see Preparing Humanoid Models for export.
Note: Unity’s primary support for Model filesA file containing a 3D data, which may include definitions for meshes, bones, animation, materials and textures. More info
See in Glossary is the FBX format. However, you can save your 3D files from most common 3D modeling software in their native format (for example, .max, .blend, .mb, .ma). When Unity finds these file types in your Assets
folder, it calls your 3D modeling software’s FBX export plug-inA set of code created outside of Unity that creates functionality in Unity. There are two kinds of plug-ins you can use in Unity: Managed plug-ins (managed .NET assemblies created with tools like Visual Studio) and Native plug-ins (platform-specific native code libraries). More info
See in Glossary, and imports the file. The 3D modeling software must be installed on the same computer as Unity, so in most cases it’s best practice to directly export as FBX from your application into your Assets
folder.
No matter what kind of data you want to extract from the Model file, you always start the same way:
Open the ProjectIn Unity, you use a project to design and develop a game. A project stores all of the files that are related to a game, such as the asset and Scene files. More info
See in Glossary window and the InspectorA Unity window that displays information about the currently selected GameObject, asset or project settings, allowing you to inspect and edit the values. More info
See in Glossary so that you can see both at once.
Select the ModelA 3D model representation of an object, such as a character, a building, or a piece of furniture. More info
See in Glossary file you want to import from the AssetAny media or data that can be used in your game or project. An asset may come from a file created outside of Unity, such as a 3D Model, an audio file or an image. You can also create some asset types in Unity, such as an Animator Controller, an Audio Mixer or a Render Texture. More info
See in Glossary folder in the Project window.
The Import Settings window opens in the Inspector showing the Model tab by default.
The options that are available for SpeedTree Models vs. other Models are very different. For example, the SpeedTree Model tab provides options mostly for setting up transitions between LODThe Level Of Detail (LOD) technique is an optimization that reduces the number of triangles that Unity has to render for a GameObject when its distance from the Camera increases. More info
See in Glossary levels.
Character and animated Models provide more diverse options on their Model tab, which allow you to:
If your file contains Animation data, you can follow the guidelines for setting up the Rig using the Rig tab and then extracting or defining Animation ClipsAnimation data that can be used for animated characters or simple animations. It is a simple “unit” piece of motion, such as (one specific instance of) “Idle”, “Walk” or “Run”. More info
See in Glossary using the Animation tab. The workflow differs between Humanoid and Generic (non-Humanoid) animation types because Unity needs the Humanoid’s bone structure to be very specific, but only needs to know which bone is the root nodeA transform in an animation hierarchy that allows Unity to establish consistency between Animation clips for a generic model. It also enables Unity to properly blend between Animations that have not been authored “in place” (that is, where the whole Model moves its world position while animating). More info
See in Glossary for the Generic type:
Note: SpeedTree Models have neither a Rig nor an Animation tab.
If your file contains materials and textures, you can define how you want to deal with them:
Unity follows a specific search plan to automatically look for textures on import. First, the importer looks for a sub-folder called Textures within the same folder as the meshThe main graphics primitive of Unity. Meshes make up a large part of your 3D worlds. Unity supports triangulated or Quadrangulated polygon meshes. Nurbs, Nurms, Subdiv surfaces must be converted to polygons. More info
See in Glossary, or in any parent folder. If this fails, Unity performs an exhaustive search of all textures in the project. Although slightly slower, the main disadvantage of the exhaustive search is that there could be two or more textures in the project with the same name. In this case, it is not guaranteed that Unity can find the right one.
(A) Possible places to find Textures
(B) Mesh being imported
If you have a character with a normal mapA type of Bump Map texture that allows you to add surface detail such as bumps, grooves, and scratches to a model which catch the light as if they are represented by real geometry.
See in Glossary that was generated from a high-polygon version of the Model, you should import the game-quality version with a Smoothing Angle of 180 degrees. This prevents odd-looking seams in lighting due to tangent splitting. If the seams are still present with these settings, choose Calculate Legacy With Split Tangents from the Tangents drop-down menu. If you are converting a greyscale image into a normal map, you don’t need to worry about this.
Finally, you can import the file into your scene:
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