Alembic Exporter component
The Alembic Exporter component allows you to customize how the Alembic package exports animation to an Alembic file.
The following topics describe the properties of the Alembic Exporter component in detail:
- Output Path section
- Alembic Settings section
- Capture Settings section
- Capture Components option group
- Mesh Components option group
- More Capture options
- Misc section
- Capture Control section
Note: The Alembic package appends an ID (for example,
(0000283C)) to the name of the Alembic node on export. This is to avoid naming conflicts, because Alembic forces each node in a hierarchy to have a unique name.
Output Path section
Specify the location to save the Alembic file to. By default, the output path is relative to the current Unity Project path.
Alembic Settings section
Use these settings to define the properties of the Alembic output.
| Property | Description | |
|---|---|---|
| Archive Type | Choose the Alembic format specification. | |
| HDF5 | This is a common hierarchical data format for Alembic. | |
| Ogawa | This format produces smaller files and better performance than HDF5. This is the default format. | |
| Xform Type | Choose the transform type. | |
| Matrix | Record the full transformation matrix. | |
| TRS | Record the TRS channels for position, rotation, scale of an object. This is the default transform type. | |
| Time Sampling | ||
| Type | Choose the time sampling mode. | |
| Uniform | The interval between frames on the Alembic side is always constant (1 / Frame Rate seconds). |
|
| Acyclic | The delta time in Unity is the interval between the frames on the Alembic side. The interval is not constant, but the impact on the game progress is minimal. It is a mode mainly assuming 3D recording of games. | |
| Frame Rate | Set the frame rate to use for uniform sampling. This option is only available when Time Sampling Type is set to Uniform. | |
| Fix Delta Time | Enable this option to set Time.maximumDeltaTime using the frame rate to ensure fixed delta time. In the case of video production, this is the desired behavior. Note: If you are managing Time.maximumDeltaTime yourself, be aware that this could lead to non-uniform delta time. This option is only available when Time Sampling Type is set to Uniform. |
|
| Swap Handedness | Enable to change from a left hand coordinate system (Unity) to a right hand coordinate system (Autodesk® Maya®). | |
| Swap Faces | Enable to reverse the front and back of all faces. | |
| Scale Factor | Set scale factor to convert between different system units. For example, using 0.1 converts the Unity units to 1/10 of their value in the resulting Alembic file. This also affects position and speed. |
Capture Settings section
Use these settings to determine the set of target GameObject(s) for the current capture. Once the capture begins, the target set is locked and does not change. Enabling or disabling a GameObject in the target set does not affect the capture. Any GameObjects generated after the start of the capture are not included.
Warning: Deleting a target GameObject in the middle of a capture interrupts the capture, and the Alembic file might have a non-uniform number of samples as a result. Some software might not handle this properly.
| Property | Description | |
|---|---|---|
| Scope | Choose the scope of the export. By default, this is set to the Entire Scene. | |
| Entire Scene | Export the entire Scene. This is the default. | |
| Target Branch | Export only a branch (or hierarchy) of the Scene. When you choose this option, the Target property appears, which allows you to select a GameObject. | |
| Target | Set a reference to the GameObject that is the root of the hierarchy you want to export. This property is only available if the Scope property is set to Target Branch. |
|
| Static MeshRenderers | Enable this option to skip capturing animation on static Meshes. |
Capture Components option group
Use these settings to define which components to save data for.
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| MeshRenderer | Enable to export MeshRenderer components. |
| SkinnedMeshRenderer | Enable to export SkinnedMeshRenderer components. |
| ParticleSystem | Enable to export ParticleSystem components. |
| Camera | Enable to export Camera components. |
Mesh Components option group
Use these settings to fine-tune the Mesh data you are saving.
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| Normals | Enable to export Mesh normals. |
| UV1 | Enable to export Mesh UV1. |
| UV2 | Enable to export Mesh UV2. |
| Vertex Color | Enable to export vertex colors. |
| Submeshes | Enable to export sub-Meshes. |
Note: Alembic does not support Material export, and therefore neither does Alembic in Unity.
More Capture options
These options allow you to control starting and stopping the capture.
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| Capture On Start | Enable to begin capturing in Start() when a Scene with an AlembicExporter component is loaded. |
| Ignore First Frame | Enable to skip capturing the first frame. Only available if Capture On Start is enabled. |
| Max Capture Frame | Set the frame to stop capturing at. |
Misc section
Enable the Detailed Log option to provide Debug logging for each captured frame.
Capture Control section
The buttons in this section allow you to define how much of the animation to capture.
In Play mode, click Begin Recording to start capturing the entire Scene. Use this option if Capture On Start is disabled.
To export only the current frame to the Alembic file, click One Shot.