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Vectorworks to twinmotion sp3?


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So lots of hoopla in SP3 about 2021 talking to Twinmotion. Not a lot of experience with this but last I did this, it was export FBX from V which Twinmotion would read. Datasmith seems to be for Unreal engine, windows only and not for Twinmotion. Native .vwx import not an option in Twinmotion 2020.2 or for that matter unreal engine if one believes their web site. I know I'm missing a lot, but it would appear nothing has changed. Can someone elaborate or point me in a direction?

thx

-j

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I just tried Datasmith Export from VW 2021 SP3,

imported into Twinmotions and looks very good.

(Some Materials look a bit strange and different though)

 

Twinmotion has FBX import, even Modo *.lxo,

but I think *.C4D import was always a tad better.

Maybe C4D is still the best export format for now ?

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Just now, M5d said:

As I understand it, this step (Datasmith) will make the Live-Sync plugin possible in a future release . . . that (finally) will warrant some hoopla!

 

I understood it the same way.

Just one way street import isn't that impressive as we already had.

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OMG

I tried again,

switching Twinmotion's Quality Settings do no more crash my M! Mini with Display getting pink.

 

Somehow everything feels more smooth now.

Even if Twinmotion had no Update.

OK, VW got SP3.

 

But Yesterday came Big Sur 11.3 Beta4,

maybe lots of issues were on Apples side ....

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I am new to twinmotion and have only fiddled with it a little bit so far, on the mac mini.

I tried exporting two VW models (one of them quite large) in C4d format; both seemed to go into Twinmotion OK without any obvious problems.

But after a while of navigating around, I found that twinmotion would freeze up completely, the only solution being to restart the computer. This happened several times and happen in both models. That was before I updated Big Sur to 11.2.3; I haven't tried it again since.

Edited by line-weight
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I had a really ugly big project that I use to test my Apps.

At the beginning I thought it would run ok on M1,

the way it did on Intel Trash Can or how the files

worked in Modo or C4D.

But when I played later a bit more with it in Twinmotion

I had the same experience, too much freezing and lagging.

Haven't tried with 11.3 Beta4 so far and so do not know

if it works better again.

 

But I opened it in VW yesterday again, and looked very smooth

and I think it would be realistically editable in VW.

 

So for me it looks like that M1 architecture is very capable and

efficient. I think we will see even increasing performance when

more and more Apps release ASi optimized versions.

 

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee

Hello @jnr:

 

"Datasmith seems to be for Unreal engine, windows only and not for Twinmotion."

 

This is not true, all Direct Link plugins are being converted to use Datasmith; it's Epic's technology for Direct Link moving forward.  The existing direct link plugins were all using older proprietary technology that is not supported by Epic anymore.

 

And you can use this with Mac or Windows, and with the current version of Twinmotion (2020.2 or later) or Unreal Editor (4.26).  There is an update to Twinmotion (2021) coming soon that improves reliability on the Mac if you were seeing problems before with it.

 

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So how will this work? Will Twinmotion be bundled with Vectorworks like Renderworks is? Will it allow us to render our models in real time? As I understand it now, one needs to export a file to render it in Twinmotion. The problem that I see with that is that if the model changes, then you need to start from scratch and re-render the model to include changes. If rendering could happen in real time that wouldn't be an issue. I've never done rendering outside what's available within VW itself, so don't even know what I don't know. I've seen Twinmotion demonstrated and it looks pretty cool. Enscape also looks cool but isn't available for the Mac OS.

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee

Hello @MaltbyDesign

 

Twinmotion is an independent product from Epic Games.  It does allow you to render your model in real-time.

 

To use this with SP3 choose the Export Unreal Datasmith file export command, this saves the .udatasmith file and "assets" (geometry and textures).  You point Twinmotion at that file to import.

 

Thereafter you can make changes in Vectorworks to add, modify, delete objects and to override textures in Twinmotion.  To update the model again after the initial export you overwrite the .udatasmith file by exporting it again, and in Twinmotion press the "chasing arrows" icon to have Twinmotion pick up the new import.  Overrides to textures and any geometry you added in Twinmotion from their content should remain unaffected.

 

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4 minutes ago, Dave Donley said:

Hello @MaltbyDesign

 

Twinmotion is an independent product from Epic Games.  It does allow you to render your model in real-time.

 

To use this with SP3 choose the Export Unreal Datasmith file export command, this saves the .udatasmith file and "assets" (geometry and textures).  You point Twinmotion at that file to import.

 

Thereafter you can make changes in Vectorworks to add, modify, delete objects and to override textures in Twinmotion.  To update the model again after the initial export you overwrite the .udatasmith file by exporting it again, and in Twinmotion press the "chasing arrows" icon to have Twinmotion pick up the new import.  Overrides to textures and any geometry you added in Twinmotion from their content should remain unaffected.

 

I have to say I am a bit disappointed. We are still missing a viable option for live rendering in Vectorworks on macOS. So far it only exists for Enscape and Lumion. When it was teased in the road maps and presentations, I was under the impression that we would finally get it with SP3. So in the end it's only a nicer export. :(

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55 minutes ago, elepp said:

I have to say I am a bit disappointed. We are still missing a viable option for live rendering in Vectorworks on macOS. So far it only exists for Enscape and Lumion. When it was teased in the road maps and presentations, I was under the impression that we would finally get it with SP3. So in the end it's only a nicer export. 😞

@elepp This is, I think, what I was getting at (my term "real-time" may not be what I intended). When I watched the presentation for Enscape it looked to me like it was capable of live rendering directly on the model and you could make changes to the model and those would be reflected on the rendering. It seems Enscape is only available for Windows. 

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3 hours ago, Dave Donley said:

@elepp You can definitely use Twinmotion and Vectorworks with this export.

 

Existing direct link plugins to Twinmotion work by the user pressing a "Synchronize" button in the CAD application, every time they want to push the model updates to Twinmotion.  One click.

 

Currently with Vectorworks you choose export and then import in Twinmotion, two clicks.

 

There is not yet a truly Direct Link with live connection like there are for Lumion and Enscape, which would require no clicks to update the model in Twinmotion.  This would be a click to establish a connection to Twinmotion and model updates would happen live as changes happen in Vectorworks (like with Lumion and Enscape).  This support in Datasmith is a work in progress and Vectorworks is on the path to this.

 

Thanks for clearing that up. Seeing forward to the improvements. For now though it's not usable for us. In our design process we would have to update it too many times. And even if it's only two clicks, in the design process it adds up quickly.

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3 hours ago, Dave Donley said:

There is a nice video here does this help?

https://www.vectorworks.net/en-US/2021

 

 

Cool - it seems like those new videos could also be included on the page that the "Message Center" links to. I saw the red notification icon yesterday and clicked the link which took me here: 

 

Had no idea there were new videos as well (granted I've already beta tested the new features but I'm thinking for other folks it'd be nice to make the videos more apparent).

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