(Solved) Maya Import - Hard or Soft but never mixed?

bitinn · Sep 2017

Hi,

This seems like something that should be so very simple I am afraid of asking here.

But how does one preserve hard edge/soft edges across export and import? Somehow for a simple export of following model, Maya Import will convert all soft edges to hard edges.

Sure, it preserves the normal just fine, but I lost all the soft edges no matter what I do. Maya will either import a model with only soft edges, or it import one with every edge hardened (even though the model should contain hard/soft edge information!)

Why on earth would May do that? Is hard edge/soft edge something outside of FBX spec?

Tzur_H · Sep 2017

I had ssimilar issues when going from modo to maya. I only know this works for FBX, no idea if you can do it for OBJ - you can edit the import settings of the FBX and enable "unlock normals" checkbox, that should fix it.

bitinn · Sep 2017

Tzur_H said:

I had ssimilar issues when going from modo to maya. I only know this works for FBX, no idea if you can do it for OBJ - you can edit the import settings of the FBX and enable "unlock normals" checkbox, that should fix it.

You are right! And this is by far the worst UI design I have seen in 2017:

I have to change the filetype dropdown to FBX in order to see these "File Type Specific Options".

For prosperity, Maya doc on this topic: http://help.autodesk.com/view/MAYALT/2018/ENU/?guid=GUID-0CD41066-4C27-48AE-9776-366DB11B4FDF

MiguelMNavas · Nov 2021

Hi! I have the same problem but I cannot find the option "unlock normals" in the import settings. Could you show me where I can find it? Maybe a screenshot? Thanks!