Best way to set many skinweights?

[jessec]

Ok, so I'm writing a script to import a file with the skin weights for all the vertices of a mesh object. I'm practically done, the only thing I can't get to work is actually assigning the weights to the vertices, one at a time. I performed some skin weight assignments in the Component Editor and checked the MEL commands it used, and came up with this:

skinPercent -tv $Influence[$c] $vertexValue[$c] $skinCluster[0] $vertexNumber[$j];

Where $Influence[$c] is the name of the joint/influnce object, $vertexValue[$c] is the numerical value I want to assign to that vertex, $skinCluster is the name of the skin cluster, and vertex number is the text describing the vertex to assign to.

However, this isn't working in my procedure. I've noticed someone else used a setAttr command, only I wasn't able to understand what values/variable to fit in where with that one, and someone also used a similar command, only with the eval function.

Anyone have a recommendation on how to go about setting these values? And if so, could you provide me with a written example of the names fit in for the variables if at all possible?

[milodc]

Just out of curiousity, why aren't you simply using weight maps?

[jessec]

You mean the bitmap image form of skin weights that Maya natively exports?

If that's what you mean, those are prone to errors, since it is dependent upon your UV unwrap and I've often had unaccurate imports of weights, as well as mirroring.

But yeah, I got this one figured out now.

[milodc]

Weight image maps get a bad rap.

I've had great success with them. An extra UV set with well-spaced UVs and big maps (at least 2048x 2048y) works wonders. Standard operating procedure for me, now.

Whatever floats your boat, though.

[milodc]

I take it back, don't use weight maps if you're using Maya 6. Looks like skin weight map importing is broken in the latest version (all I get whenever I try to import maps is a bullsh!t error, "File must be an exported weight map text file, i.e. fileName.weightMap").

You suck, Alias.

[joojaa]

hmm how did you do it previously se my other post on this matter too bacause when i compare teh results of the mayya 5 one and 6 one i get teh exact same result? Maybve someone has replaced the old one for my nyew maya?

And yes even my old maya used textfiles for this.

[milodc]

Joojaa wrote: "hmm how did you do it previously..."

Same as I did in Maya 5.0 and Maya 6.0: arrange UVs of weighted mesh, select mesh, export weight maps, import later as necessary.

It's in 6.01 that it I get the error.

[joojaa]

Well i just exported in 6,01 and imported it vback no error as long as i pointed to the textfile... May be taht the file msut have the comments at the start tough!

As far as i can tell its the exact same scrtipt in 6 as in 6.01, because it has same date stamps as my 6.0 install and nth the timsestamps of a 6.01 install..

Anyway theres allways a chance of corruption at some stage.

[milodc]

My 6.01 importSkinMap.mel is not the same as my 5.0 version. (Don't know about 6.0.)

My 6.01 is here, and my 5.0 is here.

Check them out, if you like.

[milodc]

P.S. You mind posting or sending me your 6.01 version?

[joojaa]

the only difference are theese lines (se below), all this does it it cheks your not running ple, and thet your skinwights file has a extension, infact any extension wil do, but a file with no extension will not be supported, wich is porbably what you have, just add .something in your weight map filename and the 6.01 one works fine.

So you se your is not working is not realy a big hinder for most users who would never notice anything is wrong, unless they used files that vere manualy created or from older versions of maya and never bothered to think.

But why they would do such a chek is beyond me, maybe they were planning to actualy chek taht the extension is was .weightMap just as the error says.

if (`about -evalVersion`){
	// Because fopen and fprint are disabled in PLE, 
	// importSkinWeightMap is not supported.
	warning ("importSkinWeightMap is not supported in Maya PLE.");
	return 0;
}

string $ftype[] = `file -q -type $fileName`;
if ($ftype[0] != "") { //chek that filename has a extension
	error("File must be an exported weight map text file, i.e. "fileName.weightMap"");
	return 0;
}

[milodc]

... but a file with no extension will not be supported, wich is porbably what you have, just add .something in your weight map filename and the 6.01 one works fine.

Um, yeah, I tried that several times. Having gotten an error that proclaimed that I had no ".weightMap" extension, you can imagine that the next thing I did was to explicitly specify that extension at export time.

The error persisted. Not only that, it happened on someone else's machine, too.

Guess you're just lucky. In any case, I'm just going to stick with the 5.0 script, that works fine.

[joojaa]

Still wierd! Burt usualy speking im hardly luky i have worked may as of over the years trying to understand maya.