Software

Instructions

CAUTION: ReDucto can be detected by some antivirus software as a virus...it is not. Its a false positive whose solution has remained elusive. All files that make up MudWalker X and ReDucto were compiled on a brand new clean machine unconnected to the internet or any network.

What is MudWalker X? ........................................................................................................................... 3 WHAT APPS ARE SUPPORTED? ............................................................................................................... 4 MudWalker X Supports Interop combinations between the following apps: ........................................ 4 MudWalker X Features ........................................................................................................................... 5 Export Selected (OBJ) .............................................................................................................................. 5 Export all (OBJ) ........................................................................................................................................ 5 Import OBJ............................................................................................................................................... 5 All Models to Lowest Subdivision Level ................................................................................................... 6 All Models to Highest Subdivision Level .................................................................................................. 6 Export Highest & Lowest Subdivision Levels (OBJ) .................................................................................. 6 Clean up .................................................................................................................................................. 6 Create Project Structure .......................................................................................................................... 7 NoQuarter Polygon Reduction ................................................................................................................ 7 'WeaponX' Polygon Reduction ................................................................................................................ 8 Export to ReDucto ................................................................................................................................... 8 Adding support for other Applications ................................................................................................... 8 What to do if you have a problem like this ............................................................................................. 9 Ways to Hack Extra Application support .............................................................................................. 10 Adding Extra App Support to MudWalker X Yourself the Less Risky Way ............................................ 10 Setting up the External Applications ..................................................................................................... 12 3DsMax ................................................................................................................................................. 12 Maya ..................................................................................................................................................... 12 Zbrush ................................................................................................................................................... 12 Softimage .............................................................................................................................................. 12 The Extras .............................................................................................................................................. 13 ReDucto Model Viewer ......................................................................................................................... 13 Mudbox Rescue..................................................................................................................................... 13 MudBackup / MudRestore.................................................................................................................... 13 MudUpdateScene ................................................................................................................................. 13 A Little History on MudWalker X .......................................................................................................... 14 Who is Psycho Core? ............................................................................................................................. 15

What is MudWalker X?
MudWalker X is a suite of tools that expands upon the original MudWalker toolset from 2009 that was the very 1st feature of its type for PC users. While some features have been removed either due to duplication of now standard features, or simply as there is now a better way of doing things youll find enough interesting features to keep anyone happy. The tagline on the Psycho Core site for MudWalker X is its back and this time its brought a friend is true as this time around MudWalker is not just one plug-in and related plug-ins and files for supported applications. It is also shipping with the unique polygon reduction app ReDucto (as well as a few other small things youll find useful). You are urged to read the manual for ReDucto as like MudWalker X it is unsupported because my main job is as a freelance digital artist and I cannot afford to spend all day answering emails or support questions. This is also one of the reasons they are free of charge for all. But why use it when many apps now have their own versions of this? Firstly MudWalker Version 1 was the very first interop suite around and so uses as a result far more mature and pipeline tested code; and secondly because unbelievably it still does some things other similar features cannot. (..and that's without even counting ReDucto that comes with it!) But no one is twisting your arm, certainly not me, use it, don't use it, it's your choice. The old send to application X massive list has now for the most part gone although a longer list of supported apps in a secondary menu can be enabled very easily by dropping a simple text file into the MudboxTemp directory that you will find on you main C drive after installation. In a similar way you can delete ones you no longer need or use to get rid of these features should they annoy you. MudWalker X only supports windows 64 bit and 64 bit versions of Mudbox as I dont own a Mac, havent got a Linux partition handy plus you should all be on 64 bit anyway if you are a windows user. Although I stopped releasing MudWalker over 2 years ago this has not meant it hasnt been used, rather I simply did not have the time to release it and then there suddenly popped up what seemed like a million clones of its features for various applications. Im proud to have helped to point out how valuable this feature would be to users to companies that otherwise might have never realised it. I have also added at the very, very last minute a third polygon reduction algorithm of mine. A hybrid of ReDucto and NoQuarter called 'WeaponX'

WHAT APPS ARE SUPPORTED?

The ones I own...it's as simple as that. If I do not have it available to me, then I cannot easily add the ability to MudWalker. For similar reasons MudWalker is a PC only plug-in and not available for the Mac. The list of supported apps is constantly growing at this time, but there is a list of those confirmed by me personally below.

MudWalker X Supports Interop combinations between the following apps:

Autodesk Mudbox (2013 64bit PC version onwards) Autodesk Softimage (tested on 2013, but I do have a 7.5 version knocking about if needed) Headus UVLayout (all versions) Adobe Photoshop (every version after 2009) Topogun (all versions) Autodesk 3d Max (every version after 2009) Adobe After Effects (every version after 2009) Autodesk Maya (every version after 2009) Cinema4D (unsure, but latest version is safe) Nevercenter's Silo 2 Modo (most recent versions should work, feel free to add your own Modo export script as I do not own Modo) 3D Coat (full tight interoperation) Zbrush (4.2 onwards) Also you can add others very easily in most cases and even if you are a coder or scripter in your favourite app code your own interop with a simple tool I have provided that I detail later on in the 'Extras' section. The bottom line is out of the box it supports those apps which I either use regularly or use for certain jobs. I have made things open ended enough that this can be extended far in advance of this list of the 'basics'.

MudWalker X Features
Import / Export FBX MudWalker X still has the import and export to and from applications that the old MudWalker did. While by default the massive list of applications it not enabled, all you need to do is fill in the paths to the exe files in the names text files in the MudboxTemp directory on your main C file that is created for use by MudWalker X and ReDucto. I wont insult your intelligence by going through how to edit a text file as Im sure you can all do that by now. The Import and Export are FBX based, or should I say a tweaked FBX that Ive used for a few years now. These are used as main transport for the Big 3 Autodesk applications. Although this feature is now duplicated I feel my code as it is more mature and is more stable and less prone to bugs. You can also simply delete the text files for apps you either don't use or do not wish to use MudWalker X.

Export Selected (OBJ)

This is a rather unique feature to MudWalker X in that you can normally only export and entire mesh from Mudbox. This allows you to export only the selected faces. So you can either select by hand, select by UV Shells (Mudbox 2013) or any other way you can think of. If you were for example splitting up a model into separate scene files so that a group of artists could each work on an assigned part, this makes your life far simpler. You can also use it as part of a 3D printing workflow outlined in the main features video. Where you can export selected parts to ReDucto and then use its intelligent hole filling algorithm to create a number of parts that can then be assembled after printing. If your creative, you can also use it to create working proofs for use as 3D Model kits.

Export all (OBJ)

Well this does what it says on the tin...it exports every model in the scene, because there is always a time when you need to do that.

Import OBJ
This was a feature sadly lacking in the very 1st incarnation of MudWalker due to lack of SDK support for it. It imports the MudWalker exported OBJ (named OUTPUT.obj) from any of the other supported applications as a new mesh into the scene. Alas at the moment it doesn't seem to be possible to import it as either a layer or replace the current model in your scene with an updated version from another application. Although for those sort of changes you would want to use MudWalker X's import and export FBX features. It's useful to us still though as it means now we can get models into and out of far more applications. We can of course use the Mudbox 'transfer details' function to transfer all our details and maps to our new mesh. So we can change its shape, add edge loops, re UV map it...retopologise it...all sorts of things. 5

All Models to Lowest Subdivision Level

This simple little menu item in MudWalker is the one I probably use the most along with its opposite version for highest subdivision levels. It steps all models down at an internal application level then updates the viewport; as such it is far faster than simply stepping up and down as you may do. This is ideal when you find yourself about to make a change that requires you to do so at the lowest subdivision level, or simply to export to redo your UVs. You can toggle this and the highest SubD level across all your models in your scene by the simple Ctrl + Alt + D hotkey.

All Models to Highest Subdivision Level

The opposite of the above menu item, this takes all models within your scene to their highest subdivision level. Very useful if you are working on a heavy multi part scene and do not wish to have everything at its highest subdivision level until you export a screenshot or turntable. You can toggle this and the lowest SubD level across all your models in your scene by the simple Ctrl + Alt + D hotkey.

Export Highest & Lowest Subdivision Levels (OBJ)

This was added quite some time back after a request by a few beta testers of the old MudWalker. Simply put it exports the highest and lowest levels of the selected sculpt to two files in the c:\MudboxTemp folder. One is names Lowest.obj the other Highest.obj. This means you can then incorporate this into other applications such as Xnormal if you use that for map baking in your pipeline. It also can be useful if you run scripts on your server and are a large facility to do a number of jobs automatically as one of the beta testers did.

Clean up
MudWalker X stores files in temporary location on the C drive (c:\MudboxTemp). This could in theory get rather huge after a while, so you dont forget, this clean up option has been added which deletes all files that MudWalker creates on export or for temporary storage. Simply click on it and it will delete all files both it and ReDucto create by default.

Create Project Structure

This is an expanded version of a feature of an old Mudbox plug-in I made called MudTidy. To use this feature simply save your file to whatever location you wish and then click on the Create Project Structure option in the MudWalker X menu. It will create a number of folders for you to store all files related to your project. The list of folders it creates is below:

Folder OBJs Textures FBX Maps 3DsMax Maya Softimage Images Vue Nuke Zbrush Alembic 3DCoat Mudbox

Usage Storage of any OBJ meshes needed for the project Either raw or final textures can be stored here FBX files that may be used later in the pipeline including rigged files Either final version of extracted maps or textures 3Ds Max files So you can store Mayas own project structure in here Softimage scene files Insperation / look dev images and reference images used on the project Vue scene files Nuke Scripts Any Zbrush model files used in the project Alembic files exported from Mudbox or other apps Any 3D Coat files used on the project The best place to save any future Mudbox files (as they can get rather messy)

NoQuarter Polygon Reduction

NoQuarter is not ReDucto; it is an alternate polygon reduction algorithm that uses a voxel grid based collapse. While it doesnt give the excellent results that ReDucto can, it can handle far larger data sets and file sizes and is a LOT faster. It comes with 9 preset settings where 1 is the lowest amount of polygon reduction, and 9 is the largest amount. IT also gives you the option to import the reduced mesh or not. On most normal sculpted meshes level 9 will give a low resolution game mesh that retains as much of the silhouette as possible. This works on selected models in your scene and a model must be selected 1st. If you have a model file that is so huge that you simply cannot get it into any application to for example bake a map from it against a low resolution version, then NoQuarter is perfect as it works very fast but at the price of accuracy of the reduction. (ReDucto for example is far, far slower, but does a terrific job...although that does work on an inbuilt A.I. as well.) NoQuarter also is useful for hard surface modellers or those making models for manufacturing. It is also being used as a 1st step for something far more complex as part of a 3d max plug-in myself and another Autodesk master are writing.

'WeaponX' Polygon Reduction

This was a very last minute addition before I packed all the files up in the installers for MudWalker X and ReDucto.....we are talking the last 30mins to put this in perspective. It occurred to me that there was no 'middle ground' between the speed of NoQuarter and the Quality of ReDucto. So hence the inclusion of another old algorithm of mine called 'WeaponX'. WeaponX is a hybrid algorithm of ReDucto and the voxel grid based collapse of NoQuarter, keeping the speed of the latter while nearly matching the quality of ReDucto. Like NoQuarter is uses a set of levels (included in this case of speed to add it in at the very last minute). With level 1 being the lowest amount of reduction and level 11 being the most reduction. It will (90% of the time ) give you a message in the viewport once it has done, but still leave Mudbox usable in the mean time. It creates all reduced files under the name 'WeaponX.obj' in the c:\MudboxTemp folder. So if your reducing a mesh and may have missed the screen message keep that folder open in another monitor. It also allows fast import of the reduced mesh for comparison in mudbox. Now do not let the last minute nature of this addition fool you, this is a very powerful reduction algorithm. No one knew this was being added in advance not even the beta testers for ReDucto...in fact not even my wife. So enjoy and treat it as an alpha preview that I may develop later if there is enough interest in it. but either way it now means Mudbox has 3 totally different polygon reduction algorithms and 2 of them exclusive to Mudbox.

Export to ReDucto
This button simply exports the selected models to ReDucto for use in that application. ReDucto ships with MudWalker X by default, although you do not need to be a Mudbox user to use ReDucto as it is also available as its own short cut. For further details on ReDuctos feature set and more about it please read the ReDucto PDF. The ReDucto App can of course be started separately if you want to.

Adding support for other Applications

in the default install the support for many of the applications that the old versions of MudWalker supported are inactive and can be activated or deactivated by the user with ease.

inside the C:\MudboxTemp\AppConfig folder you will find a number of text files. Simply open the ones you want to use and type in the path to the main exe file it uses and save. simply delete the text files that correspond with apps you either do not own, or do not use and they will no longer appear in the Separate MudWalkerX Extras menu. This saves me time and energy having to create an easy but boring and time consuming function in the plug-in code to do this for you.

What to do if you have a problem like this

Some applications may change their support for MudWalker X or the features it uses to send these to a scene, while these are beyond my control here's a few things you can try that usually sorts the problem in other cases.

instead of simply entering 'c:\program files\awesome software\awesomeapp.exe' instead contain the path in quotation marks: "c:\program files\awesome software\awesomeapp.exe" if this fails try putting it into double quotation marks like so: " "c:\program files\awesome software\awesomeapp.exe"" in case of real emergency you can simply add the path of the exe to your windows $PATH environment variable and simply then place the name of the exe file itself into the text file like so: 'awesomeapp.exe' remove all spaces before and after the text if that doesn't work your in screwedsville

Ways to Hack Extra Application support

Here's a little accidental feature you may find interesting to play with, although I add it's even more unsupported than the rest of MudWalker X and ReDucto! Just because for example the text file says 'Headus UVLayout.txt', it does not mean that it has to start Headus UV Layout. You can add the path to any exe file from any app at all. Some such as Headus only accept the OBJ format from MudWalker and will not load an FBX file, while others such as Cinema 4D do. So I'll let you work it out from there and have fun with it, although be aware if you send for example an FBX meant for Cinema 4D or Modo to a non 3d application I am not responsible should it break the app, your computer or even if aliens drop down from the planet Zog and abduct you. Bottom line is you play with this at your own risk, although it can be used to change apps to ones that are not yet added to MudWalker X (90% of the time that is only as I do not have time to add every 3d app on planet earth although they are in most cases perfectly able to be supported, and most times fairly easily.)

Adding Extra App Support to MudWalker X Yourself the Less Risky Way

if you really don't feel like playing around with paths to exe files or learning about windows environment variables(which are far less scary than they sound I assure you). You can add support for an external application to MudWalker yourself. If you are lucky enough for an app to support both import and export of FBX files, then your onto a winner as you can then roll your own import script or menu by remembering that MudWalker's FBX files it exports and imports can always can be found in the c:\MudboxTemp folder. in a similar way you could use the OBJ exported for use in ReDucto to be automatically imported into another application. if you do extend MudWalker X then I do urge you to make it available to others for free online providing the company you work for allows this. Below is a list of file names and types that MudWalker X exports that may be of use to those of you who wish to extend it yourself: OUTPUT.fbx OUTPUT.obj LowestLevel.obj Highestlevel.obj Default export FBX file name Default OBJ export file name When exporting the lowest and highest Subd Levels When exporting the lowest and highest Subd Levels

as an extra note please ensure that your app of choice exports the file extension in lower case only. While I have tried to add simple renaming where I can in both MudWalker X and ReDucto its good practice not to have it in capital letters.

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I have also created a helper app that resides in the c:\MudboxTemp\ReDucto folder called "MudUpdateScene.exe" for you that you can call after exporting your FBX file that will send it to Mudbox and let you choose whether to have it update the existing scene or to create a new one. So simply find your apps way to script an FBX export to C:\MudboxTemp\OUTPUT.fbx and then a shell command to c:\MudboxTemp\MudUpdateScene.exe and your good to go. I felt this would be a good way to allow those of you who are programmers yourselves or scripts some tools to have a bit of fun of your own.

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Setting up the External Applications 3DsMax

To set up the MudWalkerX menu for 3DsMax, simply copy the MudWalkerXLoader to : C:\Program Files\Autodesk\[3ds Max version]\Scripts\Startup

Maya

(adjusting the path to suit your 3DsMax version and install). Alternately you can simply run the script from your MaxScript >> Run menu. You will then have a set of items under the MudWalkerX menu including one that also allows you to start up ReDucto as well. Remember to select your model before exporting.

To automatically set up your MudWalkerX shelf in Maya, unzip the MayaShelf.zip file and copy its contents to: Documents/maya/[version number]/Prefs You will then have a MudWalker Shelf on start up available to you that also allows you to start up ReDucto as well.

Place the supplied ZScript into your ZStarup Zplugs dirctory. This will give you and a MudWalkerX out and MudWalkerX In buttons at the bottom of your tool menu. This script does nothing fancy, simply gets your model in and out of Zbrush. if you wish to create your own or refine it further please be my guest as my ZScript is a wee bit rusty and it's not like I can ask Pixologic, as I'm pretty sure I'm still on their death list lol. :)

Zbrush

Softimage

The enclosed MudWalker.xsitb works and has been tested on Softimage 2013. Should you wish you can extend its functionality further and it should at least provide you with an ample starting point at the very least... simply place it in the following folder (where [USER] is your user name: C:\Users\[USER]\Autodesk\Softimage_2013\Application\toolbars You can then load it like any other toolbar in Softimage.

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The Extras

ReDucto Model Viewer

This is a very simple model viewer that I have been using for years now that I wrote so long back I cant remember. Simply drag and drop any obj, stl or ply file onto it and it will open in a window so you can examine its wireframe, forms etc. It is VERY fast loading and often beats most other apps in a head to head load test on speed.

Mudbox Rescue
If you have ever experienced a Mudbox bug the very 1st thing you are asked to do is to delete all Mudboxs settings files so it can create new ones on the next start up of Mudbox. This simple app does it all for you, simply ensure Mudbox is not running at the time. If you are trying to solve a persistent bug or problem this can be a huge time saver. As such it'll sove around 70% of all Mudbox 'bugs' and problems.

MudBackup / MudRestore
Two very simple apps that will back up all your Mudbox settings to a 'Backup' folder inside the main 'MudboxTemp' folder on your main C drive. You can then restore all your settings at once in a single click. You can also (providing you are using the same version and operating system) use a backed up set of settings to restore to a different computer or use it to share settings if you want to.

MudUpdateScene
This is a little gift of mine to all coders, programmers or scripter's out there who wish to add support for Mudbox to their apps, to MudWalker X or whatever. It allows you to send an FBX and have it update the Mudbox scene file , merge it or as a new object or new scene. At the time of writing the 'how' of how it works I cannot pass on, (although I assume at some point it will be put into the help files for the Mudbox SDK). To use it simple export using your code / app SDK of choice an FBX file to the 'c:\MudboxTemp' folder under the name OUTPUT.fbx and then use a system command or whatever equivalent your apps SDK has to call the MudUpdateScene.exe. The rest is done for you. You can also click on it manually if you're curious..... it'll do the same thing providing the needed FBX is present in the 'MudboxTemp' folder.

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A Little History on MudWalker X

The original version of MudWalker started life as a simple tool to let me pass assets from application to application without having to mess around with opening , closing or importing and exporting files. I didn't see it as a big deal and so didn't mention it to anyone for quite a while. The idea itself came from a guy whose name I have no idea of or anything other than he was drunk, he was a young guy from Germany and at the End User Event in Holland the 1st year I was there. He'd walked up to me and started talking about how all he wanted in life was to be able to 'push a f*cking button and for sh*t to move to from one f*cking app to another f*cking app'. Those were the exact words that registered with me of his. So as soon as I got home I started work on what would become known as MudWalker. (although it had a far more interesting and funny name before this.) The core took only about 4-6 hours to code. I must have used this bare bones version for a good 8 months before I mentioned it to anyone. When I did mention it, it was in passing during a conversation with Dave Cardwell who at the time was leading the Mudbox team at Autodesk and someone I still count as a good friend. Dave immediately saw the potential of it and started to try and convince me it was worth putting out for Mudbox users. So it went into a very low key beta test of about 5 people including Neil Blevins at Pixar. Eventually it saw release as a free plug in to everyone. It was the very 1st interop plug-in suite of its kind to be available to PC users (Zbrush had beaten me on a Mac release as I did not own a Mac and they dragged their feet on a pc release. For the record it does not surprise me they were working on something similar as it was such a good idea looking back at it, that I was surprised more were not working on exactly the same thing far, far earlier). MudWalker Version 1 worked out of the box and allowed people not just to pass between Mudbox and whatever app they chose, but also between those apps themselves. So for example it could (and still can) pass between 3d max to cinema 4d to Maya etc etc. So for that reason alone its name was always a bit of a misnomer, while the Mudbox part was hardest to write back then with a brand new untested SDK still in alpha at the time, it is just as valid for other applications and still is. (Sort of makes me wish I'd gave it a less app specific sounding name to be honest). MudWalker hit hard and people loved it in their droves, but as with all good things people were inspired. So alternate versions for other applications started to appear. (I wish to god I got royalties lol). Eventually I mothballed it as life was too busy and I was getting hundreds of emails a day with requests for features ands tech support enquiries. (This pattern would be repeated a little over a year later when I put out the 1st mental ray shader to handle vector displacement maps coming out of Mudbox. It is also the reason behind my simple condition of making this and ReDucto free for everyone...no tech support emails. Period.) Although there were no releases after this, I kept updating MudWalker as I had a few minutes here and there as my own personal (and in my opinion far more stable than any alternative) tool. MudWalker dropped off the grid eventually and out of peoples thoughts. Some code from it was used in an aborted plug-in for Andrew Shapagin who approached me to write a Mudbox interop plug-in for 3D Coat. But at the time 3D Coat had some terrible FBX related bugs and eventually I again dropped it. The final revised (and working) version of that code now features as part of 14

MudWalker X. Meaning a very tight interop indeed for 3d coat users, who won't need MudWalker X and another plug-in for 3d coat interop (unless they wish to of course). Now I cannot and will not add every application in the history of 3D as I firstly have to own them first, secondly have to learn any related SDK's they use and thirdly I have to have both time and inclination. But rather than wall out applications I do not use, I have created a simple exe file that can be used by any programmer or scripter for any application to easily add support to MudWalker X. While I cannot reveal some of the secrets of how MudWalker updates Mudbox scene files, until such date as Autodesk allow people to know this, I can provide this exe that means they can do exactly that without knowing exactly how it is done. So I'm happy, Autodesk wont sue me (lol) and your happy as you can add the things you personally feel may be missing for you.

Who is Psycho Core?

Psycho Core is a software firm that is rather unique in that it sells nothing. Its is run and manned by one person Wayne Robson, for both the development and distribution of applications and plug-ins. While many are for personal or client use, others such as the original MudWalker, ReDucto, NoQuarter and Waynes Vector Displacement shader (which was the 1st vector displacement shader for mental ray to support Mudbox vector displacement maps) get released from time to time for free to the 3D industry whenever Wayne feels the urge. It does not sell you anything, it does not want your money or your loyalty...it wants nothing and hopefully gives everything in return. As Wayne is a professional freelance3D artist and digital sculptor he cannot afford to spend all his time acting as tech support for his apps and plug-ins. As such he doesnt think it would be fair to sell them. Thats why they are free and also why the only condition is that he doesnt get bombarded with emails and tweets asking how to solve problems you may have. If you are a company and require support or want to request a slight change or addition this is possible but only for real companies and not one man bands in their spare room in their house lol.

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