Softimage to Maya: Supported Scene Elements and Attributes

The following tables list the features supported when exporting from Softimage and importing into a Crosswalk-enabled installation of Maya using the dotXSI 6 (*.xsi) format.

Geometry

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Mesh	Yes
Triangles	Yes
Polygons	Yes
Nulls	Yes	Converted to locators.
UVs	Yes
Vertex Color	Yes
Normals	Yes
Splines	No
NURBS	No

Lights

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Omni	Yes
Directional	Yes
Spot	Yes
Light Common Shading	Yes

Cameras

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Perspective Lookat	Yes
Perspective Rotation	Yes
Orthogonal	Yes
Extra Camera Data	Yes	Lens data, aspect ration, etc.
For a complete description of Maya and Softimage camera interoperability, see Maya to Softimage: Camera Interoperability (this includes the export of camera data from Softimage into Maya).

Hierarchies

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
SRT Node Transforms	Yes
Advanced SRT Node Transforms	Yes	Support for pivot, neutral pose, etc.
Instances (model)	No
Instances (primitive)	No

Deformations

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Skinning (Envelopes)	Yes
Shapes	Yes	Support for blend shapes only, including weight animation. Note that the Maya import implementation only supports shape manager style weight animations. In other words, when importing into Maya, Crosswalk looks in the corresponding Mixer for the first instantiated animation clip using the shape key X and applies the weight curve of that clip to the blend shape X in Maya. If you create shape animation in Softimage with a complex Mixer setup where more them one clip with the same shape key as its source are sequenced, mixed, or blended, regardless of this, only the first animation clip's weight curve will be imported on the blend shape weight parameter in Maya.
Bones	Yes

Element

Softimage Export vs. Maya Import

Comments

Skinning (Envelopes)

Yes

Shapes

Yes

Support for blend shapes only, including weight animation.

Note that the Maya import implementation only supports shape manager style weight animations. In other words, when importing into Maya, Crosswalk looks in the corresponding Mixer for the first instantiated animation clip using the shape key X and applies the weight curve of that clip to the blend shape X in Maya. If you create shape animation in Softimage with a complex Mixer setup where more them one clip with the same shape key as its source are sequenced, mixed, or blended, regardless of this, only the first animation clip's weight curve will be imported on the blend shape weight parameter in Maya.

Bones

Yes

Animation

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Fcurves (constant)	Yes
Fcurves (linear)	Yes
Fcurves (spline)	Yes
Fcurves (hermite)	Yes

Constraints

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Constraints	No	Plotted on export using the Animation Resampling options.
IK	No	On export to Maya, the Preserve IK Chains option must be turned off. When this option is off, IK animation is plotted to FK.

Physics

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Rigid Body Dynamics	No

Shading

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Common Shading	Yes
DirectX	No
Cg Profile Effects	No

User Data

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Custom Psets	Yes	Imported as Maya extra attributes.
User Data Blob	No

File Referencing

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Model Files	No	All references are imported directly into the scene. That is, they are no longer references, but are now objects in the scene.
Images	Yes
Shaders	No

Update Mechanism

Element	Softimage Export vs. Maya Import	Comments
Update	Yes	Match and update scene elements in current scene on import into 3ds Max. See Updating Scene Elements.