Hey everyone, this is the first public release of my BeamNG Collada Importer/Exporter addon for Blender 5.x. If you've used Blender 4.5 or earlier, you probably know it shipped with built-in Collada (.dae) import/export support. Blender 5.x removed that entirely. This addon brings it back — but rebuilt from the ground up with a compiled C++ native module (shipped as a wheel) handling all the heavy Collada parsing and binary I/O, with a thin Python layer bridging it to Blender's API. What it can do: BeamNG .dae import/export (mesh data: vertices, normals, UVs, vertex colors, materials, sharp edges) BeamNG .cdae binary import/export (format versions 15 and 31) Zstd-compressed CDAE binary format for smaller file sizes Optimized exports — smaller files in both formats, faster export and game load times Import meshes into named collections Drag-and-drop file import support PBR material support (base color, roughness, metallic) via Principled BSDF Cross-platform native module (Linux x64, Windows x64) File size comparison (pickup vehicle): Code: - .dae — BeamNG original: 140 MB → Addon export: 60 MB (~62% smaller) - .cdae — BeamNG original: 32 MB → Addon export: 15 MB (~63% smaller) Compatibility: Blender 5.0.1+ and 5.2+, Linux and Windows. Where to get it: - Source code (Need to compile): https://github.com/Blenux/io_beamng_dae_dev - Install from my own Blender extension site: https://blenux.github.io/blender-extensions/ - Or grab it directly from the repo: https://github.com/Blenux/blender-extensions Note: Due to Blender 4.5 to 5.x .blend api changes, be sure to save .blend files into a new file, just in case!! I've got more features planned. If you've got suggestions or things you'd like to see added, post them below! Demonstration with Blender 5.3.0 Alpha
Hehe yeah thanks, did upload to blender extension site, but they denied it due to the custom compiled C++ the addon needs to work with (done in .whl), so I now also have a pure python version locally, will almost similar import/export speed... have many other beamng related projects, I've been toying with daily.. example (right click open image in new tab):
Yes, Python is surprisingly fast, especially if you delegate to NumPy properly. Seems we have similar ideas there xD --- Post updated --- btw the browser for the ingame configs is a really nice
Yeah I seen you did the nodes the blender like way, very nice indeed, mine just replicates the BeamNG Material UI in the world editor (plus some blender related ones for developement stuff)... Yeah that's is done completely done in C++ , so one can import the vehicle, working on other tools to aid in vehicle creation, editing jbeam (vs code jbeam editor built in), plus many other experiments, alot of failures, progress, rinse and repeat lol...
