I appreciate your response and thank you for the examples, I have gone through the Ant example before and it was really good. My problem is we built this 3D wheel (wheel of fortune kind) in Lightwave and exported as Collada, we are trying to bring the Collada file into Away builder now so we can export as an .awd file but when loaded into Away Builder the Collada file comes in with everything under a single object. We did it before where every material came in as a seperate object and we want to replicate that but its not working again. We dont have to use a Collada i just need to figure out what is the best way to get the Lightwave object into Away builder. We tried 3Ds but it had to many pollys. Any help or guidance would be appreciated.

I don’t know about LightWave, but I recommend OBJ file format.
OBJ is one of the most popular and simple format for 3d data.
So I think that there are not so large difference among each 3d authoring tools.

And you should check options for exporting OBJ on LightWave.
Include normals, uvs, materials, and so on.

I’ve been trying to get animations for my game for a while now… The only formats that seem to work are MD5 and AWD… Which NOBODY uses!

Ask any professional 3D animator out there… They use Maya, or 3DSMax, and they export their animations in FBX.

I’ve been trying to find a 3D animator with a bit of MD5 knowledge for MONTHS now…

I hate you so much now. I rue the day I chose your engine for my game. How am I supposed to find a 3D animator when the only formats you support are used by absolutely NO ONE?! Can you answer that?!

I understand your frustration. You can export from MAX to MD5, and it doesn’t require any special knowledge of MD5, so that shouldn’t be a showstopper.
Just use bones and skin and all should be good.
Hope that helps!

You could use .sea format as they also provide encoders for most editors and they even have full as3 api for away. You could even use the most ugly of all ugliest formats: collada .dae in 1.4 version.
You can also export from editors using their exports scripts and modify them for your needs. There are also awd exporters scripts around that would do the trick with minor dev as they are slightly old now.

Also FBX comes with a free SDK/parser, that you can use to parse your files if you want use FBX. Blender refuses their licence and came with own parser which is open sourced.

” I rue the day I chose your engine for my game.”

I do rue the people for using Autodesk shit. Autodesk polute the 3d landscape with tons of free softs that do all you want except these important small details that do require their other expensive softs with restrictive licences. While they are smart to create such dependency, they are also the source of nightmares in many fields. Go look at current formats and solutions in CAD/architectural fields for instance…

Last but not least, you also can write you own parser/generators/exporters.
Probably the most painful, but certainly the best option in the long run as you remove all dependencies and learn tons in the making.

I don’t think “write your own” is the answer kicker was looking for!
It’s enough to build a game, without having to write a parser first.
Nothing wrong with Collada either, I use it on a daily basis. But just like FBX it’s not a runtime format, but an exchange format.
Autodesk are a business, that is, they are meant to make money. What they offer in return is consistency, continued development and support. I’ve been using their products for over 30 years.

But I’m with you on the SEA format, it’s integration with 3D Studio MAX is unsurpassed.

As Atom said, I have a game to make, and it’s already extremely time consuming. All animators I have contacted are stuggling with export scripts as they require specific versions of 3DSMax and Blender that nobody uses anymore, and specific instruction to prepare the models and animations for export. All they can get out of them are errors and corrupted files… And what’s so wrong about FBX? You should have known that people would use AutoDesk… And why MD5? You have some kind of deal with IDSoftware?

Historically, features have been added as they were needed by the contributors to Away3D. You have to take into account it’s a free, open source library, powered by enthusiasm rather than sponsorship deals. MD5 was relevant at the time it was added, many, many years ago. It has the other advantage that it hasn’t been iterated since, which is a nightmare with something like FBX, that has many versions, and just keep on changing.
I still use Away3D when relevant, but as it’s not being actively developed, I personally moved what I could to Unity. It should offer you the level of support you need, and the free version is ample for most projects. I know that’s not a very helpful answer either. I have a working pipeline for character animation to MD5, if you can use a developer.
http://www.videometry.net/mocap-to-molehill-via-3d-studio-max-and-away3d-broomstick/

FBX is closed and undocumented, that’s what’s wrong with it. This makes parser development for this format a hell. Not to mention the licence.
At the time flash wasn’t considered as a disease, people actually did contributed to the engine by providing code and…  parsers.
When skeletal animation was requested, adding a playback in the engine was one thing, we needed to be able to import them from the editors. MD5 was back then an option to do so.

I have a game to make, and it’s already extremely time consuming

Saying ‘write your own’ wasn’t ment as f—k off, more like, ‘its not as hard as you may think ‘. I spend most my free time to dev my own tools. So trust me, I totally get you.

I’ve had a look at .sea repo this weekend, and there is all you need there.

@mightyAtom Nothing wrong with Collada
almost   till you start use/mix different im/ex -porters. For static content it’s usually ok.