FBX

Shading models and texture mapping

Solidly resolves referenced textures whether embedded directly within binary FBX files, stored in adjacent .fbm media directories, or located via relative file paths. Materials evaluate within their authored shading models under HDR environment lighting. Physically based shaders, including Autodesk Standard Surface and Stingray PBS, render with metallic and roughness parameters, while legacy Lambert and Phong materials are calibrated with balanced diffuse and specular approximations for visual consistency.

In the Render tab, Solidly provides diagnostic visualizers to inspect base colour, normal maps, roughness, and emissive channels in isolation. Imported directional, point, and spot lights can be toggled independently to evaluate lighting contributions against the environment.

Animation takes and skeletal deformation

When an FBX file contains animation takes, Solidly displays a transport bar directly over the viewport. Solidly evaluates skeletal deformation across skinned character rigs, animates node transformations and visibility tracks, and drives complex morph targets across blend shape channels.

Each authored animation take is available as an independent clip, complete with controls for frame-accurate timeline scrubbing, continuous looping, and playback speed adjustments from half speed to double speed.

Still frames from any point along the animation timeline can be captured at up to 8K resolution using Photo Mode.

File structure and schema inspection

Solidly's Info tab provides an immediate technical summary of the file, detailing node counts, mesh geometry totals, vertex and polygon counts, authored coordinate systems, linear unit scale, and embedded metadata.

In the Resources tab, Solidly maps the complete internal schema in native FBX terms, detailing geometry layer elements, animation takes and curve nodes, skeletal clusters, skin bindings, bind poses, and camera definitions. Selecting any scene node opens its dedicated FBX Properties card in the Node tab, presenting all authored attributes and custom metadata alongside their data types.

To isolate geometry details, Solidly provides wireframe rendering, face orientation indicators to verify polygon winding, and visualizers for vertex normals and tangents.

Material reconstruction and loose textures

Exported FBX files frequently separate from their texture bindings or ship alongside unlinked texture maps. Solidly scans the directory containing the model, detects texture channels by evaluating filename patterns and image contents, and groups compatible images into candidate materials matched to the file's material slots.

Suggested materials can be inspected in the Materials tab and assigned across the model using Merge Suggested, or mapped individually by dragging cards directly onto mesh surfaces in the viewport. When metallic or roughness maps are assigned to legacy Lambert or Phong materials, Solidly automatically exposes physical controls and maps the textures to standard FBX property slots recognised across modern 3D tools and game engines.

Scene graph restructuring and material editing

The Hierarchy panel provides full access to the FBX scene graph. Nodes can be reparented, reordered, renamed, duplicated, or removed. Empty group nodes, directional, point, or spot lights, and perspective or orthographic cameras can also be added into the tree. Spatial transformations can be adjusted numerically in the Node tab or positioned interactively with viewport gizmos, with Solidly resolving coordinate offsets through authored rotation and scaling pivots to maintain alignment across external applications.

In the Materials tab, Solidly organises surface parameters according to each shading model. Physically based materials expose controls for metallic, roughness, normal map strength, and emissive channels, while Phong and Lambert shaders provide adjustments for specular colour, shininess, and diffuse values. Mesh nodes include toggles for double-sided rendering, and inspector cards allow editing light intensities, cone angles, camera field of view, and file-level metadata.

File saving and texture embedding

Saving applies modifications directly to the FBX file while preserving unedited scene structures, animation takes, and custom attributes. The Save command updates the original file on disk.

The Save As command provides two output formats: standard FBX, which references textures located in an adjacent .fbm media folder, and Embedded FBX, which packages all binary geometry, materials, and texture maps into a single self-contained file.