Autodesk released a new SDK which allows you to customize the DCC FBX exporters and importers for 3ds max and Maya.
On the Autodesk website it says:
Autodesk FBX 2009.3 technology now includes published source code for the FBX and COLLADA readers and writers, enabling developers to extend and adapt the code for use in custom pipelines.
[…] and thus protect their investment in their FBX plug-ins.
And the docs specify:
- Extend the FBX and/or Collada file format to support additional kinds of data.
- Extend the functionality of the FBX plugins for 3ds Max/Maya to support the reading and writing of files that use your file format.
- Use FBX SDK directly to read and write files that use your file format, without passing through 3ds Max or Maya.
You can download this SDK which is entitled as "FBX Extensions Software Development Kit". The size of the download is 298 MB.
Today I was on a local IDGA event and this news was mentioned. Initially I thought that the FBX format itself has become open but this seems not to be the case, unfortunately
😐
Still, it's good that now one can extend the file format and those plugins. 8)