Blender Metadata Exporter

Blender Metadata Exporter is a Blender addon that connects Blender-authored assets to an external, engine-agnostic asset validation pipeline.

The addon handles DCC-side integration and asset metadata export only.
All validation logic runs outside Blender.

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What It Does

• Integrates with Blender’s UI (3D Viewport sidebar)
• Exports selected mesh asset metadata to JSON

Blender-specific code is kept minimal and focused on authoring-time data extraction.

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Pipeline Overview

Blender (metadata export) → JSON → Asset Validator

• Blender: asset selection and metadata extraction
• Asset Validator: rule evaluation and reporting

Core validation logic lives here:
https://github.com/janikowski-dev/Asset-Validator

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Design Principles

• Clear separation between export and validation
• No DCC-specific validation rules
• Consistent JSON schema across tools
• Reusable across pipelines and projects

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Scope

This addon intentionally contains no validation logic.

It exists solely to bridge Blender with an external asset validation system.

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Installation (for Artists)

Requirements

• Blender 3.x or newer
• No additional dependencies required

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Installation Steps

1. Download the addon

   • Click Code → Download ZIP on this repository
   • Extract the ZIP file somewhere on your computer

2. Open Blender

3. Go to Edit → Preferences

4. Select the Add-ons tab

5. In the top-right corner, click the down arrow (▼) menu

6. Choose Install from Disk…

7. Select the extracted addon folder or the .zip file and confirm

8. Find Blender Metadata Exporter in the addon list and enable it (checkbox)

9. Close Preferences

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Verifying Installation

• Open the 3D Viewport
• Press N to open the sidebar
• Look for a tab or panel labeled Metadata Exporter

If you see the exporter panel, the addon is installed correctly.

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Updating the Addon

1. Disable the addon in Preferences → Add-ons
2. Remove the old version
3. Install the new version using the steps above

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Notes for Artists

• This addon does not validate assets inside Blender
• It only exports metadata
• Validation results come from the external Asset Validator tool
• Validation errors usually mean:
  • required metadata is missing, or
  • naming / structure rules were violated

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For Technical Artists / Developers

• The addon is intentionally lightweight
• No validation rules should be added here
• Changes to metadata schema should stay in sync with the Asset Validator
• Blender code should remain focused on:
  • UI
  • selection
  • data extraction
  • JSON export