Unity Issue Tracker - Using multiple animation clips in Blender not all Animation clips are imported using a .blend file

Won't Fix

Votes

1

Found in

2019.3.0a12

2019.3.0b4

2020.1.0a1

Issue ID

1186253

Regression

Yes

Using multiple animation clips in Blender not all Animation clips are imported using a .blend file

Asset - Importers

Sep 23, 2019

To reproduce:
1. Create a new project
2. Import attached "28blender.blend" file
3. In Editor select the "28blender.blend" file
4. In Inspector window select Animation tab
5. Observe animation Clips list

Expected: all animation clips are imported
Actual: only one animation clip can be seen named "Scene"

Reproduced on:
2019.3.0a12 2020.1.0a1 2020.1.0a5

Not reproduced on:
2018.4.10f1 2019.2.7f2 2019.3.0a11

Notes:
- On 2017.4.32f1 getting an error in the console: "Blender could not convert the .blend file to FBX file."
- Exporting as .fbx file keeps all the animation clips
- Reproduces using Blender 2.79 and 2.8

Resolution Note (2020.1.X):

The issue is caused by the 'export all actions' setting set to false in the blender-to-FBX conversion script. This was done to fix the case 1117999 but causes an issue with this particular rig/animation setup. Reverting the change made earlier fixes the issue. We won't fix this because it's basically a matter of preference, this setting should be turned on or of depending on the imported file content. There's two easy workarounds :
1) Export to FBX with the 'export all actions' setting turned on. Exporting to .FBX is recommended over direct .blend import in the documentation for this reason but also because of collaborative workflow issues.
2) Go to the Unity installation folder and locate the Unity-BlenderToFBX.py file in Data/Tools/,
replace line 43 by bake_anim_use_all_actions=True
Blender file import actually just runs Blender in background and exports the file to FBX then imports it. The FBX exports settings can be changed in this file.

Comments (23)

kturkay

Jun 15, 2025 01:47

that fixes this headache. hope it will be useful for anyone who needed it.
github.com/kursatturkay/unity_blenderfile_actions_import_fix_runasadmin
kturkay

Jun 15, 2025 01:46

that fixes this headache. hope it will be useful for anyone who needed it.
https://github.com/kursatturkay/unity_blenderfile_actions_import_fix_runasadmin
Emperor

Feb 07, 2025 19:06

If anything, the default should be "bake_anim_use_all_actions=True" because that's how the rest of a blend export works and that's what users expect.
nns2009

Jan 20, 2024 17:36

Unity 2023.2.5
Still not fixed
Bugerry87

Jun 30, 2023 06:42

And where is such option in Unity 2022?
The Power of Unity was its intuitive user-experience without any annoying export/import workflows!
Of course I know how to export to FBX, but it stinks...
basemetal

Feb 13, 2022 07:14

Why is this not being made an option? This completely broke all of the animations in an old project I attempted to bring into 2020, so the default behavior has changed. We're supposed to dig into the exporter source code every time we do a version update?
VirtualPierogi

Dec 10, 2021 14:51

The "Won't fix" label just hurts in this context.
Unity should know better that blender is a widely adopted tool for animators and modellers,
and while it provides way to directly use blend files it doesnt allow for 1-1 export or even doesn't add a way to easily change the importer behaviour.
Looks like very unprofessional behaviour.
Miicck

Aug 27, 2021 15:34

This issue has caused a significant headache for me - the suggested workarounds are not suitable (exporting to FBX leads to difficult-to-modify animations later on - therefore requiring both FBX and .blend files for every model. Editing the .py file directly would break other projects using the same version of unity). Why is a checkbox on the import settings not being considered?
Flavelius

Aug 14, 2021 18:53

I really don't like that unity just went with breaking user expectations and work to fix a single usecase they might have had.
For anyone else struggling with this breakage, i made a plugin (project settings provider) that allows fixing this/adjusting the importer settings from within unity to the desired way of importing clips from .blend files: https://github.com/Flavelius/unityblenderanimsettingsprovider
I wish unity provided a built-in way of adjusting this, but while the won't this plugin should to the trick as a workaround
VicenteSenger

Aug 03, 2021 16:37

And they still haven't changed it back or added a checkbox to the Import Settings, it's unbelievable how out of touch they are with the user base and how they use the software.