Based on your description, it seems there's a misunderstanding about how weights work in Spine. Weight data is not stored in animations - weights are part of the skeleton setup, not the animation data.
When you bind vertices to bones using Weights in animate mode, those weights are still part of the skeleton's setup pose. The weights define how vertices are influenced by bones, and this binding data is stored with the skeleton, not with the animation.
Here's what's likely happening:
When you weight meshes in animate mode and then try to import that data into another project:
- Import the skeleton first - This should include all the weight data, as weights are part of the skeleton structure
- The mesh appearing "ruined" after importing the skeleton alone suggests the import may not be capturing the weighted mesh properly
To work around this issue:
Since importing skeletons between projects can be complex, especially with weighted meshes, here are some suggestions:
- Verify bone names match - The skeleton you're importing into needs to have bones with the same names for the import to work correctly
- Check mesh vertex counts - For weighted meshes to import properly, the meshes need to have the same number of vertices in both projects
- Consider using Import Data instead - Try using
Import Data (JSON or binary export) rather than Import Project for the skeleton, as this can sometimes handle weighted meshes better
The development team is aware that merging different skeletons can be challenging, and there's an ongoing issue to improve this functionality: EsotericSoftware/spine-editor582
If you continue having issues, could you clarify what exactly appears "ruined" about the mesh after importing the skeleton? This would help identify whether the weights are actually being lost or if something else is occurring.
