I finally found exactly what I was looking for. It works perfectly, even with the UE5 mannequin. Your work should be at the top of all answers regarding the replacement of the UE mannequin and/or rigging of a custom character for UE. Thank you!
@@CGDive "FAILED TO MERGE BONES: This could happen if significant hierachical changes have been made e.g. inserting a bone between nodes. Would you like to regenerate the Skeleton from this mesh? ***WARNING: THIS MAY INVALIDATE OR REQUIRE RECOMPRESSION OF ANIMATION DATA.***" I followed everything step by step and have tried this 3 times.
hi! I see there is no option for join rotation in ue4 preset. For example i need to offset bone roll for arms and fingers - it works in ue5 preset but not in ue4 preset. Thanks
Fingers crossed for a quick release of the update to UE5 skeleton. I am waiting for that to move forward, otherwise i will have to redo too much work. Thank you again! Could not have done what i am doing without your work.
It's taken me 3 full days but I finally have something that works after many little things going wrong, like separate face parts not playing nice, if you do things in the wrong order like joining meshes it goes badly. I am very new to Blender (couldn't even move around the viewport properly) But I managed to follow along ok enough although I found the bone tweaks a bit fast, I can do more research for that. Thank you very much for this ☺
Thank you so much, i was looking for this for ages! It works with almost evey model but sometimes i get the bone heating error. I tried to fix it like you showed in your "Bone Heat SOLVED" vid but it somehow messes up the unreal root skeleton. Do you have a tutorial for that as well? Thanks a lot for tutorial videos, they are the best :)
Really amazing product! I am going to share this with the Unreal communities I know. Of course everyone wants to know about UE5, including me. I tried it out and got stuck. Send to Unreal works totally fine to UE5. Plus, there is a UE4 Mannequin to UE5 Manny retargeter in UE5 which is really simple. But that just sends single animations from one skeleton to another. But I don't know how to make the UE5 skeleton control my skeletal mesh that I brought in from Blender. One more question: how could I animate my character in Blender (for example with a rigify rig) and then retarget that animation onto the UE mannequin? Does your new update make that any easier?
Thanks! I haven't seriously tried the UE5 workflow yet, will share any thoughts as soon as I can. I was thinking of a Rigify integration. We could make it part of the set up with some effort. But the other Epic addon, UE to Rigify, may actually be able to do this already. Again, I'll test the workflows and share my findings later on.
Yeah please share it within the community. It was not easy to find this video. 🤭 Oh no you can still retarget an entire AnimBP with all animations with IK retargeting. It only helps you to match the pose to be independent of character proportions. It might not fit your exact use case but I started to document my workflow within UE5 to migrate an entire animation system (ALSv4, pretty complex) to the UE5 manny. Sadly a lot of things can go wrong even if you're already in the Unreal ecosystem. I had to develop also some custom tools (TTToolbox plugin) to make things work...
Hey man, I've been trying this with a simple cartoon 2-arm 2-leg character. And for some reason when I do the entire retargeting process, the character looks normal in the animation testing but when playing in game mode the legs are facing upwards. It only displays in the game mode. Thank you for the video, it helped a lot!
If you have problems like i with "Bone heat weighting" i can recommend this video. Just a few clicks and then it´s fixed. th-cam.com/video/7VLqDctzvAk/w-d-xo.html
i have never clicked on a vid faster than i did on this one!!!! this is SOOOOOO useful. Thnk u so much! I cannot wait to see when u update the add-on to UE5.
Amazing plugin and really nice tutorial. Thanks for this !!. Don't wanna sound impatient but wanted to ask you that when will there be an update for UE5 skeleton?
I actually have the rig setup and it works just like the ue4 one. But because ue5 uses IK there was a problem when replacing Manny with a cartoony character. I kinda solved it by tweaking the control rig a bit. But because I'm new to it, want to take some time to learn it and make sure what I do is correct.
@@CGDive Indeed I understand. I'm thankful that u released this for us. No worries, I'll use the built in UE4 to 5 retargeter to see how that fares after using ur plugin. Thanks again !
Hi, Thanks for the great video. I followed your process step by step. Yet after I selected the character and the deform armature and set parent to with automatic weights, my character's size had been enlarged and its rotation has changed. Now it's lying on the floor instead of standing and it's several time larger than before. The skeleton controls, however, remaines its original pose and size and can be used to adjust the character's pose. I'm wondering if you happen to know what caused this? Many thanks!
The character probably already has a parent. Before you parent it to the rig, press alt+p and unparent it with keep orientation. The apply scale and rotation. Let me know how it goes.
Thank you so much for getting back to me! The problem with rotation was solved by unparent it. Yet now as I followed you steps to import it into Unreal the following error shows up: "UE5 Failed to merge bones, this could happen if significant hierachical changes have been made inserting a bone betwen nodes. Would you like to regenerate the Skeleton from this mesh? " And if click either Yes or No it would show "failed to merge SkeletalMesh "SK_Mannequin". And when I applied the mesh to the third person blueprint the character would not show any animation when inplay but only in the T-Post. Any help on this would be greatly appreciated. Thanks a lot! @@CGDive
@@kevinlong5104 it sounds like you changed the hierarchy of the mannequin rig. I don't know what your did so I don't know exactly what happened. I see that the error says ue5 tho. This tool is currently meant for the ue4 mannequin. If you're trying to use it with ue5 Manny, it won't work but competibility is coming soon.
Thanks a lot!!! what if I have a character who only has one spine bone because he is a robot? Can I attach it to a mannequin or will I have to make a new blueprint?
Hey, all the options under the [Tweak Deform Unreal] portion are not visible in my panel. So the body parts, tweak, apply rig, etc... all that is not on the panel. Am I using the wrong version?
Yes, most likely wrong version. Get the right version, remove the currently installed one, close blender, open it again and install the right one. If the problem persists, let us know again.
been a long time... but what is this error once I put everything in the Export folder and click Send to Unreal 'UE2RigifySavedProperties' object has no attribute 'selected_mode' Hope anyone's seen it, cause I'm stuck unable to move :(
This addon helps you rig a character with the standard UE Mannequin rig. It does not include a Rigify workflow at the moment although something like that can be achieved with the "1 click rig" addon (google it! :))
Don't take it personally but I've heard "I did exactly what you did..." so many times. Every time people did not really do exactly what I did. :P That's OK of course since you have your own unique character and it may require some unique steps. "Failed to merge bones" sounds like there is a problem with the bone hierarchy. My guess is that you added new bones and parented them in a way that changes the original base hierarchy of the mannequin bones.
You're a goddam legend. I downloaded this for free, but if I make a game that makes money I'll give you something in return and more for making this free for people to use
Hello, thank for a tutorial! I would like to know, is it possible to use this addon with premade rig like from accurig? it would be so cool to get autorig from this software, apply automated weight and export it in unreal compatible with epic skeleton
Thanks! Ah, no that won't work out of the box. Maybe with some somewhat complex workarounds weights from accurig could be reused but I can't give you a step by step.
something isn't right with this tutorial.. after applying the mesh and parenting the model to the deform rig mesh with ctrl-P I go to the deform rig posing and try to move it but only the rig moves and not the model.. Can you help? I've tried merging vertices, removing all parents, Zeroing the scale etc.. halp :(
Check the bottom of the screen, it probably says "bone heat weighting ..." Not a great idea to ask for help and start with "something isn't right with this tutorial", by the way. Just saying.
This is called the "N-panel" by many people because the shortcut for it is "N" :) There is also a little triangle on the side of the 3d view. If you click on it, the panel will appear.
problem--> i cannot see the circles of 4:38 in blender 3.5, using Game-Rig-Tools-3.3_3.4_3.5 and Game_Rig_Tools_Unreal-v1_1_2...and bone head weighting failing
I think that is more intuitive and less error prone even if it's not the usual "blender way" :) It also allows the whole system with the constrained root rig and deform rig to work.
I have tried all of the 'solutions' to make this work.. This one works, and works well! A couple of things i did differently with my setup.. I already had a weighted mesh and skeleton, with the same naming structure as the UE skeleton. At the point where CGDive/Todor applies automatic weighting, i did not do that as it was already done. So, instead, i just parented with armature deform. At that point, i had some additional vertex groups, due to the additional bones i had in my original character. things like, knees, buttocks, breast, etc. So, i just grabbed those bones from my original armature, and added them to the now applied solution. This all worked! I was amazed.. all i had to do at that point was Send2UE. I did not have to change the transform or bone axis references or anything. It just worked!! strictly as a test, while importing i told it to use the ALS Skeleton. It did not blink. It Just Worked. This is easily worth many times the suggested asking price. And.. AND.. He will share it with you for free, so you can prove to yourself it works, then go back and pay him! Very much appreciated! Thank you
Nice! In the newer version which you should have (newer than the one in the video), there is "Copy additional bones to Root" button. That should transfer the additional bones automatically to the final UE4 rig :) (you should have them selected)
@@CGDive Oh super cool! i am using 1.7.2, unreal module 1.0, but i am not seeing that.. I will start the process again (for practice) and it may reveal itself at an earlier stage. Thanks!
@@CGDive I can't wait! :) That is going to be amazing.. Quinn too, or Manny specifically?.. Actually, now that i think about it, they use the same skeleton, i think
@@hunanbean4095 Their bone hierarchy is the same so both. Just the simple ones tho. The complex ones that use Control Rig heavily are too crazy so I'll avoid them for the time being.
Hey man! Lovely tutorial. Helped so much. Great addon this is! However I'm having a slight issue - whatever I do my low-poly characters get squished and become super thin when rigged using this method and imported to UE4. Why could this be? Is there any way I can combat this? Thanks!
I can't say for sure esepcially because I don't know the exact method and settings you use for export/import. Also I have completely moved away from UE4. Could have something to do unapplied scale..
@@CGDive thanks for the response! I will keep trying and see if I can get it to work however I want, but I also believe it is time to move to UE5. Just need a better PC for it!
Hello! Have you seen anyone else have the issue where, after downloading and unzipping the file, the add on isn't in the folder as the full "Game Rig Tools" add on, but rather, things like "GRT_Bake_Custom_Properties" and the like. Maybe I'm doing something wrong? This is for 3.3
Hello I am having issue with unreal engine rigs. Every time I export the fbx its gives as error "Failed to merge bones..." and the character does not work with mannequin skeleton even when I export it from UE. Please help me out with that. thanks
@@CGDive I exported by character from unreal engine that was working fine. Then I re imported from blender without any changes and its still happening. Can I share you my file some how ? that would help me a lot.😍
@@activemotionpictures The setup is for the UE4 mannequin actually. It won't work directly with UE5 Manny. I already have the setup for Manny, just need to finalize it and send it to Blenderboi to integrate into the addon. But haven't had the time...
this is great. However, I am not sure if they chaned something when using the latest Blender. In WeightPaint mode, I am unable to select a Bone with CTRL+Click the Bone. I am unable to perform any WeightPainting because of that. Not sure why.
@@CGDive You are the best. I slowly understand this whole thing, and the thoughts behind. You rock and your Addon is a fantastic tool for the UE5 rig. But you know what I just realized? Most of the animations are also coming from Mixamo. Guess what? How crazy cool would it be if you could add a Mixamo Rig to your tool? Then, within UE5, it should be easy to use retargeting animation from UE5 Mannequin to the Mixamo rig, or the other way around. What you think? Keep rocking man, you are a real GOAT. Need to watch all your other videos now. Merci, merci!
@@Hobnockers Thanks for the positive words. UE5 has really nice retargeting tools so I think it would be best to retarget mixamo to your character right in engine. I will try to cover that in the future. I hope to focus a lot more on Unreal.
So far I know the pose only matches for retargeting. Happily we can now easily adjust this in the IK Retargeter to match the source pose/skeleton if we want to transfer animations. 😉
Thanks for this vid and addon. I tried it but have a problem with this and ARP stopping my project. The default UE4 mann doesnt have extra spine (below Waist bones), or leg bones (Thigh thickness) to preserve volume of the waist/hips area when the upper leg bends up (like jogging), or preserve the leg joint volume (the lower leg on the behind view - folds like a straw instead of keeping semi cylinder shape). So I cant use your addon to retarget a Mixamo "Run" to your UE4 mann. And I tried to retarget an ARP rig, which does have some type of perverse volume settings on the hips and waist (im not sure if it adds extra bones or if it's smarter how it Weight Paints). But ARP has the problem with its Knees, which become too pointy when leg bends. (And I asked you how to fix this because the ARP knee bone cannot be moved or Rotated in Pose mode - to correct the sharp point it causes.) So both plugins have problems that prevent a working animation. [And I cant use the Mixamo webpage rigger - because it produces crotch bend errors in the Weight paint. (No matter how low/high I put the Crotch Pin during setup - Mixamo puts the upper Leg end-bone at the same height = high up in the Thigh/Hip area, and there is no corrective Waist bone (lower Spine) - so the crotch area is getting painted wrong, when the Leg (thigh) bends up.] 1) Do you have a video, or do you plan to add to your plugin - a workflow/Volume preserving bones for corrective Shape keys/morph targets?? - that can export to UE4 (readable in the game)? (I watched a vid on how to setup shape keys in Blender. But I'm missing the context of how to apply that in an ARP rig, or your GameRig UE4 rig - when retargeted to Mixamo anims.) 2) Are we supposed to tell Blender to use shape keys on the Rig = all animations where the joints bend? Or do we have to set them on each animation? 3) And I am unclear on how to load shape keys in UE (I think they are called Morph Targets). Im guessing the FBX file (Exported from Blender) must have the Shape keys setup. But then how do we tell UE to read/apply them? (In the Material Editor in UE, I see a message about Morph Targets. It seems I have to tell the Material that the Mesh uses, to activate/use the Morph Targets? Or my Blender Animation was missing the Shape key setup - thus the FBX file didnt save the Targets?) Ty
If you can identify one clear problem which I might be able to help you with, I'd give it a shot. This is a complex description of a workflow involving multiple tools and multiple problem points. I can't make sense of it without spending an unreasonable amount of time on it. Also, if you're on Discord, join us: discord.gg/YFH5HUv You can also share images there which could make the question much clearer.
May I ask one question sir？ When retargeting from Standard T-Pose（downloaded form mixamo） to UE's default A-Pose , UE5's new retargeter requires me to Edit T- Pose mataches its original A-Pose to get the good result animation , which I found its very time-consuming and the result would also not be so precised (especially the fingers part,always a mess,cause the retargeted animation's hand looks very weird Is there a quick way like a plugin or other tools to easily transform the Target (T)Pose to the Source (A)Pose precisely when in UE5's IK Retargeter Editor?
Yeah, reatargeting in UE has changed a lot. I don't have enough experience with it myself. I may focus on UE in the near future but can't help much right now.
It does, I just tested it. :) There is no reason why it couldn't because the bone names comply with Blender's requirements. Most likely your mesh is not "truly" symmetrical. Here is what I mean by true symmetry th-cam.com/video/s3n9Umi2Jt8/w-d-xo.html
OMG... After 20h of trying to put the mannequinn skeleton with blender in my character mesh which i bought in the store i found this video and bought the blender addon. Then after 1h I have a full working skeleton mesh in UE5.1 with the new mesh and the original mannequinn skeleton. One ABP, One Skeleton, Thousand of different meshes. And with a bit more experience i can retarget the mesh with mannequinn skeleton in less than 10min. Thank you so much!!!!!!!!!!!
Awesome. Feel free to reach out if you ever experience problems with the addon. I am aware of a litte problem that the feet bones tend to rotete up a bit which makes the feet look scewed in Unreal. The solution is to fix the orientation of these bones in Edit Mode. Will be working on fixing this!
I'd like to help but you'll have to explain exactly what happens. "Doesn't work" is a bit too broad :D I assume you parent with Automatic weights. Watch out for any errors (bottom of the screen) after Auto weights.
Hi. I was wondering if I use a Adobe fuse character with mixamo skeleton and face morphs wil this work the same way and if you import to ue4 do you preserve the face morphs? Lastly do you have to delete the skeleton of mixamo ? Thank you for your tutorial.
Pose tools??? Is there any way that you can setup a button to apply A or T Pose translations to the skeleton after the deform weights have been applied so we don't have to manually setup a pose for retargeting once getting the character rig into UE4?
Hi there again, when I try to parent the deform armature with automatic weights, I keep getting an error message 'Failed to find solution for one or more bones'. Any ideas why this would be happening?
It's a very common error with Automatic Weights. Usually, it means that your mesh is too complex for the algorithm. It could be due to overlapping geometry (clothing etc.) or the mesh may simply be messy. I'll make a video covering different solutions.
@@CGDive Thank you so much for the reply, my model has all the things you described above lol So I will have to make some adjustments. I will be sure to watch and follow your upcoming video and I'm already subbed!
I'm wondering a little bit why have have so glossy materials on the zombie once we send it to Unreal. Is there a solution already? Because normally the materials look a bit different from this mixamo zombie.
@@CGDive thanks for clarification. What I did in the past is import the fbx in unreal and later reimport the mesh from the blender fbx export. I hoped there is nowadays a better solution. 😅
The mannequin is a "standard" for humanoid characters. There is no standard for quadrupeds and other creatures so you can use any bone hierarchy you like. For example you could use the Rigify quadruped and make it game ready with the core Game Rig Tools features th-cam.com/video/iZBx1I7vmQ0/w-d-xo.html
Awesome tutorial! Very helpful. Though I am having a few issues with my character models clothes when I bring everything in to Unreal. The clothes seem to clip in and out of the main body when moving, rather than everything moving as one solid piece, almost like the clothing is not correctly aligned with the main body. I've tried applying all transformations before merging the clothes with the main body mesh in Blender, but still no luck. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
@@CGDive Thanks so much for the reply! In blender everything looks fine, that's where I built the model, the model is just in an 'A' pose. I will try weight painting around where the clothes and main body meet and see if that helps. Thanks again! 😁
First off I just want to say thank you so much for a such a great addon. I have however run into an issue I'm not sure if its user error or what. Following your tutorial to the T when I get to Parenting the Mesh to the Deform I get a "Loop in Parents" error. However not a big deal I just parented to the Tweak instead which still gave me the right weight paints. I'm not sure what I did wrong, I will be trying again from scratch tomorrow so we will see if it happens again but any thoughts?
its a great addon, animation retarget with no problem but i encounter a bit of trouble with shoulders and arms rotations when manipulating the bones with an animation blueprint(direct bone manipulation in ue4, same code works good on the manequin) anyone else had this problem?
28:20 i have started to think that you will say then: "So, the next, I want to show you some experiment with this dragon by adding some adittional bones"
it looks great only issue is that I cant see any of the constraints that I can move on my model tried looking in blender didn't find any setting for that any guess to why that would happen?
I'm afraid to ask, but... I'm trying to use "UE4 mannequin to rigify" addon after connecting the UE rig to the new character using the addon from this video. I need to handle it to be able to add additional animations to the existing UE packs. But it breaks the whole character after I make any animations and press “bake” button in the UE to rigify addon. Do you have a quick solution to this problem? or maybe you know a different workflow to be able to animate your characters with the mannequin rig and export it to UE4 without any issues? I'd really appreciate it if you gave me the answer! I would make my life!
I'll cover UE to Rigfy in the near future. I don't know why it breaks your character. It's best to ask in the Issues section on GitHub (where you downloaded the addon from).
@@CGDive I probably found out. What worked for me: I just applied all transforms on both skeleton and mesh. then I aligned rigify metarig and applied it. then I made an animation. after it, I baked the animation. after it, I returned the armature scale to 0.01 and exported it. this way the armature doesn't go crazy after you bake the animation)
Jesus man I think there is no even a paid tutorial that can cover all the necessary information that you provide to community🥲🥲 The holy Grail of Blender's rigging and animation
If I understand the question correctly, this is something I'm in the process of figuring out. There are a couple of other add-ons that could create a rigify control rig for the ue armature. "one click rig" seems very easy to use. The other ones are ue to Rigify, and uefy (paid)
Hey! Many thanks for your work and tutorials! Quick question though, in the same idea than adding additional bones I suppose, is there a workflow to add face bones to this, like for example the face rig from Rigify. I assume it won't work with just the bones of Rigify before generating the rig, like what you did with the cartoon character where you added a tail... Is there a way to combine both Rigify face rig to the rig achieved with this addon, or is it best to use Rigify to make shape keys then to be used in supplement of this method? The goal being (of course) to have my character done in Blender with facial animation exported to UE4 or 5 through this addon (but seems to be focused on the general skeleton, not the face). Much thanks in advance!
Yeah, the addon is focused on the skeleton, not the face. Shapekeys would be the most straightforward approach for this. If you use a bone rig, it's up to you to set it up. Currently the tool just creates a Manny-like hierarchy, that's all. I have some plans to make it more interesting in the future but that's all I have for now :)
And that's already plenty and awesome! :) Thanks for the quick reply, I decided to go with shape keys and maybe one or two bones (like jaw open/close) in complement, seems indeed more simpler. Thanks again!
This video is a life saver. I had an armature all completed just to notice that it wasn't compatible. Now I can finally make the model Ive been trying to animate for so long
FAILED TO MERGE BONES: This could happen if significant hierarchical changes have been made e.g. inserting a bone between nodes. Would you like to regenerate the Skeleton from this mesh? ***WARNING: THIS MAY INVALIDATE OR REQUIRE RECOMPRESSION OF ANIMATION DATA.*** im confused
It's not possible to troubleshoot the problem just based on an error message without any context (e.g. I did x,y,z, exported, blablabla :) ). But we have had compatibility issues since 5.1 was released. I haven't had the time to test it from all angles, unfortunately. Hope to test and update the tool in the coming months.
@@CGDive NP I read your other replies and removed the reference rigs other than ue4 rig it worked. But my charector is running like a chicken 😂.... Ig I'll start over thanks for this video and the addon
Hello this looks really good! Still new to Blender, but I was wondering if one has Auto Rig Pro, should one only use that to export the character/animations to Unreal or could one use that in conjunction with this? Does this have extra features in that scenario for Unreal?
i've been following your guide for about 5 hours - still can't get it working - 11:05 "select the character (object mode) - shift select the deform armature...." surely you mean *ctrl select the deform armature......"? shift select will grab everything inbetween....? sorry, very lost and heartbroken.....
@@_bushy If you are selecting in the Outliner, yes. If you are selecting in the 3d viewport - as I am - then it should be shift-select exactly as I say :P
@@CGDive I exported into Maya and the root is an empty in Maya. I made another bone and name it to root and reattached all the bones into it. Then it works. Not sure why the root isn't a bone from blender.
@@oxibound5945 The "root" you get from Blender is most likely the pivot point of the Armature object. This often causes confusion and there is no general solution.
This is awesome. I am totally new to character creation, rigging, skinning etc. but from your simple tutorial and excellent Add on, I was able to get my character into Unreal no problem. A quick question, do you have a timeline for updating this to work with the UE5 mannequin?
So cool! 😎 The ue5 setup is completed but I haven't had time to submit it to the addon developer and make a video. It may take a while since I'll go on vacation soon.
@@CGDive Thanks a lot! Also can you help me with 1 other thing? My character is split up in 9 different objects when i import in blender (Body, Eye, EyeOcclusion, Tearline, Teeth, Tongue, Hair, Beard and boxers) How can i make everything move with the head, and the boxers with the body? When i combine them all with ctrl J, the armature does not work at all
![[Blender addon] Rig any character with the UE5 Manny/Quinn skeleton](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/U23WyAd8o_8/mqdefault.jpg)
![[Blender addon] Rig any character with the UE5 Manny/Quinn skeleton](/img/tr.png)
I finally found exactly what I was looking for. It works perfectly, even with the UE5 mannequin. Your work should be at the top of all answers regarding the replacement of the UE mannequin and/or rigging of a custom character for UE. Thank you!
Awesome, great to hear!
I can't get it to import. The bones don't merge and it either breaks my model, or breaks the UE4 mannequin...
Sorry to hear that. I can't help much based on the info you shared.
@@CGDive "FAILED TO MERGE BONES:
This could happen if significant hierachical changes have been made
e.g. inserting a bone between nodes.
Would you like to regenerate the Skeleton from this mesh?
***WARNING: THIS MAY INVALIDATE OR REQUIRE RECOMPRESSION OF ANIMATION DATA.***"
I followed everything step by step and have tried this 3 times.
Hello . I couldn't connect the bones and my character. It doesn't work when I do with automatic weights.
You are probably getting "Bone heat weighting" error. It's a common blender problem with complex meshes. It's not a problem with the addon.
Bone Heat Weighting: failed to find solution for one or more bones are u getting this
hi! I see there is no option for join rotation in ue4 preset. For example i need to offset bone roll for arms and fingers - it works in ue5 preset but not in ue4 preset. Thanks
Fingers crossed for a quick release of the update to UE5 skeleton. I am waiting for that to move forward, otherwise i will have to redo too much work. Thank you again! Could not have done what i am doing without your work.
It's taken me 3 full days but I finally have something that works after many little things going wrong, like separate face parts not playing nice, if you do things in the wrong order like joining meshes it goes badly. I am very new to Blender (couldn't even move around the viewport properly) But I managed to follow along ok enough although I found the bone tweaks a bit fast, I can do more research for that. Thank you very much for this ☺
Can I still edit the weight paint after I parented to the root?
You can.
27:57 - Is it possible to do a video on that physics tail, tutorial, please?
I'd love to do that and other UE stuff. Can't wait to get into Unreal again!
Thank you so much, i was looking for this for ages! It works with almost evey model but sometimes i get the bone heating error. I tried to fix it like you showed in your "Bone Heat SOLVED" vid but it somehow messes up the unreal root skeleton. Do you have a tutorial for that as well? Thanks a lot for tutorial videos, they are the best :)
Awesome !
Work in first try, so your tutorial is perfect !
Now I must learn make some animations in blender to import in Unreal, thx !
Really amazing product! I am going to share this with the Unreal communities I know. Of course everyone wants to know about UE5, including me. I tried it out and got stuck. Send to Unreal works totally fine to UE5. Plus, there is a UE4 Mannequin to UE5 Manny retargeter in UE5 which is really simple. But that just sends single animations from one skeleton to another. But I don't know how to make the UE5 skeleton control my skeletal mesh that I brought in from Blender.
One more question: how could I animate my character in Blender (for example with a rigify rig) and then retarget that animation onto the UE mannequin? Does your new update make that any easier?
Thanks!
I haven't seriously tried the UE5 workflow yet, will share any thoughts as soon as I can.
I was thinking of a Rigify integration. We could make it part of the set up with some effort. But the other Epic addon, UE to Rigify, may actually be able to do this already. Again, I'll test the workflows and share my findings later on.
Yeah please share it within the community. It was not easy to find this video. 🤭
Oh no you can still retarget an entire AnimBP with all animations with IK retargeting. It only helps you to match the pose to be independent of character proportions.
It might not fit your exact use case but I started to document my workflow within UE5 to migrate an entire animation system (ALSv4, pretty complex) to the UE5 manny.
Sadly a lot of things can go wrong even if you're already in the Unreal ecosystem. I had to develop also some custom tools (TTToolbox plugin) to make things work...
Hey man, I've been trying this with a simple cartoon 2-arm 2-leg character. And for some reason when I do the entire retargeting process, the character looks normal in the animation testing but when playing in game mode the legs are facing upwards. It only displays in the game mode. Thank you for the video, it helped a lot!
If you have problems like i with "Bone heat weighting" i can recommend this video. Just a few clicks and then it´s fixed.
th-cam.com/video/7VLqDctzvAk/w-d-xo.html
i have never clicked on a vid faster than i did on this one!!!! this is SOOOOOO useful. Thnk u so much!
I cannot wait to see when u update the add-on to UE5.
Me too :( I had to download UE4 :(
Thanks, guys, appreciate the support!
@@CGDive I just saved the project in UE4 and reopened in Unreal 5 just for fun hehehe...
If you don't see the plugin appear on the right, PRESS N !!
Maybee somebody know, why i dont hawe a panel with Body Parts Join Tweek and others
My characters arms are getting tucked in to the body way too far any quick fix known for this?
Amazing plugin and really nice tutorial. Thanks for this !!. Don't wanna sound impatient but wanted to ask you that when will there be an update for UE5 skeleton?
I actually have the rig setup and it works just like the ue4 one. But because ue5 uses IK there was a problem when replacing Manny with a cartoony character. I kinda solved it by tweaking the control rig a bit. But because I'm new to it, want to take some time to learn it and make sure what I do is correct.
@@CGDive Indeed I understand. I'm thankful that u released this for us. No worries, I'll use the built in UE4 to 5 retargeter to see how that fares after using ur plugin. Thanks again !
its crazy how complicated it is just to get a character to use the ue5 skeleton
Hi, Thanks for the great video. I followed your process step by step. Yet after I selected the character and the deform armature and set parent to with automatic weights, my character's size had been enlarged and its rotation has changed. Now it's lying on the floor instead of standing and it's several time larger than before. The skeleton controls, however, remaines its original pose and size and can be used to adjust the character's pose. I'm wondering if you happen to know what caused this? Many thanks!
The character probably already has a parent. Before you parent it to the rig, press alt+p and unparent it with keep orientation. The apply scale and rotation. Let me know how it goes.
Thank you so much for getting back to me! The problem with rotation was solved by unparent it. Yet now as I followed you steps to import it into Unreal the following error shows up: "UE5 Failed to merge bones, this could happen if significant hierachical changes have been made inserting a bone betwen nodes. Would you like to regenerate the Skeleton from this mesh? " And if click either Yes or No it would show "failed to merge SkeletalMesh "SK_Mannequin". And when I applied the mesh to the third person blueprint the character would not show any animation when inplay but only in the T-Post. Any help on this would be greatly appreciated. Thanks a lot! @@CGDive
@@kevinlong5104 it sounds like you changed the hierarchy of the mannequin rig. I don't know what your did so I don't know exactly what happened. I see that the error says ue5 tho. This tool is currently meant for the ue4 mannequin. If you're trying to use it with ue5 Manny, it won't work but competibility is coming soon.
Bruh my model looks so silly since the bones and supposed to be made for more organic models while mine is a robot with mechanical arms
Like👍 from me
thanks for all you work!!! you making this world being better ^_^ can't wait you next video
I was doing this manually bone by bone... 😔
Thanks a lot!!! what if I have a character who only has one spine bone because he is a robot? Can I attach it to a mannequin or will I have to make a new blueprint?
I am not sure to be honest.
Hey, all the options under the [Tweak Deform Unreal] portion are not visible in my panel.
So the body parts, tweak, apply rig, etc... all that is not on the panel. Am I using the wrong version?
Yes, most likely wrong version. Get the right version, remove the currently installed one, close blender, open it again and install the right one. If the problem persists, let us know again.
been a long time... but what is this error once I put everything in the Export folder and click Send to Unreal
'UE2RigifySavedProperties' object has no attribute 'selected_mode'
Hope anyone's seen it, cause I'm stuck unable to move :(
Not sure. I'd advise asking the addon devs.
When I send my model to the unreal, it makes me a root_001 bone and I can't use ue4 skeleton, how to fix that?
Check your "root" rig and make sure it is actually called "root" and not "root.001"
Hi :)
Something is off... How to use it with Rigify? Or this addon only convert things? Can someone explain?
This addon helps you rig a character with the standard UE Mannequin rig. It does not include a Rigify workflow at the moment although something like that can be achieved with the "1 click rig" addon (google it! :))
Blender crashes the moment I click 'Initialize skeleton', any fix for this?
We will need to know your Blender version and addon version. Most such errors are when using the addon in a Blender version it is not meant for.
Hey, I did literally EVERYTHING u said but when i imported i got the error saying Failed to merge bones :l help lol
Don't take it personally but I've heard "I did exactly what you did..." so many times. Every time people did not really do exactly what I did. :P
That's OK of course since you have your own unique character and it may require some unique steps.
"Failed to merge bones" sounds like there is a problem with the bone hierarchy. My guess is that you added new bones and parented them in a way that changes the original base hierarchy of the mannequin bones.
You're a goddam legend. I downloaded this for free, but if I make a game that makes money I'll give you something in return and more for making this free for people to use
Thanks, mate!
@@CGDive Yes! You have no idea how much of a saint you are 😭
@@griseldaflores6362 haha, no I am not. Also it's very important to acknowledge Blenderboi - the actual developer of the addon!
Hello, thank for a tutorial!
I would like to know, is it possible to use this addon with premade rig like from accurig? it would be so cool to get autorig from this software, apply automated weight and export it in unreal compatible with epic skeleton
Thanks!
Ah, no that won't work out of the box. Maybe with some somewhat complex workarounds weights from accurig could be reused but I can't give you a step by step.
something isn't right with this tutorial.. after applying the mesh and parenting the model to the deform rig mesh with ctrl-P I go to the deform rig posing and try to move it but only the rig moves and not the model.. Can you help? I've tried merging vertices, removing all parents, Zeroing the scale etc.. halp :(
Check the bottom of the screen, it probably says "bone heat weighting ..."
Not a great idea to ask for help and start with "something isn't right with this tutorial", by the way. Just saying.
This may be a dumb question, I'm a total noob to Blender. Where do I activate that vertical side tab to access the Rigging Tools?
This is called the "N-panel" by many people because the shortcut for it is "N" :)
There is also a little triangle on the side of the 3d view. If you click on it, the panel will appear.
also, does this tutorial work with the new mannequin on unreal engine 5?
No, not yet. I'll update it evetually.
i have been using this program and for some reason it just doesent work anymore and when i parent with automatic weights it just doesent do anything
You may be experience Bone Hear Error. Watch this
th-cam.com/video/FuiY0wtxdHQ/w-d-xo.html
problem--> i cannot see the circles of 4:38 in blender 3.5, using Game-Rig-Tools-3.3_3.4_3.5 and Game_Rig_Tools_Unreal-v1_1_2...and bone head weighting failing
How would I go about rigging a character with no neck (Peter Griffin)
just an idea: make the neck bone short and don't assign any weights that relate to the neck bone.
Fantastic work! Awesome tool, and a great explanation video too!
Apply for EPIC Grand you definitely deserve it. This tool looks awesome.
Thanks 🙏
Well do, most likely.
Yes Plesse! Super helpful and so far only a few kept caring about the big gap between the tools...
i keep getting Bone Heat Weighting: Failed to find solution for one or more bone
It's a common error. Watch this: th-cam.com/video/FuiY0wtxdHQ/w-d-xo.html
why not import the mannequin, into blender, and then set it up to be proportional to the mannequin.
import the mannequin and make it proportional to the mannequin?
Not sure I follow :)
Hi, i have question, i have transfer my fbx character to unreal but it is still in the t-pose any tips?
Not based on the information you shared. It's simply not enough to even take a guess.
Best rigging tutorial I've seen yet. Worked like a charm and thanks for the skinning tips!
hello i woulod like to know if this addon work with blender3.3 ??
Yes it does :) We'll probably have an update soon as well.
How come the bones are moved/edited in pose mode when lining them up?
I think that is more intuitive and less error prone even if it's not the usual "blender way" :)
It also allows the whole system with the constrained root rig and deform rig to work.
works great. lots of love to you. thanks. I'll pay now lol
haha, cheers!
I have tried all of the 'solutions' to make this work.. This one works, and works well!
A couple of things i did differently with my setup.. I already had a weighted mesh and skeleton, with the same naming structure as the UE skeleton. At the point where CGDive/Todor
applies automatic weighting, i did not do that as it was already done. So, instead, i just parented with armature deform.
At that point, i had some additional vertex groups, due to the additional bones i had in my original character. things like, knees, buttocks, breast, etc. So, i just grabbed those bones from my original armature, and added them to the now applied solution. This all worked! I was amazed.. all i had to do at that point was Send2UE. I did not have to change the transform or bone axis references or anything. It just worked!! strictly as a test, while importing i told it to use the ALS Skeleton. It did not blink. It Just Worked. This is easily worth many times the suggested asking price. And.. AND.. He will share it with you for free, so you can prove to yourself it works, then go back and pay him! Very much appreciated! Thank you
Nice! In the newer version which you should have (newer than the one in the video), there is "Copy additional bones to Root" button. That should transfer the additional bones automatically to the final UE4 rig :) (you should have them selected)
@@CGDive Oh super cool! i am using 1.7.2, unreal module 1.0, but i am not seeing that.. I will start the process again (for practice) and it may reveal itself at an earlier stage. Thanks!
@@hunanbean4095 Hmmm, ok sorry. Maybe it's in my development build only haha
But I'll try to release it soon along with UE5 Manny support.
@@CGDive I can't wait! :) That is going to be amazing.. Quinn too, or Manny specifically?.. Actually, now that i think about it, they use the same skeleton, i think
@@hunanbean4095 Their bone hierarchy is the same so both. Just the simple ones tho. The complex ones that use Control Rig heavily are too crazy so I'll avoid them for the time being.
Hey man! Lovely tutorial. Helped so much. Great addon this is! However I'm having a slight issue - whatever I do my low-poly characters get squished and become super thin when rigged using this method and imported to UE4. Why could this be? Is there any way I can combat this? Thanks!
I can't say for sure esepcially because I don't know the exact method and settings you use for export/import. Also I have completely moved away from UE4. Could have something to do unapplied scale..
@@CGDive thanks for the response! I will keep trying and see if I can get it to work however I want, but I also believe it is time to move to UE5. Just need a better PC for it!
plaese there can I fund how to make the animation of his tail ?
In unreal? Google it. I don't have such a video yet.
Hello! Have you seen anyone else have the issue where, after downloading and unzipping the file, the add on isn't in the folder as the full "Game Rig Tools" add on, but rather, things like "GRT_Bake_Custom_Properties" and the like. Maybe I'm doing something wrong? This is for 3.3
Hi. You do not unzip the file. Please install it as shown in the video at 1:35
Hello I am having issue with unreal engine rigs. Every time I export the fbx its gives as error "Failed to merge bones..." and the character does not work with mannequin skeleton even when I export it from UE. Please help me out with that.
thanks
I am not sure of the exact steps you take but this error means that the skeletons are different enough as to be incompatible.
@@CGDive I exported by character from unreal engine that was working fine. Then I re imported from blender without any changes and its still happening. Can I share you my file some how ? that would help me a lot.😍
thank you so much!
Wowooowowo!! This is IT! Great content and addon as always!!
Thanks, mate!
@@CGDive I'm diving into U5 from here on, so hopefully this will work with that version.
@@activemotionpictures The setup is for the UE4 mannequin actually. It won't work directly with UE5 Manny.
I already have the setup for Manny, just need to finalize it and send it to Blenderboi to integrate into the addon. But haven't had the time...
@@CGDive FANTASTIC! I can't wait to try the U5 version manny with GRT for Blender 3.2+ 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
@@activemotionpictures will try to get it it ASAP
when i click automatic weights ı get eror
It's a very common error. I'll do a video about it soon!
this is great. However, I am not sure if they chaned something when using the latest Blender. In WeightPaint mode, I am unable to select a Bone with CTRL+Click the Bone. I am unable to perform any WeightPainting because of that. Not sure why.
In Blender 4, you now have to alt+click. I have covered this in newer video. Unfortunately old videos cannot be updated.
@@CGDive You are the best. I slowly understand this whole thing, and the thoughts behind. You rock and your Addon is a fantastic tool for the UE5 rig. But you know what I just realized? Most of the animations are also coming from Mixamo. Guess what? How crazy cool would it be if you could add a Mixamo Rig to your tool? Then, within UE5, it should be easy to use retargeting animation from UE5 Mannequin to the Mixamo rig, or the other way around. What you think? Keep rocking man, you are a real GOAT. Need to watch all your other videos now. Merci, merci!
@@Hobnockers Thanks for the positive words. UE5 has really nice retargeting tools so I think it would be best to retarget mixamo to your character right in engine. I will try to cover that in the future. I hope to focus a lot more on Unreal.
At this point, I realize that Unity is like shit.
They seem to have made some bad decisions in recent years. It's still one of the most popular engines tho.
Does this work with rigify as well?
Not at this point.
How can I put two likes here?
haha :D
how to disable hand rig? do i have that option
One way is to simply not weigh any of the polygons to the hand bones.
So far I know the pose only matches for retargeting. Happily we can now easily adjust this in the IK Retargeter to match the source pose/skeleton if we want to transfer animations. 😉
thank you
Thanks for this vid and addon. I tried it but have a problem with this and ARP stopping my project. The default UE4 mann doesnt have extra spine (below Waist bones), or leg bones (Thigh thickness) to preserve volume of the waist/hips area when the upper leg bends up (like jogging), or preserve the leg joint volume (the lower leg on the behind view - folds like a straw instead of keeping semi cylinder shape). So I cant use your addon to retarget a Mixamo "Run" to your UE4 mann.
And I tried to retarget an ARP rig, which does have some type of perverse volume settings on the hips and waist (im not sure if it adds extra bones or if it's smarter how it Weight Paints). But ARP has the problem with its Knees, which become too pointy when leg bends. (And I asked you how to fix this because the ARP knee bone cannot be moved or Rotated in Pose mode - to correct the sharp point it causes.)
So both plugins have problems that prevent a working animation.
[And I cant use the Mixamo webpage rigger - because it produces crotch bend errors in the Weight paint. (No matter how low/high I put the Crotch Pin during setup - Mixamo puts the upper Leg end-bone at the same height = high up in the Thigh/Hip area, and there is no corrective Waist bone (lower Spine) - so the crotch area is getting painted wrong, when the Leg (thigh) bends up.]
1) Do you have a video, or do you plan to add to your plugin - a workflow/Volume preserving bones for corrective Shape keys/morph targets?? - that can export to UE4 (readable in the game)?
(I watched a vid on how to setup shape keys in Blender. But I'm missing the context of how to apply that in an ARP rig, or your GameRig UE4 rig - when retargeted to Mixamo anims.)
2) Are we supposed to tell Blender to use shape keys on the Rig = all animations where the joints bend? Or do we have to set them on each animation?
3) And I am unclear on how to load shape keys in UE (I think they are called Morph Targets). Im guessing the FBX file (Exported from Blender) must have the Shape keys setup. But then how do we tell UE to read/apply them? (In the Material Editor in UE, I see a message about Morph Targets. It seems I have to tell the Material that the Mesh uses, to activate/use the Morph Targets? Or my Blender Animation was missing the Shape key setup - thus the FBX file didnt save the Targets?) Ty
If you can identify one clear problem which I might be able to help you with, I'd give it a shot. This is a complex description of a workflow involving multiple tools and multiple problem points. I can't make sense of it without spending an unreasonable amount of time on it.
Also, if you're on Discord, join us: discord.gg/YFH5HUv
You can also share images there which could make the question much clearer.
May I ask one question sir？
When retargeting from Standard T-Pose（downloaded form mixamo） to UE's default A-Pose , UE5's new retargeter requires me to Edit T- Pose mataches its original A-Pose to get the good result animation , which I found its very time-consuming and the result would also not be so precised (especially the fingers part,always a mess,cause the retargeted animation's hand looks very weird
Is there a quick way like a plugin or other tools to easily transform the Target (T)Pose to the Source (A)Pose precisely when in UE5's IK Retargeter Editor?
Yeah, reatargeting in UE has changed a lot. I don't have enough experience with it myself. I may focus on UE in the near future but can't help much right now.
Been stuck on this for a while; Mirroring skin weights doesn't seem to work on this armature. Any idea on how I can fix this?
It does, I just tested it. :) There is no reason why it couldn't because the bone names comply with Blender's requirements. Most likely your mesh is not "truly" symmetrical.
Here is what I mean by true symmetry
th-cam.com/video/s3n9Umi2Jt8/w-d-xo.html
@@CGDive Thanks, you're totally right! There was a tiny flaw on my model. After I symmetrised it worked just fine! Thanks again!
@@Arvincle awesome!
Is it updated for ue5 yet?
Not yet. :)
OMG... After 20h of trying to put the mannequinn skeleton with blender in my character mesh which i bought in the store i found this video and bought the blender addon. Then after 1h I have a full working skeleton mesh in UE5.1 with the new mesh and the original mannequinn skeleton. One ABP, One Skeleton, Thousand of different meshes. And with a bit more experience i can retarget the mesh with mannequinn skeleton in less than 10min. Thank you so much!!!!!!!!!!!
Awesome. Feel free to reach out if you ever experience problems with the addon. I am aware of a litte problem that the feet bones tend to rotete up a bit which makes the feet look scewed in Unreal. The solution is to fix the orientation of these bones in Edit Mode. Will be working on fixing this!
hey i have a big ptoblem its not working for me to pare the rig with my mesh pls help
I'd like to help but you'll have to explain exactly what happens. "Doesn't work" is a bit too broad :D
I assume you parent with Automatic weights. Watch out for any errors (bottom of the screen) after Auto weights.
@@CGDive ue the best love this addon
Absolute stunning! Thank you for all the hard and amazing work.
Hi. I was wondering if I use a Adobe fuse character with mixamo skeleton and face morphs wil this work the same way and if you import to ue4 do you preserve the face morphs? Lastly do you have to delete the skeleton of mixamo ? Thank you for your tutorial.
No idea, I haven't tried these workflows. Sorry :)
Pose tools??? Is there any way that you can setup a button to apply A or T Pose translations to the skeleton after the deform weights have been applied so we don't have to manually setup a pose for retargeting once getting the character rig into UE4?
It's not part of the current toolset. I think there is an addon called CATS that can do that but I'm not sure how well it works with ours.
Hi there again, when I try to parent the deform armature with automatic weights, I keep getting an error message 'Failed to find solution for one or more bones'.
Any ideas why this would be happening?
It's a very common error with Automatic Weights. Usually, it means that your mesh is too complex for the algorithm. It could be due to overlapping geometry (clothing etc.) or the mesh may simply be messy. I'll make a video covering different solutions.
@@CGDive Thank you so much for the reply, my model has all the things you described above lol So I will have to make some adjustments. I will be sure to watch and follow your upcoming video and I'm already subbed!
I'm wondering a little bit why have have so glossy materials on the zombie once we send it to Unreal. Is there a solution already? Because normally the materials look a bit different from this mixamo zombie.
I never rely on the export/import when it comes to materials. They usually need some adjustment in UE.
@@CGDive thanks for clarification. What I did in the past is import the fbx in unreal and later reimport the mesh from the blender fbx export. I hoped there is nowadays a better solution. 😅
Humanoid rig okay, but what can this rig do for quadruped models?
The mannequin is a "standard" for humanoid characters. There is no standard for quadrupeds and other creatures so you can use any bone hierarchy you like. For example you could use the Rigify quadruped and make it game ready with the core Game Rig Tools features
th-cam.com/video/iZBx1I7vmQ0/w-d-xo.html
Awesome tutorial! Very helpful. Though I am having a few issues with my character models clothes when I bring everything in to Unreal. The clothes seem to clip in and out of the main body when moving, rather than everything moving as one solid piece, almost like the clothing is not correctly aligned with the main body. I've tried applying all transformations before merging the clothes with the main body mesh in Blender, but still no luck. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Sounds like weight paint issues. Does behave the same way in Blender?
@@CGDive Thanks so much for the reply! In blender everything looks fine, that's where I built the model, the model is just in an 'A' pose. I will try weight painting around where the clothes and main body meet and see if that helps. Thanks again! 😁
awesome Work! Had a bad Day getting into unreal engine 4, But Your Tutorial and Addons are on another level. Thank You and have a nice Day!
comment, ty
First off I just want to say thank you so much for a such a great addon. I have however run into an issue I'm not sure if its user error or what. Following your tutorial to the T when I get to Parenting the Mesh to the Deform I get a "Loop in Parents" error. However not a big deal I just parented to the Tweak instead which still gave me the right weight paints. I'm not sure what I did wrong, I will be trying again from scratch tomorrow so we will see if it happens again but any thoughts?
Good to hear that you solved it. If you can send me a blend file where that problem occurs, I can take a look at it.
its a great addon, animation retarget with no problem but i encounter a bit of trouble with shoulders and arms rotations when manipulating the bones with an animation blueprint(direct bone manipulation in ue4, same code works good on the manequin) anyone else had this problem?
In today's world, someone is giving pure things for free! May god bless you!
Haha, enjoy and let us know if you need help!
@@CGDive For sure! Any email ID?
@@raktimjs cgdive.com/contact/
@@CGDive Thank you so much!
28:20 i have started to think that you will say then: "So, the next, I want to show you some experiment with this dragon by adding some adittional bones"
Haha, depends on the dragon but they works be pushing it :)
Thanks. The second example was just what I needed
what about blender shapekey facial expressions? can you include them too or must they be done in unreal
They can be done in Blender and will be exported. The addon doesn't do anything in that regard because it doesn't need to.
@@CGDive awesome ty!!
it looks great only issue is that I cant see any of the constraints that I can move on my model tried looking in blender didn't find any setting for that any guess to why that would happen?
2:38?
this is so much useful for me. thanx
I'm afraid to ask, but... I'm trying to use "UE4 mannequin to rigify" addon after connecting the UE rig to the new character using the addon from this video. I need to handle it to be able to add additional animations to the existing UE packs. But it breaks the whole character after I make any animations and press “bake” button in the UE to rigify addon. Do you have a quick solution to this problem? or maybe you know a different workflow to be able to animate your characters with the mannequin rig and export it to UE4 without any issues? I'd really appreciate it if you gave me the answer! I would make my life!
I'll cover UE to Rigfy in the near future. I don't know why it breaks your character. It's best to ask in the Issues section on GitHub (where you downloaded the addon from).
@@CGDive I probably found out. What worked for me: I just applied all transforms on both skeleton and mesh. then I aligned rigify metarig and applied it. then I made an animation. after it, I baked the animation. after it, I returned the armature scale to 0.01 and exported it. this way the armature doesn't go crazy after you bake the animation)
Jesus man I think there is no even a paid tutorial that can cover all the necessary information that you provide to community🥲🥲 The holy Grail of Blender's rigging and animation
Haha thanks! 🙏
I think my stuff is still a bit basic but the basics are important.
How can I get an animation rigfy controls on the skeleton have here at the end?
If I understand the question correctly, this is something I'm in the process of figuring out. There are a couple of other add-ons that could create a rigify control rig for the ue armature. "one click rig" seems very easy to use. The other ones are ue to Rigify, and uefy (paid)
Hey! Many thanks for your work and tutorials! Quick question though, in the same idea than adding additional bones I suppose, is there a workflow to add face bones to this, like for example the face rig from Rigify. I assume it won't work with just the bones of Rigify before generating the rig, like what you did with the cartoon character where you added a tail... Is there a way to combine both Rigify face rig to the rig achieved with this addon, or is it best to use Rigify to make shape keys then to be used in supplement of this method? The goal being (of course) to have my character done in Blender with facial animation exported to UE4 or 5 through this addon (but seems to be focused on the general skeleton, not the face).
Much thanks in advance!
Yeah, the addon is focused on the skeleton, not the face. Shapekeys would be the most straightforward approach for this. If you use a bone rig, it's up to you to set it up.
Currently the tool just creates a Manny-like hierarchy, that's all.
I have some plans to make it more interesting in the future but that's all I have for now :)
And that's already plenty and awesome! :)
Thanks for the quick reply, I decided to go with shape keys and maybe one or two bones (like jaw open/close) in complement, seems indeed more simpler.
Thanks again!
This video is a life saver. I had an armature all completed just to notice that it wasn't compatible. Now I can finally make the model Ive been trying to animate for so long
I’d love to se the simulate tail workflow :).
FAILED TO MERGE BONES:
This could happen if significant hierarchical changes have been made
e.g. inserting a bone between nodes.
Would you like to regenerate the Skeleton from this mesh?
***WARNING: THIS MAY INVALIDATE OR REQUIRE RECOMPRESSION OF ANIMATION DATA.***
im confused
It's not possible to troubleshoot the problem just based on an error message without any context (e.g. I did x,y,z, exported, blablabla :) ).
But we have had compatibility issues since 5.1 was released. I haven't had the time to test it from all angles, unfortunately. Hope to test and update the tool in the coming months.
@@CGDive NP I read your other replies and removed the reference rigs other than ue4 rig it worked. But my charector is running like a chicken 😂.... Ig I'll start over thanks for this video and the addon
@@CGDive Bone Heat Weighting: failed to find solution for one or more bones although im getting this rn
@@voxelia It's a very common and annoying error with Automatic Weights. I'll have a video about it soonish. Sick and tired of it :)
@@CGDive will be waiting mate
Hello this looks really good! Still new to Blender, but I was wondering if one has Auto Rig Pro, should one only use that to export the character/animations to Unreal or could one use that in conjunction with this? Does this have extra features in that scenario for Unreal?
Auto-Rig Pro has its own way to export a Mannequin-compatible rig. You won't need this addon if you are using ARP :)
Amazing work! Helpful and understandable.
11:12 doesn't work for me..... the bones leave the mesh after ctrl+p with auto-weights :(
Try it again from the start, following the workflow exactly If you get the same result, please get in touch with me again and share a file I can test.
@@CGDive wow! thx for the mega fast reply :) i shall keep trying :)
i've been following your guide for about 5 hours - still can't get it working - 11:05 "select the character (object mode) - shift select the deform armature...." surely you mean *ctrl select the deform armature......"? shift select will grab everything inbetween....? sorry, very lost and heartbroken.....
@@_bushy If you are selecting in the Outliner, yes. If you are selecting in the 3d viewport - as I am - then it should be shift-select exactly as I say :P
@@CGDive again thanks for a rapid reply.... it's because i am unfamiliar with both blender and ur4 ..... so following "any" tutorial is a challenge :)
GOATED
lol thanks!
How can I solve failed to merge bones error?
I am not sure. It depends on what you did before you got the error :D
@@CGDive I exported into Maya and the root is an empty in Maya. I made another bone and name it to root and reattached all the bones into it. Then it works. Not sure why the root isn't a bone from blender.
@@oxibound5945 You exported into Maya............................ Oh, ok, I am out! :D
@@oxibound5945 The "root" you get from Blender is most likely the pivot point of the Armature object. This often causes confusion and there is no general solution.
This is awesome. I am totally new to character creation, rigging, skinning etc. but from your simple tutorial and excellent Add on, I was able to get my character into Unreal no problem.
A quick question, do you have a timeline for updating this to work with the UE5 mannequin?
So cool! 😎
The ue5 setup is completed but I haven't had time to submit it to the addon developer and make a video. It may take a while since I'll go on vacation soon.
When I click parent with automatic weight my character gets very big, any fix?
yep
th-cam.com/video/zl3mXu1t90U/w-d-xo.html
@@CGDive Thanks a lot! Also can you help me with 1 other thing? My character is split up in 9 different objects when i import in blender (Body, Eye, EyeOcclusion, Tearline, Teeth, Tongue, Hair, Beard and boxers) How can i make everything move with the head, and the boxers with the body? When i combine them all with ctrl J, the armature does not work at all
@@TommyS04 What doesn't work? How did you apply weights?
When I add each mesh to the head bone for example, it moves very weird, i can make a video if that helps you, or do you know what the problem is?
@@TommyS04 I am not sure what "add a bone means" so yeah, making a video is a good idea :)