You're reading from Virtual Filmmaking with Unreal Engine 5 A step-by-step guide to creating a complete animated short film

Product type Paperback

Published in Feb 2024

Publisher Packt

ISBN-13 9781801813808

Length 480 pages

Edition 1st Edition

Tools

Unreal

Concepts

Animation

Author (1):

Hussin Khan

View More author details

Table of Contents (23) Chapters

Preface

1. Part 1:Pre-Production: Project Development and Gathering Resources

2. Chapter 1: Getting Started with Unreal Engine FREE CHAPTER

3. Chapter 2: Understanding the Principles of Photography, Film Cameras, and Lenses

4. Chapter 3: Understanding the Art of Storytelling and Creating Your Storyboard

5. Part 2: Production: Creating the Environment

6. Chapter 4: Importing 3D Objects and Creating Levels

7. Chapter 5: Creating Environments with Quixel Megascans

8. Chapter 6: Creating and Applying Materials to 3D Meshes

9. Part 3: Production: Adding and Animating Characters

10. Chapter 7: Creating Actors with Unreal Engine MetaHumans

11. Chapter 8: Retargeting the MetaHumans for Unreal Engine 5

12. Chapter 9: Adding Animations and Facial Expressions to Your MetaHuman Characters

13. Part 4: Production: Shooting the Scene

14. Chapter 10: Adding and Animating Virtual Cameras Using the Level Sequencer

15. Chapter 11: Enhancing Set Dressing, Retiming Shots, and Adding Niagara Particles

16. Chapter 12: Setting the Mood with Lighting and Adding Post-Processing Effects

17. Part 5: Post-Production: Adding Post-Processing Effects and Music

18. Chapter 13: Exploring Color Management, Additional Camera Settings, and Rendering Your Shots

19. Chapter 14: Adding Sound and Finalizing Your Virtual Film

20. Index

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21. Other Books You May Enjoy

Appendix: Creating Material IDs Using Blender

Creating an IK Retargeter for MetaHumans

To retarget the UE5 Mannequin to the MetaHuman, take the following steps:

In the From_Mixamo folder, duplicate the previously created RTG_Manny IK Retargeter and rename it to RTG_MetaHuman. Then, double-click to open it.
In the Details panel, in the Source section, change Source IKRig Asset to IK_Mannequin, and Source Preview Mesh to SKM_Manny_Simple.
In the same panel, change Target IKRig Asset to IK_metahuman, and Target Preview Mesh to m_med_nrw_body:

Figure 8.35: Setting the source and target IK Rig Assets

Note

The following are abbreviations of the body types of MetaHumans in UE:

- m/f: male/female

- srt/med/tal: short/medium/tall (height)

- unw/nrw/ovw: underweight/narrow/overweight

In the Viewport, the UE5 Mannequin (Manny) and the MetaHuman may overlap. Use Target Mesh Offset to separate the characters by 200 units in the Xaxis.

Figure 8.36: The UE5 Mannequin to Metahuman retargeting

Note

If your characters do not resemble what is shown in Figure 8.36, use the Reset drop-down to reset their pose.

Note

It is perfectly normal for the MetaHuman to be missing its head and other parts. What we are really interested in now is matching the Mixamo animation to the MetaHuman. We will learn how to add and animate facial expressions in Chapter 9.

Select the Asset Browser tab, double-click the Samba_Dancing animation, and now, both the UE5 Mannequin (Manny) and the MetaHuman are dancing in unison. Perfect!
As before, we will export this animation for the MetaHuman. Select the Samba_Dancing animation and click Export Selected Animations in Asset Browser. Then in the pop-up window, select the MetaHumans folder, right-click, and create a new folder named MH_Animations. In the Suffix window, type _MH. Now, click Export.
Save the project (Ctrl + Shift + S).

And we are done! In this section, we successfully retargeted the UE5 Mannequin to the MetaHuman and saved the mocap animation to be used with our MetaHuman. In the next section, we will test our animations, both for Manny and the MetaHuman, ensuring that the animations work as expected. We will be using UE Sequencer for this.