5.6 Animation Retargeting Bug

Development Character & Animation
,
1

I use Mixamo animations to test and demo retargetting.

When retargetting an animation to a Metahuman in 5.6, I am getting very different results than in 5.5. Attaching image.

RetargetBugSM
RetargetBugSM1920×506 135 KB

I used an identical process to import the character and retarget the animation.

I realize that a manual retarget will resolve, but it is definitely worth reporting, and wondering if anyone else is experiencing this.

I assume something has changed with the actual bone structure in the Metahumans (not likely), or the automatic retargetting feature in 5.6 is unfinished or changed.

1 Like
2

For now, retargeting is broken on 5.6.

Even if you export the third-person SK mannequin from 5.6 to reimport it under a different name and then try retargeting on the SK mannequin, thus using the same names on both sides, it won’t work. You’ll get this error message: “IK Retargeter bone chain, Root, was unable to be normalized. Chain too short.”

I tried this after cloning a project and found that all my animations were broken, since even those that had been retargeted on a previous version will be broken again at the hand level.

It’s currently not possible to use these functions, at least I haven’t found them yet; I think we’ll have to wait for a patch.

3 Likes
3

I was able to retarget Rokoko mocap animations to the Metahuman 2.0 character skeletal mesh in 5.6 without issue (besides the usual clean-up etc.). Need to test again with Mixamo animations though.

4

Successfully retargetted Mixamo animation sequence to MetaHuman 2.0 character. Might be a band aid solution, but it’s pretty clean and simple:

  • Import Mixamo animation WITHOUT selecting a skeleton in import dialogue
  • Note a Skeleton asset was imported
  • Open the MH 2.0 character BP, select body, open character Skeletal Mesh (‘SKM_Character Name_BodyMesh’)
  • Open Skeleton (‘metahuman base skel’)
  • Add the Mixamo imported skeleton to the list of compatible skeletons
  • Save everything
  • Right-click on imported Mixamo Animation Sequence > Retarget Animation
  • Select character Skeletal Mesh (‘SKM_Character Name_BodyMesh’) as target
  • Select animation, choose path, export animation…

Give it a shot…

1 Like
5

I’ve noticed this bug in UEFN too. Hopefully they fix it, as even the default mannequin retargeted to himself won’t work.

2 Likes
6

This worked for me, my 5.6 Metahuman can use Mixamo animations again, thank you Emerging

1 Like
8

Does EPIC know about this bug, and is there a plan to fix it anytime soon?

2 Likes
9

I also didn’t get retargeting on the same skeleton with different skeletal meshes (pelvic height is different). What helped me was that in the new settings I first added standard Ops and then removed Root and IK. After that, everything started working fine. I also set up Translation Offset in Pelvis.

image
image322×189 8.57 KB

2 Likes
10

Has anyone found a solution to this yet, or has EPIC said anything about it?

3 Likes
11

Yeah, retargeting has been generally bugged in 5.6… I hope they fix it going forward because it’s a bit of a hassle.

But I think, I’ve found a reliable workaround:

  1. Retarget the animation you need in a 5.5 project.
  2. Export the retargeted animation as FBX.
  3. Import the FBX into your 5.6 project.

This worked for me.

1 Like
12

Thank you, that solved my issue!

1 Like
13

For my animations it was the new ue5.6 manny skeleton if i choose the older mannequins (the silver ones) it worked. So by assigning skeletons i was succesfull

1 Like
14

How do you import without selecting the skeleton? If none is selected, the import button is grayed out.

1 Like
15

Same question

16

Can u make video? I m still not getting

17

I tried all the above and what worked better for me was going back to 5.5 do the retarget there and then migrate to 5.6 otherwise you put the first animation you see that is “working fine” but if you do a right click to check show skeleton, the skeleton are not moving, so you are not gonna be able to do a bone match, or you will but the animation is not gonna work