I am beating my head against a wall trying to get my iPhone to appear in the Live Link → ARKit Face Subj field of a Metahuman BP. There is nothing there in the drop down.
I am pretty sure that the root cause of this is my ignorance about how to set up the network correctly. Ideally I would like to plug my iPhone (13) into my PC (no Wi-Fi card) by USB.
I have seen various tutes about getting your network IP and adding that to Live Link, but none on how to ensure the iPhone is visible in editor. I expect this will require several steps involving VPN, Defender etc.
If someone would have the patience to create a step-by-step guide for a network newbie such as myself it would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for this - but the set-up is lightly different for Live Link Face and I still have the problem of troubleshooting my network. I will try vCam - just to see if the problem is a specific one for Live Link Face or not - I suspect it will be a problem for whatever app I use, as it is a problem with the network set-up.
If you run into problems getting UE to recognize or see Live Link Face ( or VCam ), you may want to check your Windows setup.
Below are a couple of things you can check:
There are a couple of things you can check.
On the iOS device, check to see if the “Local Network” communication is enabled in the Live Link Face App settings. This is found under the main iOS Settings-> Live Link Face.
You may have encountered the following popup window on Windows when first launching various versions of the engine. This sets the Windows Defender Firewall communication options for specific apps like Unreal. Unfortunately, this popup only shows up once - when you first use the app for the first time. When you see this, you want to make sure you Enable the “Private networks, such as my home or work network” option. This ensures the editor can communicate with other devices or computers on your local private network. The “Public Networks” option is generally not enabled, but it is optional based on your needs.
Luckily, you can check and modify the Windows Defender Firewall Settings for the Inbound rules by going to the Windows Search in the task bar and launching the “Windows Defender Firewall with Advanced Security” app. It should look like the panel below when you first launch it.
If you click on the “Inbound Rules” on the left side of the panel, you can scroll down to the Unreal entries. Each version of the the Editor, Multi User Slate Server, unrealtraceserver and even built games will be listed. At a minimum, you need to make sure you have the “Private” Profile enabled for both the the TCP and UDP Protocols for the version of the Engine you are using. If not, you can fix it by editing the entry by hand, or you can delete them. If you delete them, you can relaunch the Editor, and the original “Windows Security Alert” popup will show up again - allowing you to re-enable the “Private Network” option from the popup window.
I have highlighted the two entries for my 5.2 version of my UnrealEditor. As you can see, I have the “Private” profile enabled for both the TCP and UDP protocols.
Thank you very much @Lucky_Monk57 for your detailed and careful reply. All of these are set as you recommend.
I notice you do not mention the UDP messaging plugin - which I was, at the end of a long day pretty much randomly jabbing buttons, able to set as you can see in the first screenshot. This action seemed to be the reason my iPhone appeared in the ARKit Face Subj and, after a restart of the level, the MHMe started lipsynching with the Live Link Face input.
My main problem is that this does not appear to replicate reliably. I added the Aoi metahuman to the level and, as you can see, am not offered the option of adding the iPhone to him. Nor does the other Metahuman (MHMe) appear to lipsynch any more.
Starting with UE 5.x, UDP messaging is not necessarily you are using a simple Live Link setup and both the computer and device(s) on are all the same subnet, and they can see the private IP address of the computer.
However, in more complex setups UDP messaging may be a necessity. UDP messaging makes it possible to send and receive messages between different processes on the same computer, or between multiple computers.
To get more reliable UDP messaging you can do the following. Even with a proper setup, sometimes things still have to be toggled, reloaded or restarted.
Unicast Endpoint - Set the Unicast Endpoint to the host computers IP address, and in addition an a colon ( ‘:’ ) and the port number
To accept all port numbers use ‘:0’. For example, ‘192.168.1.28:0’
To specify a specific port use ‘:<port_number>’. The port number as the target in the Live Link Face app needs to match. For example if the port specified in the app is to the default port of ‘11111’, ‘192.168.1.11111’.
Static Endpoints - Static Endpoints should match the IP address of each Live Link Device and should include a ‘:6666’ at the end. Devices broadcast their presence to UDP using port 6666 ( and technically 6667). For example, the iOS device’s IP address is ‘192.168.1.10’, so the static endpoint would be ‘192.168.1.10:6666’
From the snapshots you provided - I noticed the Static Endpoints did not have the port. I am a little surprised it kind of worked with out them. Hopefully having them at the end will make it more reliable.
Even after proper setup, you may still need refresh things. Sometimes the devices and/or software can get in weird states - especially when dealing with networking protocols. A fresh reload or restart usually does the trick. However, sometimes just toggling the ARKit flag or subject sometimes does the trick.
Obviously, if you are still having issues - you can follow the steps I outlined earlier to troubleshoot other networking issues that sometimes occur. The most common are related to the Windows firewalls and public vs private networks properly setup.
I hope this information helps a little. Let me know if you get more reliable results with this information.
Hi there - sorry for the delayed response. For some reason, although I am watching this topic, emails are not arriving at my gmail account. But that’s another matter.
So, I changed the ports as you recommended and a restart of the engine appears to have done the trick. I expect things will be fine now.
Follow up question… possibly worthy of another thread…
The project is a music video with multiple singers. I have discovered that if I have several metahumans connected to live link face they will all sing in unison… ideal for a, “Galileo, Galileo, Galileo, Magnifico!” scenario
I guess if they are singing different things then I would have to import the LLF slates as animation sequences and add them into the sequencer for the relevant Metahumans?
Once again, I truly appreciate the care and attention you are giving this issue for me.
