Hello there! I recorded a facial animation with live link into sequencer and that all works pretty well with MetaHumans.
Now I want to keyframe-animate the body with the control rig, but the head doesn’t move when rotating the spline for example. It just stays in place, like it’s not attached to the IK chain anymore. How do I combine the facial capture with the body control rig?
Thanks in advance! J.
I think when you recorded the live link you had to change the animation mode to use the live link blueprint, change that back to use the anim blueprint. See if that’s your issue?
I tried, that didn’t work. When I delete the face animation in sequencer, the head moves with the body. But I can’t combine both. There is probably some easy solution, just pretty new to MH.
I can’t remember having this issue, I’ll take a look when I’m on my system, is the change in animation type holding, keyframe the change so it holds the change, I remember having issues with that before, also what happened if you bake the face mesh to control rig?
Check on your face mesh under animation that you have Animation mode Use Animation Blueprint and the Face_AnimBP_C applied to the Anim Class, only thing that I change and it doesn’t allow me to move the head unless it’s setup like that, the animation that I apply to the face still works like that and I can control the head rotation.
Thanks for your input. When I change the Anim Class it switches back as soon as I start playing in the sequencer and then Unreal just crashes. I should also mention that I recorded the head rotation with live link. But also not using it doesn’t help with fixing the head to the body. I will try baking the facial capture.
Baking the facial capture worked. Now the head moves with the body, but the recorded head rotation is gone. Which makes sense. I will try to just bake the head rotation as well-
When you switch the anim class you’ll see a key frame button next to it, if you key that it will stop
It reverting back.
Are you using faceware or live link with the i phone?
I’m using live link with iphone. It seems that it’s something with the head rotation. Which is on the body rig, not the face.
This seems to be the answer, but a bit tricky to set up: https://answers.unrealengine.com/questions/1025590/view.html
I’m not really sure if you’re adding custom animation to the head using the control rig or the animation that comes from the live link, I use faceware but should be the same. The rotation of the head is driven from the body, if you’re recording from live link you’ll need to add the live link blueprint to the body as well to capture those key frames from the head rotation.
I set up live link on the root MH BP, which includes face and body. The head rotation is actually being recorded and I can play it back. Just when I try to custom animate the rest of the body (after baking the body anim) with the control rig the head won’t move with it. When I then bake the face anim as well the head’s rotation is gone.
I think you might be missing a few steps.
With your recorded capture in sequencer you’ll see it with all the key frames.
-You’ll need to bake to Animation Sequence by selecting the body in the Sequencer and right clicking and selecting Bake Animation Sequence, chose your destination folder and name the sequence.
-Now select the face and do the same.
-Back in the Sequencer just delete your Metahuman and then re add it.
-Now delete the control rig elements in the sequencer that are under body and face.
-You’ll now need to add the animation tracks to your Body and Face, click the Plus Track button on the Body and in the pop out select animation, from there you will see the Baked animation sequence you created in the first steps.
-Do the same for the Face.
-Now these should play back in the sequencer.
From here if you want to add additional animation on top you’ll need to bake the tracks to control rig, once you have baked the tracks to control rig you’ll then need to add an additive track to be able to add animation on top of what you have already captured.
If you look in this video by Gabriella from Feeding Wolves from around 2minutes in you’ll see what I’m talking about.
Hope this helps.
Thanks so much for the detailed explantation. Looks like I was indeed missing a few steps and basic animation knowledge. I will check when I get back to my computer.
I had a look and followed your steps. Baking the animations works well. But I noticed the head rotation from live link is not stored on the body rig, but the face (as parts of the MH skeleton overlaps and is available on body and face). It’s recorded initially in sequencer, but when I bake it (tried both options “Face_ControlBoard_CtrlRig” and “simple_face_CtrlRi”) the animation get lost (or at least not transferred). There is no way to drill deeper in the sequencer clips to access the data and link it manually somehow?
Anyway: Thanks for your patience!
I’m not sure, I thought the head rotation was controlled from the body, if you see the keyframe under the head you can just select all of those key frames and paste them in to the body head control. It may be a blueprint thing with live link, I’ve only used the live link for Faceware and pretty sure it records to the body head rotation on that. Must be someone else here that has had this specific issue abs can chip in.
