How to Rig the Unreal Mannequins with Advanced Skeleton in Autodesk Maya

it is class creatives in this video we'll discuss how to rig the unreal mannequins with Advanced skeleton Auto rigging plugin with Autodesk Maya for unreal projects in this video we'll discuss how to set up Advanced skeleton in Autodesk Maya Auto regularly unreal 4 and unreal 5 mannequins and Maya utilizing their reading template so that you can create custom animations or work with their motion capture animation library for use in your unreal projects we'll also discuss the Import and Export process going to and from the Unreal Engine to Autodesk Maya the go-to free solution for utilizing Auto rigging Autodesk Maya software has been unreal engines art tools this tool is completely free and works great to Import and Export animations to and from Maya and the Unreal Engine unfortunately the tool has been discontinued by epic and is no longer receiving updates and the tool requires python 2 which was completely removed by Autodesk for all Maya versions post 2022. the tool still functions perfectly fine and is still a great free solution for anyone looking to animate and rig with Maya 2022 or earlier versions so what Auto rigging tools can be utilized for the latest versions of Maya and Python 3 one of the best alternatives on Rails art tools is Advanced skeleton the tool is free to download and come is fully unlocked and fully functional you can visit their website for full licensing roles and restrictions depending on your project goals and distribution needs the installation process is very user friendly simply download and unzip the folder drag and drop the mail script to an empty or existing my shelf and you're ready to start rigging our first step is to export the mannequins from unreal inside your third person project you'll find the ue4 mannequin skeleton mesh asset right click the asset select asset actions and export keep the default name or rename the export to your liking choose your export settings if necessary and click the export button the process is identical if you wish to export your unreal 5 mannequins Manion Quinn so that you can rig up these assets inside of Maya with Advanced skeleton once we have that exported you can simply take those meshes and bring them inside of Maya where we can start the rigging process quick pause to tell you a little bit about class creatives they offer a top ranked game design curriculum online all courses are taught by industry veterans with experience from Studios such as Disney Naughty Dog Insomniac Google and more character animation fundamentals teach the importance of video reference to bring characters to life utilizing Autodesk Maya and Unreal Engine learn professional workflows such as 3D character modeling utilizing industry standard software such as zbrush Autodesk Maya and substance painter the entire character design workflow is covered from start to finish in their Master Class offerings extensive character rigging courses teach the process of how to customary characters for all of your project needs the great thing about class creatives is the ability to learn at your own pace in your own schedule get started today for free with the link in the description create a new scene in Maya I recommend to create a scene with Y up even though unreal requires Z up the animation libraries inside of advanced skeleton require wire for the rig in order to make use of the animation libraries so make a mental note of this if you want to utilize those built-in resources which we will cover later in the video import your unreal 4 mannequin skeleton which we exported out of unreal press the advanced skeleton button on your shelf Editor to open up the Shelf skeleton menu inside the menu browse the tools and click on name matcher this will open up a new GUI where you can select the unreal template option this will set Advanced skeleton to rig the character according to the ue4 mannequin skeleton which will also make it compatible with existing ue4 mannequin animations and assets and the unreal Marketplace for your projects the rigging process is very simple click the create and place fit skeleton button then click to build Advanced skeleton and when that finishes click the button to constrain to joints now the unreal 4 mannequin is rigged and ready to animate inside Maya and any animations you now create will be compatible with the unreal 4 mannequin inside of unreal the advanced skeleton rig features ikfk controls and also controls you'll find within our tools and other high-end rigs such as space switching for the ue5 mannequins Manny and Quinn the process is identical then you will want to select unreal 5 from the drop down menu in the templates click create and place build Advanced skeleton and constrain to joints and your character will be ready for animation in Maya for your unreal 5 mannequin project one really great feature of advanced skeleton is their built-in libraries of animations that can help you get some basic animations imported onto your characters once you have them rigged up as I mentioned before in order to utilize these Library animation assets you will need to make sure you have rigged your character with Y up exporting the animation will still import perfectly fine into unreal via their GUI or the game exporter which we'll cover later there are two ways to bring the library animations onto your rig character asset the first method is once again under the tools tab in advanced skeleton listed under walk designer once you have the walk designer open simply choose a walk you would like to import and make any adjustments that you require once you have the animation attached you can then click the button to bake the keys onto the character and then you can tweak and re-time the animation with the Curve controllers to your liking second method will utilize a few external animation libraries to bring an animation to the character rig click on the Picker icon on the Shelf Editor to bring up the GUI once that opens up you'll want to select the selection box and click on load this will enable one of the two character selection gui's and will allow you to import motion capture animations onto the rig browse to the anim drop down and select mocap Library here you will have some options to import several animations from online resources that you can utilize for motion capture based animations in this example I'm going to browse to the motion capture CMU database and browse to a walk click download and apply the animation will be downloaded and applied to the rig once this is done click on bake animation and the animation will be applied to the controllers and you will be able to edit that animation to your liking inside of Maya I like to know that there is one other GUI for selecting the controls of your character and that can be accessed by clicking on the selector icon and the Shelf editor this GUI functions just like the Picker and there are some documentations on the advanced skeleton site that covers some of the differences between the two the main advantage of the Picker is so that if you want to rig a character and have itself contained and sold without the use of advanced skeleton the Picker creates separate files that can be used for that purpose so it really depends on who will be utilizing your Rigs and how you will be Distributing them we can utilize either GUI while we animate I found that the Picker is nice that you can drag and select multiple controllers such as the hands whereas the selector GUI does not allow drag group selection which might slow down your animation time to export your animations to the Unreal Engine the process is very straightforward and not much different than if you were to export with an art tools rig based character or any other unreal rigged character for animation you can utilize the export options in advanced skeleton manual export or the game exporter for this video we'll cover the game exporter since it allows a lot of flexibility and multiple animation export ability open the outliner select the root of the character go to file game exporter browse to animation clips and be sure to set your export to selection so that it will only export from what we have selected in the outliner click the plus icon and name the animation under settings and you can select your fbx and other additional settings choose the file path of your animation and click the export button once we have the animation exported out of Maya simply drag and drop the animation fbx to your unreal project select the skeleton in the drop down and your animation is now working inside of the Unreal Engine with the appropriate mannequin skeleton the process for the unreal 5 mannequin is the same simply drag your animation fbx to Unreal select the unreal 5 mannequin skeleton inner animation will be ready to use in your project Advanced skeleton could root custom meshes or even meshes that adhere to the unreal mannequin skeletal hierarchy Paragon assets and other unreal Marketplace assets can be imported to Maya and rigged following the same steps we followed in this video rigging the mannequins this will allow you to create custom animations for your unreal projects with Maya which you have purchased and downloaded in the unreal Marketplace giving you a great starting point for your project overall Advanced skeleton is a great tool to quickly rate characters with the unreal mannequin skeleton configuration for your projects and is currently fully supported by the developer with regular updates on their website it has some slight differences to the unreal art tools but is a great alternative if you need to work with Python 3 and require version of my after the 2022 version hopefully this video is helpful as you rake your characters in Maya for your unreal projects well that about wraps up this video are you utilizing Advanced skeleton rigs in your unreal projects let us know your thoughts in the comments and don't forget to like And subscribe and we'll see you in the next one perfect

Channel: Class Creatives

Views: 13,406

Keywords: video games, Animation, Rigging, Character Design, Maya, Autodesk, 3dartist, 3danimation, computergraphics, gamedesign, Advanced Skeleton, ART tools, Epic Art Rigging Toolkit, Mannequin, Unreal Engine, UE5, UE4, Manny, Quinn, tutorial, rigging tips, character rigging, rigging techniques, rigging workflow, Maya tutorial, rigging for games, game rigging, 3D rigging, joint placement, skinning and weights, name matcher, animation library, mocap, motion capture, import, export, advanced skeleton

Id: vA9P_TVLw-0

Length: 10min 2sec (602 seconds)

Published: Tue May 09 2023