How to Create a ‘MetaHuman ID’ in Unreal Engine

NOTE: IMAGES ON THIS PAGE ARE FROM THE OFFICIAL UNREAL ENGINE YOUTUBE VIDEO, “How to Use MetaHuman Animator in Unreal Engine“

Create new ‘MetaHuman Identity’ asset

• In the Content Manager, go back to your “Project Folder“.
• Make a new folder called “MetaHuman_Identities”, and open it.

CREATE NEW METAHUMAN IDENTITY

• Right-click in the folder, hover over MetaHuman Animator, and click on MetaHuman Identity.

• Rename this new asset as “ActorName_MHAID“, with your actor’s name of course replacing ActorName.

• Double click the new file to open it.
• Expand the editor window that has appeared to fullscreen.

Setup ‘Callibration Frames’

CREATE COMPONENTS FROM FOOTAGE

• Click to select your newly created MetaHuman Identity from the list on the left.

• Click the CREATE COMPONENTS button, then hover over FROM FOOTAGE, then double click the take that contains your callibration neutral poses.

There will now be a hierarchy on the left side, filled out with the captured data of the file you chose. The neutral pose item will be selected.

CHOOSE FRAME FOR “FRONT” POSE

1. On the timeline at the bottom, move to a frame with a good neutral expression.

The eyes should be looking forward, not at the camera but forward in space.

• Now, on the bottom left of the video preview area, click the button with a big plus symbol.
  

•  A popup will appear that says “current promoted frame will be set as front view”. Click ok.
  

• Now, below the video preview, click the blue bar to rename the frame, and type in “Front”.
  

CHOOSE FRAME FOR “LEFT” POSE

• Now to the left, click on the icon that looks like a camera.

• In the timeline, scrub along to find a frame of the person looking just slightly to the left side of the screen, which is their right of course.

• Click the plus button.

• Double click the blue horizontal line that has appeared, and type “Left”.

CHOOSE FRAME FOR “RIGHT” POSE

• Now to the left, again click the icon that looks like a camera.

• In the timeline, scrub through to find a frame of the person looking just slightly to the right side of the screen, which is their left of course.

• Click the plus button.

• Double click the blue horizontal line that has appeared, and type “Right”.

MHAID: ‘MetaHuman Identity Solve’ & Check Mesh

• Above the video preview, click the button that says “MetaHuman Identity Solve”.

A progress bar will appear, and say “Running MetaHuman Identity Solve”.

• When the progress bar is finished, click the “mesh to metahuman” button above the view preview window. Click the upper option, “auto-rig identity (Skeletal Mesh Only)”.

In bottom right corner of the screen, a dialogue box will let you know that it is processing remotely via the Epic servers. This step can take a while.

It will then say “Mesh to MetaHuman complete!”, and a new dialogue box will appear that says “Finalizing MetaHuman Identity”.

Once that finishes processing, just click OK the next dialogue box, which is just letting you know that a Skeletal Mesh is now available in your Content Browser.

MHAID: Add teeth pose

• Now in the hierarchy in the top left of the editor window, click the word Poses.

• Above that, click the ADD button with a green plus sign.

Hover over ‘Add Pose’, and click on “Add Teeth“.

• In the timeline below, choose a frame from your video that shows the actor bearing their teeth.

• Click the plus button.

• A dialogue box will say “Current frame will be set as front view”. Click OK.

• In the video preview, zoom into the teeth.

• On the right side, twirl down TEETH.
• With the ‘TOOTH LOWER 2’ line selected (highlighted in light blue), go above the video preview, and click on FIT TEETH.

• A dialogue box will say that is fitting the teeth, then finalizing MetaHuman identity.

MHAID: Prepare for Performance & Check Mesh

• Now in the hierarchy in the top left of the editor window, click the phrase “Neutral Pose”.

• Above the video preview, click the “Prepare for Performance” button.

• A dialogue box will say “Training the MetaHuman Identity for Performance processing”.

• Once it finishes, close the editor window for your “MetaHuman Identity”.

• In the Content Browser, double click the SKELETAL MESH that has been created.

• An editor window will appear. Click drag it over to just under the top menu, so it fills the screen as a tab.

• In the viewport, click-drag to check the mesh looks correct.

• Now close this editor window.