Beginners guide to using Daz characters in unreal engine 5.5 and 5.6
milliethegreat
Posts: 438
Can somebody give me a step by step beginner's tutorial for importing and using Daz characters in unreal engine 5.5 and up. I want to use them as animated background characters (npcs) and as a player character that can be used in first person or third person animations. I want to use animations bought on FAB (UE marketplace) I'm new and never tried anything like this but really want to try it as I hope to make short YouTube videos at some point.
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I don't know this per say, but I have a feeling the maker of that plug in or bridge is in kind of a situation in that when they update the plug in and or then UE updates and things break. At this point I think I will stick with UE4. The classic way is just exporting FBX's and importing them in UE. But there was a plugin / bridge where you can easily export from Daz to UE. The maker of that bridge had two videos about how to set up and use it and important information was given in them both about it. When it works it seems to work great, but does not always work or has issues here or there.
I was thinking of the bridge. That's my plan. I can't find any UE 5.x videos only UE 4 videos. Anyone have any links for UE5?
I have several videos that cover the process, including how to retarget other animations to transferred Daz characters. Here you go:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPcx_LSSGfZf3aoIf4Z99OOGBHQdtkGSE
Note that the retargeting process has funamentally changed with 5.6 and up, so this all works up until Unreal Engine 5.5.
Hope this helps!
I'm not using 5.6 and soon maybe 5.7 so no offense but this isn't exactly useful for me.
Actually the first video in that play list works just fine. The thing that changed with the bridge is the IK-RIgs and Retartgeter are no longer provided you have to make them yoru self. I used this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUGHf6F7IWM to do that
Then I used Jays video to refresh me on the rest and thats it.
guess i'm screwed. i don't know anything about rigging. im not a professional animator or modeler
so much for using daz characters in animations :(
retargeting and ik bones are complicated for novices right? i'd imagine thats for proffesionals i suppose? is this a job i need to hire someone to do? if so anyone know of someone i can get a quote from? if you do kindly let me know. thanks
a) there is more than one bridge/workflow for bringing daz characters to UE5. Besides DaztoUnreal bridge there are at least two others
b) whichever one you do, the genesis figure will all come into UE5 as a rigged skeletal mesh
c) a "control rig" and a rigged skeletal mesh are two different things. you do not need to do rigging.
d) animation retargeting to your character is literally a few button clicks as per those videos
d) use a standard workflow so you dont need to reinvent the wheel or hire someone
e) https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=daz+to+UE5.6
Sorry for all the dumb questions and statements. But there are different ways of going about this? I thought you there was one. What constitutes as a "standard workflow" as opposed to a non standard workflow. And don't you have to make a skeleton manually ie rig one manually a control rig? and I thought control rigs were mandatory for animation. Again sorry for the dumb questions. I have browsed YouTube videos in the past (UE 5.5 to 4.27 era as i started doing actual art on 4.27) and they were so confusing. Then again i have no prior experience or education in animation so do with that what you will. It just seems the barrier to entry just got astronomically higher and the process just got more complicated. I could probably figure it out easier in 4.27-5.5 but now..... and I use 5.6 and 5.7 as I update my projects when a new release of unreal engine comes out
yes
following a well-documented process - described already in this thread
If you cannot find a well-documented process for 5.6 or 5.7, then use 5.5
i cant use 5.5. the assets i use dont support that low of a version of unreal. a majority of the currently support 5.7 and some also support 5.6. and unreal is not backwards compatible also the process in the thread is for professionals right? are you sure i shouldn't hire someone for this?
I think the way you are "supposed" to do it these days, i.e. 5.6-7 is to use FaceWrap and the Conforming Mesh method to turn your custom head and body into a proper Metahuman. There are lots of tutorials on YouTube.
It depends if you are happy with the product of that workflow.
If that suited everyone's needs, the other bridges like daztohue and DTL wouldnt exist. (Granted, they existed before it became easier to wrap face and body to metahuman. )
someone wrapping to metahuman also needs separate workflow for clothes i assume.
I'm looking for the same thing. I've found a few ok-ish tutorials, but nothing that is easy to follow without already knowing UE quite well. It also doesn't help that the plug-in is out of date with UE versions (I'm using 5.5.4), though there is an update available on GitHub. I've been able to export/import a G9 character, but getting it to move about no so much. I also wonder if environments and sets can be moved as well.
but those are complicated and not beginner friendly for people with no animation/rigging experience i suppose?