Reimagining Characters with Unreal Engine’s MetaHuman Creator

Elevate your films with cinema-quality character designs and motion capture animation

Brian Rossney

BIRMINGHAM—MUMBAI

Reimagining Characters with Unreal Engine’s MetaHuman Creator

Copyright © 2022 Packt Publishing

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.

Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is sold without warranty, either express or implied. Neither the author(s), nor Packt Publishing or its dealers and distributors, will be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to have been caused directly or indirectly by this book.

Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals. However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.

Group Product Manager: Rohit Rajkumar

Publishing Product Manager: Vaideeshwari Muralikrishnan

Senior Editor: Hayden Edwards

Technical Editor: Simran Ali

Copy Editor: Safis Editing

Project Coordinator: Sonam Pandey

Proofreader: Safis Editing

Indexer: Manju Arasan

Production Designer: Joshua Misquitta

Marketing Coordinators: Teny Thomas and Nivedita Pandey

First published: January 2023

Production reference: 1071222

Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.

Livery Place

35 Livery Street

Birmingham

B3 2PB, UK.

ISBN 978-1-80181-772-1

www.packt.com

To my mother, Gaby, for her relentless inspiration. To my wife, Kenia, and my two children, Eoin and Isabella, for their encouragement, support, and understanding. To all the folks at Media House for their never-ending motivation. And, last but not least, to all my great friends who have been checking in on the book’s progress and spoiling me with their encouraging words.

– Brian Rossney

Foreword

I have known and worked with Brian Rossney for the best part of a decade.

Our paths crossed when Brian and I worked on TV commercials, with Brian as the Director and myself as Director of Photography. What was unusual about Brian was that he had an innate ability to direct, that was equally complemented by a comprehensive grasp of all aspects of post-production and visual effects.

Brian’s hard-won experience and passion in this field goes back over 20 years. Primarily working in commercials and dramas, he has produced countless excellent visual effects, 3D environments, and digital doubles. These skills, along with the ability to transfer information about the subject to others, was quickly recognized, and it came as no surprise that he was hired to teach advanced video production at Dublin City University.

As a Director of Photography on feature films and episodic television, I’ve grown accustomed to seeing pre-visualization. But seeing what was possible with Brian’s guidance and the Unreal Engine, particularly in terms of lighting and animation, was an eye opener. On one film, Brian created pre-visualizations in 3D for every shot. Then he progressed to using the Unreal Engine for his own work, creating an impressive short film titled Apetito which maximized the technology.

Simultaneously ILM and Disney began utilizing the Unreal Engine for their The Mandalorian series!

The Unreal Engine is most definitely a filmmaker’s tool, with the required skills seemingly out of reach for most. However, Reimagining Characters with Unreal Engine’s MetaHuman Creator allows artists to animate realistic characters in an easy-to-follow fashion, without being bogged down by boring techno garble.

The book is designed for professionals and hobbyists who don’t have time to learn about all the technology behind the magic, but want to get to work on their projects quicky. This is why Brian’s book is an effective reference – it gradually introduces you to key concepts surrounding digital characters, along with how to use and navigate around Unreal Engine’s MetaHuman Creator.

On top of this, he collates the most efficient ways of working, particularly in terms of getting MetaHumans to work with Mixamo animation libraries or bespoke body motion capture through DeepMotion.

Users who have an iPhone can also create highly realistic facial capture to use on their characters, or alternatively can use their webcam and Faceware technology. Both methods are provided with step-by-step breakdowns of how they are accomplished.

Brian never intended to write the definitive guide to every aspect of MetaHumans or all things relating to Motion Capture. However, he did intend to write a book where readers can get results fast, without having to rely on multiple sources of information. Having completed all of the research for you, the outcome is within these pages.

So, get up and running with creating your own highly realistic digital characters and animations for your film project – something that, until now, was only imaginable for huge animation and film studios - without all the stress and heartache.

Happy filmmaking!

Ciaran Kavanagh

ISC IATSE 669

Contributors

About the author

Brian Rossney is a creative director and VFX supervisor at Rossney Pictures. With 22 years of experience working in the film and TV industry, Brian specializes in post-production and digital visual effects. He has produced commercials and TV opening sequences using 3D animation tools and 3D node-based compositing applications. With a thorough understanding of the VFX and 3D animation pipeline and live-action film producing and directing, Brian has lectured at Dublin City University and Galway Film Centre, and has worked as a VFX supervisor for Hallmark and Maravista. He is also the creator of two short films – they are called Apetito, using Unreal Engine, and 1976, using Unreal Engine and MetaHuman Creator.

I’d like to thank my very patient editor, Hayden Edwards.

About the reviewer

Emilio Ferrari is a motion capture supervisor and the CEO of Raised by Monsters (a preproduction studio based on Unreal Engine). He works closely with the Unreal Engine department to develop tools that facilitate a smooth transfer between the mocap stage and engine. In addition to managing the mocap stage, he also leads research and development efforts focused on finding ways to blend VFX, film, and Unreal Engine through playable tools.

Emilio is currently working on the development of the book Digital Filmmaking with Unreal Engine 5, which focuses on cinematography and storytelling with Unreal Engine.