Animating the MakeHuman character in Unity

Hello everyone,

In last article we have seen how to characterize MakeHuman characters in Maya so we can use it for animations. In this post, we will see how to animate those character in unity. Here we will see how to apply animations to our character. So lets start with it.

Step 1:Character Model Setup and Export from MakeHuman
 Design the character in MakeHuman as per your requirements. Once you are done with the designing make sure to do below checks.

         a) Bring the Character in "T-Pose".

             Below image shows how and where in MakeHuman character in T-Pose. This pose is necessary so as to map all bones to unity mecanim.

              

T-Pose Setup

   b) Set the skeleton type as "Game Engine"

        Below image shows where to change the skeleton type of our character. Here we will select Game Engine as our Skeleton Type as it have optimized sets of bones necessary to get the character animated.

"Game Engine" Skeleton Setup

After completion with above steps , you can export the character directly to your Unity Project folder, make sure the character model is exported in FilmBox (FBX) file format. Below image shows to export the character in FBX file format.

FBX Export to Unity Assets Folder

Step 2: Import the Model in Unity3D

 Once our character model is exported from MakeHuman, unity will auto import the model from MakeHuman.

In case, the materials did not import properly and the model appeared as grayed out, you can fix the material issue by selecting material naming as "From Model's Material" and Material search as "Local Materials Folder".


Set the rig animation format of the character model as "Humanoid" as shown in image below-

After selecting the Humanoid, click on configure button, below screen will show up-

 Click on Done, if all the bones are properly configured, you can also test all the muscle settings to check if the model is perfectly rigged and ready for animation.


Step 3: Create animation controller.
In unity, with animation controllers you can setup a game object or character to perform a set of animations in defined sequence, you can also define transitions from one animation to another using animation controllers in unity, below images show how you can create an animation controller, the configuration of transition of animation "dancing" to "idle" state.

Creating Animation Controller

Right click on selected folder and select animation controller as shown in above figure.

Setup the animation sequences, you can download the animation files(like samba dancing) from Mixamo.


Step 3: Configure your MakeHuman character with animation controller.

As most of the work is been covered in above two steps, this is one simple step in which you just have to drag your character in your scene and configure the new animation controller to that character. Below image shows the same.

After the above step is done, click on play button and your can that your character is dancing like a "Pro" dancer.

Character animation in "Play" Mode

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Animation Ready Rigged Human model using MakeHuman and Maya within an hour

Hello everyone, 

I’m going to show, how we can design, rig 3d characters in quick steps instead of modeling it. These steps are very much helpful for a game developer with little or no modeling experience.  So, without wasting any more time, let’s get started quickly.-

Step 1:  Designing a character in MakeHuman:

MakeHuman is a character designer tool which is currently limited to designing only human characters of almost any kind; we can even design a small human baby. Its interface is simple, easy to understand. Using this tool we can get our required character model ready within few minutes.
So the initial step will be to get the software, and design a human model that suits your requirement, here we can only design human model.

After designing character, check with pose/animate menu section. In skeleton tab you have to select “Cmu mb” rig preset, this step make sure that a model can be used easily within Maya.

Ok, now you are ready to go, almost 80 percent of work is completed. Now be sure to pose that model like this in figure below. This is an important step, without this Maya will give you validation errors and you may need to pose manually in Maya.
•    To this select pose tab from Pose/Animate menu.
•    In tag filter, select rest poses and then
•    Select Tpose from right side list.

Ok now we are almost done with MakeHuman application, last step you need to do is export that model from MakeHuman application as FilmBox (.fbx) file format. Check the image  below, you will get to know how to do it.

Ok now lets import that fbx file in Maya Application.
 

Step 2:  Assigning Human IK to model in Maya:

Genuinely speaking, I’m complete noob in Maya, so I may not be able to cover the complete theoretical details. So to begin with this part lets first import the Fbx model to Maya. Here is what your model will look like in Maya.

Ok, its almost done, we have our completely rigged model ready in Maya, now we have to assign some Human IK so that model will be animation ready, to do this.
Select Animation from drop down below menu bar.

Then from top menus select  

Skeleton==>> Human IK.

You will see character controls dialog will appear on right side.
Now as we don't have to create skeleton, we will just define our skeleton.
From that dialog, click on “Skeleton” button in define section, now you see something like this-

 
Ok now the concentration part (last part), this process will take not more than 10 minutes believe me, and its very easy, because you may have studied biology during high schools.
First step in this task is to make our model transparent set X-Ray View with X-Ray joints, check the image below-

Now, double click on the bone near right shoulder in character controls dialog. And then click on the same bone of model in ViewPort. You may need to zoom to set the bones correctly. You see something like this-

Now continue the same process with all the bones until that red spot mark turns to green.

***Note:For shoulders, select the bones shown in the image below.

***Note:And for hips select the bones highlighted with red and purple ovals in the image below:

Ok, all set, there’s your model ready for animation. You can test animation with importing motion files from Maya visors or by rotating hands and legs whatever you want.
You can always modify the character here in Maya or blender if you want. Imagination is the limit.
We will cover character animation and importing those animated character in Unity/Godot later.
Check the image below.

That’s all for this session folks.
Thank you very much.

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