G—P / FMX 320 / Tutorials / Tutorial 01

Tutorial 01 · Characters

Create and rig a character 45 min

The fastest way to a rigged character in Unreal is to build one in the editor: a MetaHuman arrives rigged, skinned and ready to animate in minutes. Modelling and rigging by hand belongs in Blender, so the Unreal half of the job is importing, retargeting and adding controls.

Start The project from Tutorial 00, signed in to EpicTime 45 minutes · 15 for the MetaHuman, 15 for Control Rig and retargeting, 15 for a Blender importNeed Internet for MetaHuman Creator; Blender only for the last sectionServes Week 8–9 rigging and animation, and any final with a character in it

Download the demo projectUETutorials-demo.zip, 71 MB. Unzip it and open the .uproject in Unreal 5.8 to follow along.

Download the answer keyUETutorials-answer-key.zip, 72 MB. Every tutorial finished, so you can check your work against it.

By the end of this tutorial you can

Brief · 5 min Three roads to a rigged character

RoadToolsTimeBest for
Build a human in editorMetaHuman Creator (in the engine since 5.6), Mesh to MetaHuman15 minSeeing what "rigged" means with zero modelling
Import a custom modelBlender with Rigify or Auto-Rig Pro, FBX export, IK Rig and IK Retargeter20 minAnyone who already sculpts or models
Buy or downloadFab marketplace, Mixamo5 minEnemies, crowds, placeholder soldiers

Build · 15 min A MetaHuman, then its rig

  1. Build the character

    Open MetaHuman Creator from the Content Browser. Pick a preset body, change the face, hair and clothing, then click Assemble to drop it into the project.

    MetaHuman Creator inside the editor: the Presets panel on the left, the Ada preset applied. If the viewport shows a red core-data warning, install MetaHuman Creator Core Data from the Epic Games Launcher first.
  2. Look at the skeleton

    Open the skeletal mesh and expand the bone hierarchy. Ask yourself: what happens if the knee bone did not exist? That question is the whole point of rigging.

    The Skeletal Mesh editor on SKM_Manny_Simple. The Skeleton Tree on the right is the bone hierarchy; expand pelvis to walk down the spine.
  3. Move a control

    Open the character's Control Rig asset. Grab the hand control and drag it so the arm follows. Controls are the puppet strings; bones are the puppet.

    The Control Rig editor on CR_Mannequin_Body. The coloured shapes around the mannequin are the controls; drag the hand ring and the whole arm follows.
  4. Build a rig from parts

    Create a Control Rig from the Mannequin instead, choosing Modular Rig. Drag the Spine, Arm and Leg modules onto the skeleton. A working rig from parts takes about two minutes.

  5. Retarget the animations

    Right-click one of the Third Person animations, such as MM_Idle, and choose Retarget Animations (in 5.8 the entry is on animations, not on the skeletal mesh). Pick Manny as the source, your MetaHuman as the target, select the animations, and export. The new character now runs and jumps with no hand animation.

    The Retarget Animations window. In 5.8 it opens from the right-click menu of an animation such as MM_Idle rather than the mesh. Pick the source and target meshes here, then export.
  6. Play it

    Replace the mesh in the Third Person character blueprint, set the new animation blueprint, and press Play.

Build · 15 min Importing a Blender character

This is the road you already know from the Blender days. The new part is IK Rig, which lets Manny's animations land on a skeleton with different bone names.

  1. Export from Blender

    Rig with Rigify or a plain armature, apply all transforms, scale at 1 unit = 1 cm, and export FBX with Only Deform Bones on and Leaf Bones off.

  2. Import on a new skeleton

    Import into Unreal with Skeletal Mesh and Import Animations on and no skeleton selected, so Unreal creates one for this character.

  3. Make an IK Rig

    Create an IK Rig for the new skeleton. Define retarget chains for spine, head, each arm and each leg, then set the retarget root to the pelvis. Unreal 5.4 and later guesses the chains with Auto Create Chains.

    An IK Rig for Manny after Auto Create Retarget Chains: each bone on the left is labelled with its chain, Spine, LeftArm, LeftIndex and so on.
  4. Make an IK Retargeter

    Create an IK Retargeter from Manny's IK Rig to the new rig. If the arms are in A pose instead of T pose, fix the retarget pose. Export the animations.

The Skeletal Mesh Editor can fix an import

Unreal can paint skin weights, add bones and repair a bad import inside the Skeletal Mesh Editor. Find the weight-paint brush once so you know it exists. Full rigging still belongs in Blender.

Before you close this

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