Learn to import animated hair (x-gen) seamlessly from Maya to Unreal in this comprehensive tutorial. Level up your game’s visuals with realistic hair animations!
What is grooming
Grooming in Maya or Unreal Engine is the process of creating and animating realistic hair and fur. It is a complex process that involves creating individual hair strands, assigning them physical properties, and animating them to move realistically.
In Maya, grooming is typically done using the XGen or Ornatrix plug-ins. These plug-ins provide a variety of tools for creating and animating hair, including tools for creating hair strands, assigning hair properties, and animating hair movement.
In Unreal Engine, grooming is done using the Groom plugin. This plugin provides a similar set of tools for creating and animating hair X-gen and Ornatrix plug-ins in Maya.
Benefits of grooming in Maya or Unreal Engine
- Realistic hair and fur: Grooming can be used to create realistic hair and fur that looks and moves like real hair.
- Control over hair properties: Grooming allows you to control the physical properties of hair, such as its length, thickness, and shape.
- Animation: Grooming can be used to animate hair and fur so that it moves realistically.
Before starting the same info
Character and animation from Adobe Mixamo if you are having an account sign-in or don’t have to sign up. Then go to character download it in FBx binary t-pose and download animation also. Then check and drag the character into Maya software.
Step 1: Preparing the Groom
– Start with your character in the original pose from Mixamo, and apply an XGen groom with a few modifiers.
– Duplicate the mesh of your character and transfer the groom description to the new duplicate mesh. This compresses the groom.
– Export the groom’s description with the current frame and ensure “Right Final Width” is checked. Save it as What do you want”.
Step 2: Unreal Engine Settings
– In Unreal Engine, go to “Project Settings” enable “Compute Skin Cache” and disable “Tick Animation on Skeletal Mesh”.
– Enable the plugins “Limbic Groom Importer” and “Groom Enabled” as well as “Niagara” and “Niagara Extras” from the plugins section. Restart the engine after making these changes.
Step 3: Importing into Unreal Engine
– Import the FBX of your character into Unreal Engine.
– Drag and drop the character into the scene.
– Import the groom cache by dragging and dropping what you have saved into the engine.
Step 4: Setting Up Groom in Unreal Engine
– Add a groom component to your character and select the groom asset.
– Adjust the groom’s rotation to -90 degrees on the X-axis and 180 degrees on the Z-axis.
– Re-import the groom by right-clicking on it and using the same rotation values.
– Adjust the hair width as desired using the groom’s settings.
Step 5: Attaching Groom to Skeletal Mesh
– For creating animated hair x-gen follow this step
– Add a Niagara component to your character.
– Go to the Niagara system asset, click “Groom Assets,” and wait for the list to populate.
– Select your character and the hair should start simulating and sticking to the mesh.
Step 6: Importing Animation
– Import an animation for your character to see the hair in motion.
– Assign the animation asset to the character’s skeletal mesh component. For creatine animated hair x-gen
Step 7: Fine-tuning the Hair
– If you have long or larger grooms, consider checking “Project Blend” and “Project Stretch” in the Niagara system to prevent unwanted popping or stretching.
That’s it! You’ve successfully created animated hair x-gen into Unreal Engine using the hair simulation tool.
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