ZenDyn

Important:

ZenDyn is a standalone product and is animation blueprint based. In order for it to function correctly, it changes your Metahumans default Face animation PostProcess blueprint at runtime. This can create conflicts with other components attached to your Metahuman such as ZenBlink, that also set their own facial animation PostProcess Blueprint. It is advised to use ZenDyn independently from these other products, as integration requires skills and experience that are beyond the scope of these setup instructions.

Setup Instructions

  • Prepare the Project:
    • Add a MetaHuman to your scene.
  • Enable the Plugin:
    • Go to Edit > Plugins.
    • Search for ZenDyn and enable it.
    • Restart Unreal Engine to activate the plugin.
  • Access ZenDyn Content:
    • Enable Engine Content and Plugin Content in the Content Browser settings.
    • Search for ‘ZenDyn‘ in the Content Browser to view all plugin-related content.
  • Option 1: Click the quick add icon on the Level Editor Toolbar to Spawn ZenDyn in the scene.
  • ( version 1.2.0 and above only )
  • Option 2: Add ZenDyn World Actor:
    • Drag the included Example BP_ZenDyn blueprint into the scene. ( The blueprint is located in the plugin Content folder, you may need to enable “show plugin content’ in the content browser)
    • Zero out its transform.
    • Alternatively, use Quick Add to add the blueprint by typing and searching for ‘ZenDyn.‘
  • Option 2: Add ZenDyn Actor Component:
    • Select your Metahuman Actor in the Outliner
    • In the Details Panel click the “Add” button
    • Search for “ZenDyn” to attach the included Actor Component.

Usage:

Use in Sequencer:

  • Create a Level Sequence and add your Metahuman.
  • Add an existing facial animation (baked sequence) to your Metahumans “Face” animation track in sequencer.

Note: ZenDyn DOES NOT work with ControlRig tracks in sequencer, your animation must be baked into a sequence.

  • Option: Use LiveLink Live animation *instead of existing animation.
  • *There is a bug in some engine versions that may cause a crash, If you use both LiveLink and Existing animation in sequencer at the same time.
  • Select ZenDyn in the Details panel and click the “Add Keyframe” icon to add a keyframe to sequencer for the selected property. Example: “Brows”, “Brows Smoothing”

Results:

  • Simulate or Play to view results.
    • Note: You cannot adjust properties of the ZenDyn Actor Component in the details panel during P.I.E. This is a limitation of the UnrealEngine Editor. You can change the properties in sequencer or programmatically. This is why the preferred Method is to use the ZenDyn World Actor Instead.

Baking:

You can bake ZenDyn animations in take recorder as you would Live link.

A YouTube tutorial is here: https://youtu.be/gGTP-p0QOnI?si=f_ZQxUr8K-Km-kJU

Important Baking Notice:

You CAN NOT record or bake output from the new dynamics module.

This module uses bone driven dynamic effects that CAN NOT be interpreted by RigLogic.

The purpose of the dynamics module is to provide live dynamic effects.

You CAN render the dynamics output using movie render queue.

Use Programmatically (Advanced):

  • You can utilise and access the public variables of the ZenDyn Actor Component by adding the component to your Metahuman blueprint and then referencing it.

Use Details Panel:

  • Adjust Default properties in details Panel
    • Note: You cannot adjust properties of the ZenDyn Actor Component in the details panel during P.I.E. This is a limitation of the UnrealEngine Editor. You can change the properties in sequencer or programmatically or before you press play/simulate.

Character:

Metahuman:

  • Here is where you choose your Metahuman Actor that you want ZenDyn to use.

Head Mesh Name:

  • Choose your head skeletal mesh name here.
  • By default Metahumans use “Face” as the mesh name.

Control And Smoothing:

These sliders control the strength/weight and Smoothing of the animation.

Each facial group has various default controls the current available groups are:

  • Brows
  • Eyes
  • Nose
  • Cheeks
  • Mouth
  • Jaw

Control:

  • Control: You can Reduce or Boost animation for each group by adjusting these properties 0 (Disabled/Reduced) , 3 (Boost/Max).

Smoothing:

  • Smoothing: You can also control the amount of smoothing 1 is none and 100 is maximum.

Dynamics:

These properties control live facial dynamics. You can add secondary bone motion to facial animation, and optionally blend in procedural field motion using the Field Generator.

Mode:

Global: Applies one shared dynamic setup to the selected facial hierarchy.

Groups: Exposes separate dynamic settings for Brows, Nose, Cheeks, Mouth and Eyes. Each group is automatically configured with Group Dynamics enabled and its default Group Bones populated.

Field Generator: Procedural field motion is now controlled inside the Global or Group settings. Set Field Type to None to disable procedural field motion.

Global and Groups use the same settings structure. In Global mode the settings affect the global dynamic setup. In Groups mode each facial region has its own copy of these settings.

  • Root Bone: The starting bone used to discover the affected hierarchy. The default facial root is FACIAL_C_FacialRoot.
  • Additional Roots: Optional extra roots to include in the affected hierarchy.
  • Exclude Bones: Bones that should be excluded from dynamics or field motion.
  • Exclude Children Of Excluded Bones: When enabled, children under excluded bones are also excluded. This is enabled by default for the global setup.
  • Group Dynamics: When enabled, only bones listed in Group Bones are affected.
  • Group Bones: The selected bones affected by a group. In Groups mode these are populated automatically for Brows, Nose, Cheeks, Mouth and Eyes.
  • Strength: The strength of the dynamics effect
  • Damping: The Damping effect strength.
  • Stiffness: The stiffness of the effect
  • Gravity: Controls the level of gravity x,y,z. affecting bones.
  • Iterations: Iterations of the Effect
  • Smoothing: Smoothing amount of the effect
  • SmoothInterpSpeedIncreasing: – 0-100. A value of 0 Provides smoothest motion
  • SmoothInterpSpeedDecreasing: – 0-100 A value of 0 Provides smoothest motion
  • Reset : Can be used to hard reset the simulation

Field Generator Parameters:

  • Field Type: Selects the procedural field. Available types are None, Sine Ripple, Ocean, Pulse, Noise Drift, Turbulence, Spiral and Breath. None is the default and disables the field generator.
  • Field Amount: Strength of the procedural field effect.
  • Field Amplitude: Amplitude of the field on the X, Y and Z axes.
  • Field Frequency: Frequency of the procedural field motion.
  • Field Speed: Speed of the procedural field motion.
  • Field Spacing: Spacing between field phases across the affected hierarchy.
  • Random Phase Amount: Amount of random phase variation in the field.
  • Random Seed: User controllable seed for deterministic field variation.
  • Reset: Hard reset of the field generator.

Face:

Use this section to control Facial Animation:

  • Use Breathing: Enables or Disables the Breathing effect
  • Breath Strength: Strength of the breathing effect
  • Breath Speed: The speed of the breathing effect

–

  • Use Emotion : Enables or Disables the Emotion Pose
  • Emotion: Select a predefined Emotion Pose
  • Emotion Strength: The strength of the Emotion Pose
  • Emotion Switch Speed: The speed emotions switch
  • Emotion Blend Type: The type of Blending used to blend Emotion with existing animation.

–

Eyes:

Use this section to Control Eyes:

  • Micro Saccadic Enable: Enables or Disables the Saccadic effect
  • Micro Saccadic Weight: Strength of the Saccadic effect (Left Right/Up Down)
  • Micro Saccadic Speed: The speed of the Saccadic effect (Left Right/Up Down)
  • Generate Blinks: Enable or Disable Auto Blink
  • Blink Interval: The interval between blinks
  • Blink Duration: The duration of each blink
  • Blink Smoothing: Control to smoothing blinks.
  • Enable LiveLink Eye Fix: Use this if you experience problems with eye movement while using LiveLink

Global:

Use this section to control Global properties:

  • Global Control: Overall Animation strength
  • ZenDyn Enabled: Global Enable/Disable
  • Zen Dyn Curves: A Data Asset that contains the curves used for Control and Smoothing.
  • LiveLink Mode: Choose Metahuman Animator or Legacy. Legacy is ARKit. (v1.2.2+)
  • ZenDyn Debug Enabled: Global Debug Enable/Disable