IFF - MetaHuman Cinematic
01
Problem
Client would like to create a 3D character of herself and create short animated cinematic scene. Customer would like story of the cinematic to revolve be around her 3D character.
Task
Develop workflow to reliably scan human face and import it on to Meta Human.
Research latest technologies in photogrammetry field.
Find solution to do it on a home budget without expensive studio equipment.
Create story around character.
Design Level and lighting.
Animate character and record all scenes.
Solution
Use latest available technologies to create 3D Character that resemblance client body physic and facial structure including make up and hairstyle.
Poly Cam: Produce 3D mesh from photos
Blender: 3D software to edit Face Scan
Unreal Engine: To combine 3D scan with MetaHuman Template
MetaHuman Creator: To customize look of MetaHuman
Create story around character.
Design Level and lighting.
Animate character and record all scenes.
02
Complexity of human face and limitation of technologies to overcome ''uncanny valley'' look.
Animating facial expressions by hand
MetaHuman high system requirements and size.
Project started with simple 3D scan of client face. For that Purpose I used Polycam App on mobile phone. Process included taking 70 pictures from different angles of client face. After removing blurry pictures for better processing I was able to export them to Blender to remove unwanted parts and clean up artefacts.
Next step involved importing Face scan from Blender to Unreal Engine to create MetaHuman model with facial structure of my client. Process required few steps as following:
Marking neutral pose frame for solving process.
Highlighting facial landmarks - nose line, eyes, brows, lips and teeth.
Next Step was to export solved MetaHuman to Editor to bring it to live.
Final step was to download create MetaHuman with full body and facial control rig from Quixel Bridge to any project.
Gallery
03
Planning
At the time of undertaking and agreeing to client request I had no experience in photogrammetry and using 3D scans to create digital avatar of humans. There were no deadlines set by the client and whole project was aimed to learn and explore new ways to create characters for games and cinematics.
My approach was very simple and linear - one step at the time. Subsequently, resolve all the issues encountered before moving forward.
Issues and step backs
None of the technical areas such as exporting scan between four different software did not cause any technical issues.
The most time consuming area was hand key framing MetaHuman animations through Sequencer and control rig.
The scope of the project had to be resized due to the time spend on animating facial features like blinking or breathing.
Having True Depth camera that can that can translate video to animation would significantly speed process.
Final product exceeded client expectations and surprised me with quality and resemblance of MetaHuman and my client.
Whole process took four days from scan to finished cinematic.