When working with animated characters, there may be times when you want to apply the same animation data to an entirely different character. Using the Copy Pose From Mesh Animation Blueprint node and a little bit of Blueprint Visual Scripting, you can reference a Skeletal Mesh Component and copy whatever pose is being used to another Animation Blueprint for a different Skeletal Mesh.
In this how-to, we use the Copy Pose From Mesh node to copy the player's animations onto another Skeletal Mesh.
Steps
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In the Content/ThirdPersonBP/Blueprints folder, duplicate the ThirdPersonCharacter Blueprint using the default name.
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In the Content/Mannequin/Character/Mesh folder, right-click the SK_Mannequin and under Create, select Anim Blueprint and use the default naming convention.
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Open the ThirdPersonCharacter1 Blueprint from Step 1 and delete all the nodes in the Event Graph.
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Select the Mesh in the Components window, and then in the Details panel, set the Anim Class to UE4_Mannequin_Skeleton_AnimBlueprint.
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Open the UE4_Mannequin_Skeleton_AnimBlueprint, and in the Anim Graph, add the Copy Pose From Mesh node and connect it to the Final Animation Pose, then promote the Source Mesh Component to a variable called Character Reference.
The Character Reference variable will refer to the Skeletal Mesh Component of the character we specify.
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Inside ThirdPersonCharacter1 Blueprint, create a variable called Character Reference and set the Variable Type to Third Person Character, then enable Instance Editable.
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Drag the ThirdPersonCharacter1 Blueprint into the level, then in its Details panel, assign the ThirdPersonCharacter from the level as the Character Reference variable.
By assigning the value here, we will have a reference to the character whose Skeletal Mesh Component we want to copy (in this case, the Player).
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Open the UE4_Mannequin_Skeleton_AnimBlueprint and on the Event Graph use a Try Get Pawn Owner node to Cast to ThirdPersonCharacter1, then off the As Third Person Character 1 pin, get the Character Reference variable.
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Off the Character Reference node, add the Get Mesh node and set the Character Reference variable inside the Animation Blueprint.
The Skeletal Mesh from the Player will now be copied and assigned to the Character Reference inside this Animation Blueprint, driving the character's pose.
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From the Main Toolbar, Play in the Editor.
End Result
When you play in the Editor, the non-playable character will play the same animations as your player character.
As you move around, the other character in the level will copy your animation pose even though that character has no logic or State Machine driving the different poses. While this example copies the player, it is possible to set up a non-playable character (NPC) with AI and a State Machine driving animations, then have another NPC that has no logic copy the pose through the Copy Pose From Mesh node to mimic the same behavior and logic.
When using the Copy Pose From Mesh node, in the Details panel, you can enable Use Attached Parent which will look for an attached parent and use it as the source if the Source Mesh Component is not valid.
Also, you can Copy Curves in addition to Bone Transforms, which will copy the curves that exist in the current Skeleton. If the curve list has changed, it will require the animation system to be reinitialized.