The MetaHuman Character Rig SOP used to assemble characters is only available in Houdini 21.0 or later.
This guide shows how to assemble a MetaHuman Character in SideFX Houdini. It assumes you have already created a MetaHuman Character in Unreal Engine and used the DCC Export pipeline to export the head DNA, body DNA, and texture files.
The DCC Export assembly pipeline has the option to export either a folder or a zip archive. If using a zip archive, you must extract the contents to a separate folder before using the contents with the Character Assembler.
Assembling the MetaHuman
Open Houdini, then create or open a scene.
Create a Geometry node and enter the geometry context.
Create a new instance of a MetaHuman Character Rig SOP.
In the node parameters, set the MetaHumans Folder. This should be the folder that contains a specific MetaHuman character exported from Unreal Engine.
After selecting the folder, the character will begin being assembled into the Houdini scene automatically, and appear in the viewport after a few moments.
(Optional) Configure the import settings to import the head, body, and textures, as well as the number of LODs. If animated maps are evaluated there could be an impact on rig performance.
See the MetaHuman Character Rig HDA reference documentation for more information about the parameters available for this node.
Preparing for Animation
To prepare the MetaHuman character for animation using the APEX animation context;
Create an APEX Scene Add Character SOP. Connect the output of the MetaHuman Character Rig SOP to the second input.
Create an APEX Scene Animate SOP. Connect the output from the APEX Scene Add Character SOP (created in the previous step) to the input.
Select the APEX Scene Animate SOP, turn on the display flag and click on Animate in the left toolbar.
You can then begin to animate the character using the Faceboard and body rig controls.
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