Animation Node Technical Guide

Animation nodes are used inside of Anim Blueprints to perform operations, such as working with Animation Assets, blending Animation Poses, and manipulating a Skeletal Mesh's bones. A suite of animation nodes are included in Unreal Engine, but you can also create custom nodes to fit the needs of your project.

To open an Animation Blueprint in your project's source code editing IDE, open the AnimBP in the AnimBP Eitor, and click the Parent Class link in the top-left of the editor window.

Anatomy of an Animation Node

The two essential components of any Animation nodes are:

• A runtime struct that performs the actual operations to generate an output pose.
• An editor-time container class that handles visual aspects and functionality of the node within the graph, such as node titles and the context menu.

In order to add a new animation node, both of these must be created.

Node Hierarchies

It is possible to create a hierarchy of nodes, but any non-abstract editor-time classes should contain exactly one runtime node.

Do not add additional nodes when deriving unless the parent was abstract and did not contain one.

See the UAnimGraphNode_BlendListBase node family for examples.

Runtime Node Component

The runtime struct is derived from FAnimNode_Base and is responsible for initialization, updating, and performing operations on one or more input poses to generate the desired output pose. It also declares any input pose links and any properties needed by the node to perform the desired operation.

Pose Inputs

In the runtime node, pose inputs are exposed by creating properties of the type FPoseLink or FComponentSpacePoseLink. FPoseLink is used when working with poses in local space, such as blending animations. FComponentSpacePoseLink is used when working with poses in component space, such as applying skeletal controllers.

An Anim BP node can have a single pose input. The following are examples of animation nodes using a single pose input.

An Anim BP node can also have more than one pose input pin for nodes that blend between multiple animations:

Once implemented into your custom Anim BP node, each of these properties will display a pose link input pin.

Properties of this type are always exposed as input pins. They cannot be optionally hidden or used only as editable properties in the Details panel.

Properties and Data Inputs

You can assign any number of properties to an AnimBP that are used to perform the operations of the node. Similar to other properties, you can declare custom properties using the UPROPERTY macro.

Using special metadata keys, animation node properties can be exposed as data inputs pins to allow values to be passed to the node. The following are metadata keys you can use when create custom AnimBP nodes for your project.

Optional Pins

For properties that are hidden, but exposable in the AnimGraph, using keys like PinHiddenByDefault or PinShownByDefault, you can expose properties in the node's Details panel, by navigating to the property and toggling Expose As Pin from the dropdown menu.

You can also hide property pins from the AnimGraph by right-clicking the pin you want to hide, navigating to the Binding option and toggling Expose As Pin from the dropdown menu.

Editor Node Component

The editor class is derived from UAnimGraphNode_Base and is responsible for visual elements like the node's title or adding context menu actions.

The editor-time class should contain an instance of your runtime node exposed as editable.

	UPROPERTY(Category=Settings)
	FAnimNode_ApplyAdditive Node;

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UPROPERTY(Category=Settings) FAnimNode_ApplyAdditive Node;

Title

You can override the appearance of an Animation node's title elements in the AnimGraph, such as the text and background color, using the GetNodeTitle and GetNodeTitleColor functions.

For example, the UAnimGraphNode_ApplyAdditive node uses a gray background and displays "Apply Additive":

	FLinearColor UAnimGraphNode_ApplyAdditive::GetNodeTitleColor() const
	{
		return FLinearColor(0.75f, 0.75f, 0.75f);
	}

	FString UAnimGraphNode_ApplyAdditive::GetNodeTitle(ENodeTitleType::Type TitleType) const
	{
		return TEXT("Apply Additive");
	}

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FLinearColor UAnimGraphNode_ApplyAdditive::GetNodeTitleColor() const { return FLinearColor(0.75f, 0.75f, 0.75f); } FString UAnimGraphNode_ApplyAdditive::GetNodeTitle(ENodeTitleType::Type TitleType) const { return TEXT("Apply Additive"); }

Tooltip

When creating custom animation nodes you can create custom tooltips that are viewable in the AnimGraph by overriding the GetTooltip function:

	FString UAnimGraphNode_ApplyAdditive::GetTooltip const
	{
		return TEXT("Apply additive animation to normal pose");
	}

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FString UAnimGraphNode_ApplyAdditive::GetTooltip const { return TEXT("Apply additive animation to normal pose"); }

Context Menu

When creating your own custom animation nodes, you can add node-specific options to the node's context menu, which is accessible by right-clicking the node in the AnimGraph. You can add context menu options to your custom animation nodes using the GetContextMenuActions function, which also is a function of all Blueprint nodes in Unreal Engine.

For example, the UAnimGraphNode_LayeredBoneBlend node adds context-menu options for adding a Add Blend Pin or Remove Blend Pin:

	void UAnimGraphNode_LayeredBoneBlend::GetContextMenuActions(const FGraphNodeContextMenuBuilder& Context) const
	{
		if (!Context.bIsDebugging)
		{
			if (Context.Pin != NULL)
			{
				// we only do this for normal BlendList/BlendList by enum, BlendList by Bool doesn't support add/remove pins
				if (Context.Pin->Direction == EGPD_Input)
				{
					//@TODO: Only offer this option on arrayed pins
					Context.MenuBuilder->BeginSection("AnimNodesLayeredBoneBlend", NSLOCTEXT("A3Nodes", "LayeredBoneBlend", "Layered Bone Blend"));
					{
						Context.MenuBuilder->AddMenuEntry(FGraphEditorCommands::Get().RemoveBlendListPin);
					}
					Context.MenuBuilder->EndSection();
				}
			}
			else
			{
				Context.MenuBuilder->BeginSection("AnimNodesLayeredBoneBlend", NSLOCTEXT("A3Nodes", "LayeredBoneBlend", "Layered Bone Blend"));
				{
					Context.MenuBuilder->AddMenuEntry(FGraphEditorCommands::Get().AddBlendListPin);
				}
				Context.MenuBuilder->EndSection();
			}
		}
	}

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void UAnimGraphNode_LayeredBoneBlend::GetContextMenuActions(const FGraphNodeContextMenuBuilder& Context) const { if (!Context.bIsDebugging) { if (Context.Pin != NULL) { // we only do this for normal BlendList/BlendList by enum, BlendList by Bool doesn't support add/remove pins if (Context.Pin->Direction == EGPD_Input) { //@TODO: Only offer this option on arrayed pins Context.MenuBuilder->BeginSection("AnimNodesLayeredBoneBlend", NSLOCTEXT("A3Nodes", "LayeredBoneBlend", "Layered Bone Blend")); { Context.MenuBuilder->AddMenuEntry(FGraphEditorCommands::Get().RemoveBlendListPin); } Context.MenuBuilder->EndSection(); } } else { Context.MenuBuilder->BeginSection("AnimNodesLayeredBoneBlend", NSLOCTEXT("A3Nodes", "LayeredBoneBlend", "Layered Bone Blend")); { Context.MenuBuilder->AddMenuEntry(FGraphEditorCommands::Get().AddBlendListPin); } Context.MenuBuilder->EndSection(); } } }

Derived Native Getters

You can create your own UAnimInstance derived class to achieve performance improvements . You can add new getters if there is a need for improved performance. You can set up a new getter following the steps below:

• The getter functions must be tagged as UFUNCTIONS.
• They must be BlueprintPure.
• They must include the metadata AnimGetter="True".

They must also define some specifically named parameters (this is also explained above the base anim getter functions in AnimInstance.h). That list of parameters includes :

You can also use helper functions to get the actual nodes in your getters. These exist on the UAnimInstance: