Version 1.3.2: Rigify Part 1


Full Image on Artstation


Github page - Release Page

Changelog
1.3.2

• Face rig Automatic Weight failure detection and (some) auto-correction.
• Support for Voxel Heat Diffuse Skinning add-on for voxel weight mapping of the face rig.

1.3.1

• Optional two stage Rigify process to allow modifications to the meta-rig.
• Optional basic face rigging.
• Support for ActorCore character Rigging. (Only with basic face rigging)
• Support for G3 character generation, which includes Toon base characters. (i.e. the old CC3 base)
• Support for rigging G3Plus, G3, ActorCore characters exported from iClone. (iClone exports with no bone name prefix)
• Some Control Widget fixes and scaling.
• Better character Generation check on import for exports without JSON data.

1.3.0

• Rigify function added.
• Character objects are bound to the Rigify control rig.
• Vertex weights are remapped to Rigify deformation bones.

Rather than wait for a video to show-case this, I'll release this now. Rigging is a complex process and I want to make sure the initial rigging works before pushing ahead with trying to figure out animation re-targettng and exporting.

• CC3+ (G3Plus)
• CC3 (G3)
• Actor Core (with G3 skeletons)

CC3+ and CC3 characters can be fully face rigged (as they have a consistent UV map which can be used as a reference for face positions). Actor Core models all have different UV maps and it is impossible to place the face bones automatically. The face rig will work on top of the blend shapes and so can act as a way to refine facial expressions or go beyond them.

As an alternative I have made a custom basic face rig than can control Actor Core characters eyes and jaw. It is also optionally available on all other characters types if you don't want the full face rig and just want to animate the face with Blendshapes alone.

Face Rigging Notes
Mapping the full face rig relies on Blender's "Parent with Automatic Weights" function, which is unfortunately quite unreliable. So I have included some checks to detect any failure to weight correctly in which case the add-on will try to clean up the suspect meshes and temporarily reduce them to only the head parts to try and get a successful weight mapping.

If you have the add-on Voxel Heat Diffuse Skinning (which is a paid add-on, but there is a free version (link) the author made as a more reliable replacement for "Parent with Automatic Weights"), there is a button (after the character is rigged) to try and bind the face rig with this method of weight mapping, which never fails but the results are a little different.


Animation Retargeting
Animation retargetting is still possible using 3rd party add-ons. I have been having some success with the Rokoko re-targeting add-on, which is free to use but needs an account with Rokoko. I will try to get a demonstration video of this out soon.

*If* I can figure out the retargeting process then hopefully it will be possible to include an automatic retargeting function.

Hello Victor, I have tested the Blender too to export to Unity and I found it great overall.
I do have a question, more a feature request but it might be completely out of scope of this tool.

Would you consider creating a  solution for merging materials for the Unity exporter? (not the round trip to CC3 obviously)
I want to explain:

Since Smart Hair and Brows/Beards came to CC3 it's simply a mess to get "Game Ready" characters that look decent enough.
If I use LOD: Original character (LOD0) is working great. Next LODs are simply a big mess (Hair/Beard are awful and not acceptable even from a distance)
If I use Merge Material: I can't pick what to merge and CC3 will output Beards/Brows/Hairs that aren't compatible with the Unity CC3 Import tool. Actually I have the impression that CC3 Import tools simply don't apply any custom shaders when Merged materials is used.

When I saw the Blender tool Unity export I thought that might be the key.
Would it be conceivable to have some sort of material merging (or atlasing) tool so we can define for example: 
-Merge all Body Materials to 1 Material (possibility to include Nails or other items that make sense)
-Merge all Beard and Brows Objects + Atlas to 1 Material
-Merge Clothing and Atlas

The Reallusion built-in tools just don't work properly for this when Smart Hair is involved. For the project I'm working on I don't mind have PBR Skin but I do care having proper Hair/Beard/Brows looking from a normal distance (not close up)

I hope this could get some traction for getting some really neat options for optimizing game characters.
The goal is to reduce draw calls here. I don't mind setting up myself the LOD groups then having a LOD0 with original character with 250+ draw calls is ok then LOD1 ~80 drawcalls etc.
Here are a few screenshots as reference. I know they are not taken from CC3 to Blender to Unity but directly CC3 to Unity, I'm using this post because I believe that this kind of things could potentially be handled by the Blender plugin

Character from CC3:


Imported normally to Unity with HQ materials (3D Pipeline) - 239 draw calls (with your sample scene)


Imported in Unity with LOD groups:
LOD0 / LOD1 (notice that even colors on clothing are not kept from RL LOD creation) - 55 Draw calls in LOD1
Again, the goal isn't to view this up close, but it should be at least acceptable on the Hair/brows to not distinguish a big chunk of mess like this


Merged Materials by Type (that one isn't even recognized by Unity import tool so it doesn't apply any of your shaders) - 96 Draw calls (a good balance if that would be an LOD1 character)

Blender Auto setup Tool 1.2.2

I'm using an HDRI from PolyHaven.com (formerly HDRIHaven.com), along with a Sun lamp, area lamps and point lights.

@lightbearer
 
Just out of curiosity, what are you using for lighting when you render in Cycles?


artstation.com/dreadmoormediaarts

Image created using the Basic Shader.

Here is a picture of the node structure, if it helps.

I've been working on the project for a little more than a week now, so I believe everything was brought in under v 1.2.2, but I can't rule out that I used an earlier version of the plugin (though I don't believe so).

The Emission Strength on the Head Skin Shader is set to 1. I did zero it out and it shows the same result. 

Worse case scenario, I will use the Basic Material. It still looks quite good.

It looks like there either entirely too much subsurface or there's some emission in there.

Check that the emission settings are all set to zero.

In the material nodes on the skin shader, is anything plugged into the subsurface radius socket? (There's not supposed to be.)

Were the materials in the blend file originally built with an older version of the add-on?

In your opinion, is there a way to keep the flexibility of using the Advanced Shader and the various tweaks in this situation?

Using 1.2.2 

But I think I figured it out. I had Rebuild Advanced Materials selected. When I used Rebuild Basic Materials, the skin looks "normal."