Imported Filebase Asset Not Playing Mixamo Animation
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Objective: To get my imported Filebase asset to play Mixamo animations.
Currently I have a 3D FBX model of an enemy that I want to use in my project and have imported it from Filebase. At the same time I am wanting to take a shortcut and use some Mixamo animations instead of creating my own, for the abilities that the enemy is going to use.
However what I thought was going to be an easy process has ended up in quite the rabbit hole!
Problem
The 3D model has an Animator component attached to it with a Controller that should play the Mixamo animation when pressing ‘Play’. The animation is playing in the Animator window but the model is stuck in their lifeless T-Pose. Other 3D models work fine.
Checks Done to Determine the Root Problem
- Making sure both the animation and the model are set to ‘Humanoid’ for the ‘Animation Type’ field under the ‘Rig’ tab.
- Check Avatar Definition under the ‘Rig’ tab on both the model and animation and confirm that it is mapped correctly.
- Check for any import errors if using a copy of another avatar.
- Check for incorrect game object names in the Animation window when selecting the animation itself. The text will show up as yellow and identify as (missing!)
- Check that ‘Apply Root Motion’ is not causing the issue with the model.
- Check the Muscles & Settings tab on the models ‘Avatar Configuration’ on the ‘Rig’ tab.
This was where I found the first problem (a scaling issue):
But all indications on the Mapping looked fine:
Problem Solve
After spending a couple hours learning to de-rig armatures and use Mixamo’s Auto Rigging feature only to be met with an error (see below), it was determined that that best/easiest course of action was to resolve this by simply starting over and re-rigging the armatures.
Continue reading below to see why this error occurred and why I was unable to resolve it.
If you wish to continue with the process of learning how to de-rig an asset and use Mixamo’s Auto Rigging feature, please use these links:
How to De-Rig an Existing Assets Armatures in Blender
How to Use Mixamo’s Auto Rigging Feature
Where the Solution Went Wrong (keep reading till the end)
After completing the above steps for de-rigging an asset successfully and uploading the model to Mixamo, I was met with this error:
This error pops up when Mixamo is unable to locate the mesh of the legs of the model as they are hidden under the monsters tutu/kilt/flappy thing.
Alright then, next step, let’s learn how to move the flappy things out of the way so Mixamo can find them!
Moving the Tutu’s Flappy Things Out of the Way Using Blender
First step is to make sure we select as many of the faces as possible so that we can separate it from the existing mesh:
In Edit mode, make sure to select the ‘Face Select’ icon:
After grabbing an initial large chunk I was able to add the rest by holding down ‘Shift’ and clicking on the missing pieces.
From here we need to separate this mesh. Navigate the the second top bar on the left:
Mesh → Separate → Selection
Now we will see the ‘Monster_97.001’ has been split away.
Clicking on the eye symbol next to this will now hide it and you can upload this asset over on Mixamo.
After thinking I was about to have this issue resolved, it all went downhill after the realisation there is no leg mesh surrounding the leg armatures so Mixamo still won’t be able to pick this up!
Learning to sculpt was just something I was not prepared to do at this stage!
I’m sure there are other solutions also, but it was at this point that I decided to not proceed any further and a colleague was able to help me out with re-rigging the asset from scratch.
Lessons Learned
Always be apart of some Game Development network as the community is amazing and some are willing to give up their time to help you by simply re-rigging the asset.
What maybe took this person 10–15mins to re-rig the armatures I spent a couple hours going down the rabbit hole to only fall short.
Don’t get me wrong, I learned a tonne of valuable information along the way and sometimes this is a great approach. But, sometimes it is much easier to ask for help!
