ZENBLINK Tutorial for UnrealEngine

[@Jobutsu]

I put a lot of effort into these tools and decided to stop hoarding them. This is the first plugin, I hope some of you will find it useful.

[@entropychef]

I have been looking for ages to get a closeup when pupils diolate. Blinking, subtleties...Awesome! Of course inspired by Blade Runner. Awesome work! Next up, breath in cold climates.

[@Jobutsu]

The next update has even better pupil constriction.

[@AngryMan540]

Fab really needs a wishlist….

[@TheDigiVault]

An incredibly useful and time saving tool.

[@SimonePixel]

Very cool! This will save a lot of time for sure!

[@jbach]

Great idea! Does this include control for saccadic eye movements? Add the ability to also customize iris and this will be a must-have!

[@3dchick]

Bought!! 😀

[@Jobutsu]

Enjoy!, If there is anything you would like to see in the next version, let me know. The animation will be a lot smoother, I am already working on that.

[@knartfocker_]

Very cool seeing all the parameters, one thought I also had is a hybrid mode for eye movement type where it will track a target but also randomly look around at the target, it might get a bit too realistic at that point tho😅

[@Jobutsu]

You could create random eye movement, record it and then use ZenBlink again with weight set to 0.5 and blend it with the recorded animation maybe ? I never tried that but it may work.

[@renderme2550]

Nice idea. A little bit like iclone's Digital Soul pack. I've been hoping someone would develop a similar tool for UE as it's cumbersome bringing Digital Soul animations into Unreal. Purchasing to support your future development efforts.

[@Jobutsu]

And I promise there will be future development, regardless of sales. These are the tools I use.

[@Phyzx420]

ZENBLINK with UE 5.5 lip sync I will have to get this.

[@weshootfilms]

does the follow command override any face animations

[@Jobutsu]

If you mean existing animation, only eyes,blinking,pupils and head. You adjust weight to obtain the desired result.

[@farzanb]

This is great, how would you then blend a recorded animation from zen blink and combine it with lets say a mouth recorded animation? is there a way to blend 2 animations in the sequencer or unreal?

[@Jobutsu]

You can use "Weight" on any animation track in sequencer to blend animations. 0 no blend - 1 full blend.

[@farzanb]

@@Jobutsu Thank you for the reply mate, I know of that one but doesn't that over write it? it blends the entire animation but if the head and eyes are on one track and mouth on another I feel there should be an easy way to blend them aside from creating an elaborate control rig. Not sure if that makes sense.

[@Jobutsu]

So if you have a facial animation on one track and the recorded ZenBlink on the other ? I do not know. ZenBlink overwrites eye,blink, head, pupils when it is running with a weight of 1. Maybe there is a way to record all facial animation tracks including ZenBlink ?

[@farzanb]

@@Jobutsu I see. I don't have access to it but is it possible you can do a demo? Like use your tool and unreal new audio to face tool together in sequencer and see if they can work together? That be amazing. Sorry hopefully it's not alot to ask, I feel show casing that working together will def make me buy it. Regardless thou, thank you for doing good work! Tools and tutorials!

[@Jobutsu]

I will do this.

[@Conbini.]

This is cool, one question that is both a greater Unreal Sequencer question and about this specific plugin -if I add Zenblink into sequencer to play *with* an existing facial animation, will that somehow weaken or dilute the existing animation? I'm sure you've seen how Unreal Sequencer will do that if you try to add multiple animations, it sort of brings down the strength of the existing animation (sort of like turning down the blend weight), which can make facial animations feel way too subdued / anesthetized / lifeless. Thanks, I hope that's not the case, and looking forward to trying this out!

[@Jobutsu]

At a weight of 1 this will override blinks, eye movement, pupils and head movement. I took as much care as possible to ensure it did not dilute any other animation that enters the Animation Instance. The ZenBlink animation layer processes at the end of the animation graph before post process.

[@Conbini.]

@@Jobutsu Dope, buying it now! Thanks for the quick reply. This will be a fun tool and a lifesaver for projects. I have been sort of struggling with Unreal combining the body & face anims for Metahuman, where while I successfully got them both to work, it almost spontaneously does that thing where both the animations seem to influence each other and hence both become diluted / less "weight"-y... Wonder what the key is.

[@commontimeproductions]

Are you able to keyframe the eye constriction? Great plugin idea!

[@Jobutsu]

You can record the animation in sequencer and do with it as you wish. But you can already keyframe pupil constriction. The purpose of this is to save you that time, so that you can do something else in the project.

[@commontimeproductions]

@@Jobutsu Wow, I didn't know that I could already do that! I love your plugin! Just picked it up on Fab. Thanks a million :)

[@Jobutsu]

There have been reports of a minor bug in the UE5.5 version, I already submitted a fix. If you have that problem, send a msg with your order number to support email and I will provide the fix.

[@commontimeproductions]

@@Jobutsu Thanks so much for the heads up! I plan on checking it out later today when I finally get to sit down with the engine. You rock!

[@renderme2550]

@@Jobutsu If we purchased on the day of release and it's in our FAB library is the fix automatically applied to the one in the library if we haven't used it yet?

[@yarosreddeadredemption8659]

Hello! Thank you very much for your plugin! It has great potential for my work with animation. I bought it and tried to understand a little how it works and I had some questions and difficulties (I'm new to animation and maybe I'm doing something wrong): 1) is it possible to control the strength of the influence of emotions, they seemed a little monotonous and too calm to me, for example, for anger, I wanted the eyebrows to frown more, and for fear, the eyes were more open and darted faster. 2) is it possible to record animation not only of the eyes and head during active zenblink, but also if body animation is used, to record everything that is in the sequence? Just when activating the recording, the character cancels all settings, gets into a T pose and only the eye movement and a little head are recorded 3) is it possible to make the eyes follow the target for some time, then at some point "get distracted" removing themselves from the target of approach, and then again follow the target, perhaps another one? When I tried to implement this in a sequence, the switch from tracking to random happened abruptly, with a noticeable jerk.

[@Jobutsu]

1. Next update. This first version does not control brows etc, only eyes, lids, pupils and head. 2. I need to explore this further before I can give a definitive answer. 3. I am actively working on a resolution for smoother switching, it is in the TODO queue. But it is taking some time because the targeting and random modes are independent functionality in the code and so the code needs large sections rewriting.

[@yarosreddeadredemption8659]

Thank you very much for your work, right now this is an incredibly useful plugin for me, I will follow the updates!)

[@harmonytron]

Do you have discord? I buy your product but can't understand how to make it blink and rig animation together.

[@Jobutsu]

There is a support email on the Fab marketplace. You can contact that with your order number if you need help. I am busy with the next update of ZenBlink, so there may be a slight delay in my response over the next week but I will make time for anyone that buys the plugin.

[@chj6362]

Is it possible to use with Unreal Engine 5.5 MetaHuman lip-sync?

[@Jobutsu]

Yes. Create the lipsync animation, use it with sequencer and run ZenBlink

[@barefootash]

@@Jobutsu Thanks, I bought it and am excited to get it going. So far, no luck. On thing is when I try to zero out once dragging into my scene in 5.5, it just crashes UE. I apply the setting other than that, and it doesn't show the animation when I hit simulate. Also tried in sequencer. Steps I take are: Drag ZB into my project, set to my metahuman, chose the appropriate setting, try to simulate and nothing. I am sure I am missing some basic step.

[@Jobutsu]

Contact the support email with your order number and I will send you a working version. There is a bug in the UE5.5 version of the blueprints that is causing problems for some people. I have submitted a fix already but it will take a while to appear on Fab.

[@barefootash]

@@Jobutsu Thanks so much! I'll do that.

[@gazablife4065]

Loved it to the core :) thanks @jobutsu