Native Dancer: Jingle Dancer in Motion

Author: Ariann Rousu – Native Dancer Digital Artist

Summary

This Native Dancer blog documents the process of animating the Jingle Dancer using data from the Xsens motion capture system. Mainly transferring motion from the default skeleton used for Xsens to the Jingle Dancer within the Unreal Game Engine. Including preparing the character for animation and bone mapping. These steps demonstrate how we are mimicking traditional Native dances and regalia in a real-time game engine environment. As mentioned in previous Native Dancer Project Blogs, we recorded the dancing animations from live powwow dancers.

Importing Assets

The jingle dancer character was imported into Unreal Engine as an FBX file, preserving the skeletal structure required for animation. Included with the import of a Character Creator character to Unreal should include a skeletal mesh, skeleton, physics, and textures. Because of the complexity of the character, the clothing and accessories were imported separately.

Before beginning any animation work, the clothing and accessories were attached to the character’s physics asset. Adding these elements at this stage ensured the character was fully assembled and physically consistent prior to animation testing. The garments are not equipped with cloth physics but are weighted as static meshes. Meaning they move with the character but are not being simulated using physical properties that mimic real clothing. Cloth physics will be added later to mimic real clothing, for now I am only setting up the animations.

IK Rig Set up

For animation compatibility and retargeting, an IK rig was set up for the Movin Man mannequin. This step establishes a consistent control structure for applying and transferring animation data between characters.

The CC4 character included an IK rig from the original FBX import through Character Creator 4, possible with Unreal Plugins. I used the bone map from the CC4 Characters IKrig to create new bone maps for the Movin Man Mannequin. With both the mannequin and CC4 character aligned through IKs, the characters were tested and retargeted within the Unreal Engine.

Putting it All Together

To start I aligned the bones of the CC4 character to match the IK setup of the xSens mannequin. This ensures that both characters start in the same pose, allowing the motion that follows to align more accurately. The IK Retargeter also allows for previewing the animation on the character.

To apply the motion and make it usable in Unreal scenes, both characters are added to an animation sequencer. Attaching the animation to the linked characters allows for the character to perform in the scene. From here I can edit the animation’s start and end frames, set up camera angles, record the animation and more.

What’s Next?

Although this character is at the most completed stage it has been, there are still adjustments to be made, and the steps outlined in this blog maybe repeated again before the final character is ready. Stay tuned for the steps and troubleshooting that is going into adding cloth physics to the clothing of this character. I hope to have the whole character, included weighted bouncy jingles completed soon.