I’ve searched/read/watched others on this topic, but there’s a lot of outdated info out there.
What’s some ways to create characters currently that is quick and makes quality humanoid models?
Would be nice if I could use sliders to edit the face and body types, and try different outfits, skin colors, etc. I know I sound spoiled, but I’m just trying to find info and create a pool of knowledge of the best of what’s out there currently.
I’m trying UMA right now, but I’m not a huge fan of certain things, like I can’t see the character in the scene, not straightforward when hooking up a premade animator to it…
Is there a good Blender plugin, or a Unity Asset I’m missing, or maybe an open source program?
UMA is fabulous. And it is not just characters. You can turn any model into a UMA and the system is great for games where you want to change clothing or body parts.
Most folks judge UMA based on the models included but UMAs can use DAZ or any model from the asset store.
Interesting. I might check it out for use on my cartoony, low-poly models. Is UMA mostly for in-editor characters, or can you use a UMA model to build a run-time character-customize feature?
If you use something like MakeHuman, don’t be stressed out that the models don’t look exactly the way you want. The real benefit of MakeHuman (in my humble opinion) is the beautiful rig provided for you with the model.
I often make a character in it with roughly the right proportions and then in something like blender I go to to town on the model.
As long as you don’t do anything too crazy (like adding extra arms), the skeleton should work 100% with the changes you make to your model. This just saves you quite a few hours as opposed to making them from scratch.
Long story short; MakeHuman is fantastic for a creating a rigged base mesh.
The quick way to make something unique is using low poly. But that’s probably not what you meant by quality.
The quality way is to use software such as Make Human, Manuel Bastioni Lab for blender, Daz 3d (with gaming license), and maybe Mixamo, I mean Adobe Fuse. Those programs and addons are character generators.
Here’s a problem.
Those generated models will have DISTINCT look people will recognize. At least some of them. So as a result, while model will look quality, it may end up having a cheap feeling to it.
MB-Lab has license issue for closed source game unless you use official ManuelbastioniLAB which discontinue since Blender 2.79.
Model generate by MB-Lab must be AGPL 3 while model generate with official ManuelbastioniLAB can be CC 4.0 by.
Welcome back neggy. Unique hq characters is a long lengthy process. IMO. Sketch low poly sculpt t pose texture rig retopo uv unwrap animate. Done properly you’re looking at weeks of work.
You can still use official one with blender 2.79, though.
Additionally, Makehuman (suggested earlier) also has a licensing problem. Makehuman removed *.mhx export plugin from core distribution, and any model extracted from a modified distribution is placed under a viral license. It is kinda nuts, honestly.
I wrote about it before in the past, but the devs of makehuman seems to be interested in destroying their own project by trying to eat the cake and continue to have it. The license is dodgy and best avoided.
Speaking of which, I recall that iClone developers (I think that was iClone developers) made some sort a higher quality character generator, however I can’t remember what it is called and can’t find it on the store anymore. It seems it was discontinued.
hmmm, it is a bit weird.
reading it, they’re saying you only get CC0-licensed output files if you use their official version because their data files are AGPL’d and that’s the specific exception they give you, and noone else can. But they’re implying that their AGPL license would be applicable to new from-scratch data files, and Im actually not sure if that’s legitimate. Im pretty sure GPL isnt intriniscially viral on asset data just because the code that handles it is.
iClone is by reallusion, who also do Character Creator 3.
GPL is inherently viral, however this normally does not apply to output.
The thing is, in case of makehuman output is a derived work from makehuman topology data which is under AGPL. Hence, output is AGPL too unless there’s an exception.
Normally in this kind of scenario a developer that still has a shred of sanity despite sticking to GPL (/joke) provides an exception. For example, IIRC, gcc despite being GPL provides exception for its runtime library and allows linking to it. Without such exception compiler would’ve been completely unusable for non-gpl projects, as linking with C/C++ runtime would make your project GPL.
The part I disliked about makehuman is this:
Basically, in situation where you deduce makehuman data from CC0 output they claim “it is now AGPL, because magic”.
That’s a major red flag and a good reason to avoid the program.