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Create and upload a VRChat Avatar with blend shapes visemes - Remaster

12/16/2020

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The Mission
VRChat uses blend shapes to detect phonemes via a microphone, and adjust your character mouth to the correct shapes, giving the impression that you character is talking.
Resources
  • MayaLT 2018
  • Unity 2018.4.20f1
How to do Blend Shapes Visemes for VRChat
Isn't it great when you talk with somebody online and you see his mouth moving while he talks?
It really add ups to the experience, specially in Virtual Reality.

That's what this is about.
Creating different shapes so you can see yourself talking when you look at a mirror.
​
It's the little touches that makes something good to something better.
Let's say you already have your model done, it's also rigged and skinned so its ready to go.
​But, you want to make some blend shapes because in-game they look neat and funny.
​
Well, let's make them!
​

First, we need to know how many blend shapes we need to make. VRChat uses 16 different blend shapes. These are:
  • Blink Both eyes
  • aa
  • ch
  • dd
  • ee
  • ff
  • ih
  • kk
  • nn
  • oh
  • ou
  • pp
  • rr
  • ss
  • sil (silence)
  • th
To make things easier in the future, I highly recommend always using the same prefix for each name, so later in Unity it's almost automatic. The prefix being vrc_v_blendshapename.
Different blend shapes visemes used in VRChat
This gives you a general idea of how I made the different shapes of the mouth depending on the viseme. Another thing to keep in mind is that even if vrc_v_sil doesn't change the shape whatsoever, you must change something regardless.
​
Now that we have every shape done, we will use the Shape Editor.
Open the Shape Editor in the sculpting tab in Maya. Or going to Deform>Blend Shape.
Autodesk Maya Deform Blend Shape
Now, select one shape that you created and then select the original model. Go to the Shape Editor and click on "Create Blend Shape". Repeat this with all the 16 shapes.
Autodesk MayaLT Shape Editor tab
Export and import

We have every shape ready, so now we will export all the package.
Select all the shapes, meshes and bones and go to export.
Be mindful of checking in the box of Animation and make sure that Blend Shapes is activated too, if it's not, it won't export correctly.
Autodesk Maya export blend shapes
Now write the name you want and export it.
Upload

You should have your Unity 2018.4.20f1 or whichever version VRChat uses already set up. If you don't, check this guide out made by my friend Alejandro Peño where he explains how to set it up:
Upload Avatars to VRChat Cross-Platform (PC and Oculus Quest).
With the character imported, we will add a new component called VRC_Avatar Descriptor.
Unity 3D VRC_Avatar Descriptor component
Now it will appear a couple of parameters you can edit.
Unity 3D VRC_Avatar Descriptor component
We are only going to modify 3 of them. View position, LipSync and Eye Look.
View Position

This parameter allows you to decide where the first person point of view is located. In other words, from where are you going to see inside VRChat.
It is a no-brainer that we should put the little indicator at eye level. As close as posible to the eyes.
Avatar view position in Unity for VRChat
Lip Sync

How can we make our character talk? With this option right here!
In mode, select Viseme Blend Shape.
Unity VRChat Viseme Blend Shape
Now it will appear a Face Mesh tab. Using the little circle on the right, you can select the mesh where the Blend Shape Visemes are stored. In this case, since it's all the same mesh, we only have one option.
Unity VRChat Viseme Blend Shape
Now we are talking (pun intended). Like I said before, putting the right names, makes our lives easier. Every single blend shape is in place. But just to be sure, give it a look.
Unity VRChat Viseme Blend Shape
Eye Look

If you have sharp eyes, you might have realized that blink was nowhere to be seen (These puns just keep coming). That's because we will use the Eye Look tab to configure it.
​
Click on Enable and a couple of options will appear.
Ignore the others and go to the Eyelids section and select the blendshapes option.
Unity VRChat Eye Look
Select once again the mesh where the BlendShapes are stored, and it will appear something like this.
Unity VRChat Blink Eye look
If something is not properly added, you can change it from here. Since we don't have only the Blink Blendshape states, we will leave Blink like it is and change the other 2 so they don't have any state at all. Like this:
Unity VRChat Eyelids
PRO TIP

Use the preview button to make sure that everything works correctly. You can even check all the other blendshapes if you want!
Once it's finished, you can upload the character like you usually do. Again, if you don't know how to do it, you can check this guide:
Upload Avatars to VRChat Cross-Platform (PC and Oculus Quest).
Conclussion

Blend shapes visemes are a great way to give life to your avatars in VRChat.
​I would 100% recommend using them in your future avatars.
Depending on the model it takes around 30 minutes to an hour
​to create all the shapes needed, and they look great.
​
It's a lot of fun making these, so give them a try!
Picture
Pedro Solans
3D ANIMATOR
​Junior 3D Animator improving every day possible. Videogame and cat enthusiast.
Twitter
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How to Rig and Prepare your Avatar for the Metaverse using Maya

12/16/2020

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The Mission

What do we have inside? Bones. So do all of our (and yours too) Avatars. But, how do we put them there? And more importantly, what can we do to adjust them to every posible humanoid avatar?
​Let's find out!
Resources

  • Maya LT 2018
  • Your favourite internet browser
Rig your avatar for the Metaverse using Maya by Polygonal Mind
Getting the rig

Since we want humanoid avatars, the best way to get a fast rig is using Mixamo.
Mixamo is an automatic rigging website tool that allows you to create quick humanoid for free.
I won't cover how to use Mixamo, since we already have that cover in this post here:
https://www.notion.so/polygonalmind/Fix-and-reset-your-Mixamo-rig-Pedro-eccd01b2095545749e0a3d2a3e573558

​But I will explain how to use all the tools that I used when rigging almost every of the +200 different avatars we have made for the 100 Avatars project.
So tag along, because the world of rigging is one where patience is KEY.
Avatar imported

You have the avatar on your Maya proyect ready now.

​There are a few places where you have to take a closer look since these are the most problematic areas. These areas are shoulders, armpit and hands. Depending on the character you might have to take a look at other places, specially if it is a complex character.
Bones too big?

Maybe super small?
​
Go to Display>Animation>
​Joint Size
and you can change it there!
Maya Rig Joint Size
Maya Rig character
Ask yourself; are all the bones where they are supposed to be?
In this case... no. Using the X-Ray Bones options you can easly see where each bone is inside the body.
Maya Rig X-Ray Bones
In this case, the shoulders aren't where they should be, so, how can we move them?
Maya rig
With a really useful tool called Moved Skinned Joints.

Go to the Rigging tab, and then to Skin. Almost at the bottom, you should find the tool. Click on the square on the right and then on any joint. Now you can move them freely without any problem!
Maya skin rigging
Use it to move the shoulders where they should be.
maya rigging
Now it's time to skin!
Maya paint skin weights
Open the Paint Skin Weights on the same skin tab as before.
​
Be sure to click the square on the right.
​
If you had your mesh selected now all should appear black and white, representing the different areas where each bone has influence on the mesh.
It will also appear this new window.
​
On the upper part you can see each bone of the rig. Everytime you click on one, you will see the influence of the bone in the mesh.
​
Every bone has a lock on the left, this serves to "freeze" the bone and its values so it never changes. Super usefull.
​
Right below that you can select different modes.
  • Paint: The default option where you can paint influences which you set the value down below.
  • Select: Select any vertex, face or edge so you can only paint those regions.
  • Paint Select: Both in one
​
Then there's paint operation:
  • Replace: Replaces values for the current value.
  • Add: ADD the value to the current value.
  • Scale: Same as add, but scaling.
  • Smooth: Allows you to smooth the influence between different values so the change is not that sudden.
Maya rigging
Maya rig skin weight
Profile allows you to select what kind of brush you want to use. The currently selected simply put the values on every vertex it touches.
The other ones simply scales down the values the more you are on the extreme of the brush.
Value is the value you set the influence of the brush. More means more influence. The maximum is 1 and the least is 0.
​
The Flood button makes every selected region get the value you selected.
maya rig brush
Lastly, you can select how big the brush size is by pressing and holding the B key on the 3D Viewer.
With this explanation of the tools, you should have a good idea of how to skin a character inside Maya.
​
Now, skinning is not an easy thing, at least to make it right. It requires a lot of patience. A couple of advices I can give are, try to use the 1 value as little as you can. You should also use the smooth option since it really is unvaluable. Dont be scared of rotating bones. Aim to get the cleanest breaking point in your mesh.
Conclusion

Remember to check those zones I wrote about earlier and have fun! Skinning is an important process and takes time. The more you practice the better you will become!
What now?
If you want to see what's the next step, read my post about how to make visemes for your avatar and configure it inside Unity!
https://www.polygonalmind.com/blog-posts/create-and-upload-a-vrchat-avatar-with-blend-shapes-visemes-remaster

Picture
Pedro Solans
3D ANIMATOR
Junior 3D Animator improving every day possible. Videogame and cat enthusiast.
Twitter
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