MetaBridge DNA — User Guide

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What's New

v2.1.4 — Proportions

• NEW: Proportions. Leg, torso, neck and arm length, shoulder and hip width, waist, chest, hips, thigh, calf, arm and neck size, head size, and heel and front height for high heels — with a one-click Long Legs look. The feet stay on the ground, clothing and hair follow, and the new proportions go out with DNA export, MD Live and Cascadeur. See section 7.

Fixes

• After Remove Rigify Rig (or deleting the control rig by hand), the character kept acting as if the rig were still there — Proportions stayed hidden and Import FBX Animation stayed blocked, even for a new character built in the same slot. Both are available again as soon as the rig is gone.
• Thin lines showed on the skin along the UV seams — round the ankle and along the sole most of all. The skin now shades smoothly across them, as it does in Unreal.
• Body Blend weight sliders, Refit Clothing To Body and Clothing Offset respond several times faster.

What is this addon?

MetaBridge DNA lets you bring Epic Games MetaHuman characters into Blender, pose their faces in real time, and export them back out.

With it you can:

• Load a MetaHuman character (head + body) into Blender
• Move sliders or bones to make facial expressions — no shape key editing needed
• Save your favorite expressions as reusable presets, and blend several at once
• Drive the face live from an iPhone using Apple's Live Link Face app
• Build an animatable body rig (Rigify) for the character
• Blend multiple bodies together, and dress the result in clothing and hair
• Export everything back to DNA, FBX, or glTF

Everything is in one place: open the N panel on the right side of the 3D Viewport, and look for the MetaBridge DNA tab.

Installing

MetaBridge DNA is a Blender Extension. Either:

• drag the metabridge_dna-*.zip into the Blender window, or
• Edit ▸ Preferences ▸ Add-ons ▸ Install from Disk, and pick the .zip.

Blender needs 4.5 or newer, and Windows 64-bit.

Updating and removing are done from Edit ▸ Preferences ▸ Add-ons, the same as any other extension.

If you were using an earlier version installed the old way, remove it first — Blender will otherwise load both and the panels appear twice.

Plug-ins for the other programs

Three features reach into a program outside Blender, and each needs a small plug-in on that side.

Marvelous Designer's and Cascadeur's plug-ins come with this addon — nothing to download. The Unreal one does not fit inside this package, so Open Unreal Plugin Folder (in Edit ▸ Preferences ▸ Add-ons ▸ MetaBridge DNA) fetches it the first time you click it instead — needs an internet connection just that once.

Install Cascadeur Plugin does the same automatic repair if its own local copy is ever missing or incomplete, before it installs anything.

Install none of them to start with. Each section below sets up its own when you get there, and a feature you never use costs you nothing.

The third_party folder sits inside the installed addon:

%APPDATA%\Blender Foundation\Blender\<version>\extensions\user_default\metabridge_dna\third_party

Replace <version> with the Blender you installed it into — 4.5, 5.0 and so on. Paste the result into the address bar of a File Explorer window.

If you would rather not guess the version, Blender will tell you: Edit ▸ Preferences ▸ Add-ons, find MetaBridge DNA, and click the arrow to expand it. The File row shows the full path — third_party is beside the file it names.

Turning on Preferences ▸ Interface ▸ Developer Extras adds a small folder button to that same row, which opens the addon's folder for you.

The folder's own README.md repeats the steps below. That same expanded MetaBridge DNA row also carries Install Cascadeur Plugin and Open Unreal Plugin Folder buttons, and Marvelous Designer's own Open MD Plug-in Folder — so none of the three needs a File Explorer trip at all.

1. Loading a Character

Steps:

1. Click the folder icon and pick the folder that contains your MetaHuman characters.
2. Click a character's thumbnail to select it.
3. Turn Head / Body / Textures on or off, depending on what you want to load.
4. Pick a LOD level (0 = highest quality, higher numbers = lighter/faster).
5. Click Assemble.

Good to know:

• You can load more than one character — click New to add another one as a separate slot.
• The list at the bottom shows every character currently in your scene. Click the radio button next to one to make it "active".
• The trash icon removes a character from the scene.
• If you want to load a different LOD later, change the LOD number and click Re-Assemble.
• LOD and facial expressions: a MetaHuman head carries its expressions at LOD 0 only. Above that the face still moves — the jaw opens, the eyes turn, anything driven by a bone works — but the shape-based detail is not there, because the character does not contain it at that level. The panel says LOD n: joints only when that is the case. Use LOD 0 for face work; the higher levels are for a lighter scene when you are animating the body.
• Need to load one specific .dna file? Use the Load Head DNA... / Load Body DNA... buttons next to Assemble.
• Material defaults: if a material_defaults.json file is present in the addon folder, its BSDF values are applied automatically to newly created materials on every Assemble. Existing (already-created) materials are never overwritten, so your edits are preserved across Re-Assembles.
• All meshes are automatically set to Smooth Shading on Assemble.

2. Making Facial Expressions (Face Rig)

Steps:

1. Click Append GUIArmature — this adds the control rig you'll use to make expressions.
2. Turn Face Rig: ON.
3. Select the GUIArmature in the viewport, go into Pose Mode, and move its bones. The face updates live as you move them.

Good to know:

• You're never editing shape keys directly — you're only moving control bones.
• If you don't see any reaction when moving a bone, double check Face Rig is switched ON.

3. Expression Presets (save & reuse expressions)

Instead of posing a face from scratch every time, save an expression once and reuse it — and mix several expressions together.

Saving a preset:

1. Pose the face the way you want it.
2. Click Save As Current Expression... and give it a name.
3. To update a preset you already saved, select it in the list and click Save Current Expression.

Using a preset:

1. Pick a preset from the dropdown.
2. Click Apply Preset — it appears in the Active Sliders list just below, already turned on.
3. Drag its slider between 0 (no expression) and 1 (full expression).

Blending multiple expressions:

• You can have many sliders active at once — they combine automatically.
• Add All From Active Folder loads every preset in your current folder as a slider, all starting at 0.
• The X button removes one slider; Clear All Sliders resets everything back to neutral.
• Sliders are normal Blender properties, so you can keyframe and animate them.

Good to know:

• Set Folder... lets you choose where presets are saved/loaded from.
• Import... lets you bring in a preset file from anywhere on your computer.

Converting presets from other programs:

• Convert & Import (Maya/Houdini)...: brings in a saved pose from Maya or Houdini and matches its bone names automatically.
• Convert ARKit Payload...: turns an ARKit remap payload into ARKit_... presets. The standard 52 used by ARKit Live already come with the addon — use this only to replace them or add your own.

4. ARKit Live (real-time face tracking from your iPhone)

Stream your real facial expressions live from an iPhone straight onto the MetaHuman character, using Apple's free Live Link Face app.

Setup:

1. Make sure your iPhone and your computer are on the same Wi-Fi network.
2. In the Live Link Face app, use normal streaming mode (not "MetaHuman Animator" mode).
3. In the app, set the target IP address to your computer's address, and the port to 11111.
4. In Blender's ARKit Live panel, leave Host as 0.0.0.0 and Port as 11111, then click Connect.

Tuning the feel of the tracking:

Recording:

• Click Record to save the live performance as keyframes on the timeline. Click Stop Recording when done.
• Or use Load Live Link Face CSV... to bake in a pre-recorded CSV file.

Head Rotation (Experimental):

• Requires the body's Rigify rig to be set up first, with Apply Retarget and Link Head Rig both done.
• If the head turns the wrong way on some axis, use the Invert Pitch / Yaw / Roll buttons.

Troubleshooting:

• Nothing moves at all: check for a red Apply error message and make sure the correct character is Activated.
• Face looks slightly off at rest: use the Calibrate feature in the Live Link Face app first, then fine-tune with Deadzone/Gain.

Export ARKit Blend Shapes (Beta)

Bakes the character's face into a separate FBX with the standard 52 ARKit expressions as real, named Shape Keys — for taking the face into a program that expects that exact set, instead of this character's own MetaHuman rig.

1. Click Export ARKit Blend Shapes (FBX)... and pick where to save.
2. Turn on Include Custom ARKit Presets to also bake any extra expressions added through Convert ARKit Payload, beyond the standard 52.

This character's own rig and meshes are never touched — the export builds its own separate head (with its own skeleton) to bake onto, and leaves that behind in the scene once the FBX is written, in case you want to look it over or export it again by hand.

These 52 are this character's own version of each expression, built to match Apple's shape as closely as this rig allows — not a byte-for-byte copy of Apple's original ARKit shapes. Most will read correctly in whatever program receives them; a few may need small hand adjustment.

Not happy with one of the 52, or want to add more of your own? Every one of them is a normal expression preset — pose the face the way you want it and use Save Current Expression to overwrite it, the same way as any preset in section 3. The next export picks up whatever you changed.

5. Rigify Body Control Rig

Turns the MetaHuman body into a fully animatable rig using Rigify.

Requires the Rigify addon to be enabled first (Edit > Preferences > Add-ons, search for "Rigify").

Steps, in order:

1. Build Meta-Rig — creates a draft skeleton matching the body.
2. Generate Rigify Rig — turns the draft into a real, posable control rig.
3. Apply Retarget — connects the control rig so it drives the MetaHuman body. Body correctives are registered at this step.

   ⚠️ If the draft skeleton from step 1 wasn't positioned correctly, this can distort the mesh. Check that everything looks right after step 2, before applying.

4. Link Head Rig — connects the head so it moves with the body.
5. Remove Rigify Rig removes everything from steps 1–4 if you need to start over.

Additional Options

A collapsed section below Remove Rigify Rig, holding two switches you rarely need to touch:

• IK Stretch ON/OFF — off by default, so limbs stay rigid. Turn it on if you want the arms and legs to stretch when you pull the IK controls past full reach.
• Heel Pivot ON/OFF — off by default. On, rotating the foot spin control pivots the foot around the heel; this also makes the foot drift away from its controller as you rotate it upward, so leave it off unless you specifically want heel pivoting.
• Finger IK ON/OFF — off by default. See below.

Finger IK

Normally each finger joint has to be rotated one at a time. With Finger IK on, each finger gets a target at its fingertip — drag the target and the whole finger follows. Much faster for gripping a prop, planting a hand on a surface, or shaping a pose.

Rigify has no finger IK of its own, so this is added by this addon. All ten fingers are covered, thumbs included.

1. Turn on Finger IK in Additional Options. Ten small box controls appear at the fingertips.
2. In Pose Mode, drag a fingertip control. That finger bends to reach it, and no other finger moves.
3. Turn it off to go back to rotating the joints by hand.

Per-finger sliders

Under the button there is a slider for each of the ten fingers: 0 poses that finger by rotating its joints, 1 makes it follow its fingertip target. The ON/OFF button just sets all ten at once.

This is what makes the feature useful for real hand animation:

• Holding a prop — put the fingers touching the object on 1 so they stay planted while the wrist moves, and leave the fingers in the air on 0 where hand-posed arcs look better. The thumb usually wants its own setting.
• Easing into a contact — a value in between blends the two. Keyframe a finger from 0 to 1 over a few frames as the hand lands on a surface and it settles into place instead of popping.
• Backing off one bad finger — if one finger bends oddly, drop just that slider instead of turning the whole hand back to FK.

Switching without losing the pose — IK to FK / FK to IK

The two sliders hold two separate poses, so moving a slider swaps between them rather than carrying one across. These two buttons carry it across:

• IK to FK — keeps the pose you built with the fingertip targets, hands it to the joint controls, and switches all ten fingers to 0. The fingers do not move. Use this once you're happy with an IK pose and want to keep refining it joint by joint, or before keyframing in FK.
• FK to IK — keeps the pose you built by hand, moves the fingertip targets onto it, and switches all ten fingers to 1. Again nothing moves. Use this when a hand you posed by hand now needs to hold onto something.

Both work on all ten fingers at once, and both are safe to press repeatedly.

Good to know:

• Switching it on keeps the fingers exactly where they already were — nothing jumps.
• Switching it off leaves the pose exactly as it was too, so you can move back and forth freely.
• The fingertip targets follow the hand, so posing the arm keeps the finger pose intact.
• Snap Fingertip Targets to Pose moves all ten targets onto wherever the fingers are right now, without changing the pose. You need it when a slider sits between 0 and 1 — the finger is then somewhere between its two results and no longer touching its target — or after loading an animation.
• Lowering a slider by hand does not keep the IK pose. The joint controls still hold whatever they held before, so the finger springs back to that. Use IK to FK instead — see below.
• There is no elbow-style direction control for fingers, so the solver picks which way a finger bends. It follows the joints sensibly for normal poses, but pulling a target far sideways can twist the finger oddly. Lower that finger's slider if it does.
• With Finger IK off, the rig behaves exactly like stock Rigify — the finger master curl and the individual joint controls work as usual.

Body Correctives — automatic muscle & twist detail

Once Apply Retarget is done, the body rig automatically adds secondary deformation (shoulder blade, muscle bulge, limb twist) using data built into the character's DNA. No setup needed.

• Body Correctives RBF: ON/OFF — toggles the RBF solver layer. Leave it ON for the most realistic result. Basic twist/muscle correction stays active either way.
• If a character's DNA doesn't include this data, the button shows "none in this DNA" and is grayed out.

Fine-tuning by hand (RBF Controllers)

For spots that need a manual touch-up beyond the automatic result:

1. Pick the joint you want from the Driver Bone list, or leave it on Auto and select a control in Pose Mode (e.g. shoulder.L).
2. Click Show RBF Controls — small diamond-shaped helper bones appear for that area.

Use the Driver Bone list for the knee. Its correctives belong to calf_l / calf_r, and while a leg is on IK there is no control you can select that points at those, so Auto finds nothing there. 3. Adjust the influence slider (0–1) per bone in the Active RBF Controllers list: - 0 = automatic corrective off (bone stays at rest/neutral) - 1 = automatic corrective fully applied (default) 4. Rotate a helper bone by hand to add an extra manual correction on top of the automatic result. 5. Click Hide when done to tidy the viewport.

Rotating a helper bone at influence = 1 stacks your manual rotation on top of the full automatic result. At influence = 0 only your manual rotation is used.

Import FBX Animation (Beta)

Apply a MetaHuman animation exported from Unreal (FBX) straight onto this character — body and head animate together, automatically, even if the character's proportions don't exactly match the source animation.

1. Click Import FBX Animation... and pick the .fbx file.
2. Both the body and head are keyframed with the retargeted animation.

The button is greyed out while the control rig is connected to this character, because the rig would overwrite the imported animation every frame. Click Remove Retarget (and Unlink Head Rig) above, then import. Hover the greyed-out button to see this reminder.

Retarget Rigify Animation (Beta)

Copy an animation from another already-animated character onto this character's control rig. Use this when the animation lives on a rig rather than in an FBX file.

1. Open the Retarget Rigify Animation (Beta) panel.
2. Source Rig — the animated armature to copy from.
3. Source Type — which kind of rig that is:

1. Target Rig — this character's Rigify control rig.
2. Click Retarget.

The animation is baked onto the target's controls, corrected for the two characters having different proportions and different rest poses.

About Blender Rigify as a source:

This addon's rig is not identical to a stock Rigify rig — its spine has six segments where Blender's has four — so an animation cannot simply be copied across. Picking Blender Rigify maps the two properly.

It works whether that animation was made with IK or FK arms and legs. You do not need to convert or bake the source rig first.

Good to know:

• Once Apply Retarget and Link Head Rig are set up, the connection is saved with your file — reopening it works without re-clicking Apply Retarget.
• The Rigify shoulder bone (shoulder.L/R) must be manually elevated when raising the arm. Key the shoulder bone alongside the arm for the most natural shoulder deformation.

6. Body Blend (experimental)

Combine two or more MetaHuman body types — and their matching heads — into a brand-new blended character. Found in its own Body Blend (experimental) panel, collapsed by default.

Adding sources: - Use Base DNA — adds the addon's own reference character from the base_dna/ folder. - Add Folder... — adds every character in a folder at once. This is how you build a library. See below. - Add Body DNA — add one specific .dna file by hand. - Load Library... — load a compact archetype library and add every archetype in it as a source.

Add Folder... — building a library Point this at a folder holding the original .dna files of several characters, with each character's head and body sitting side by side:

MyBodies\
   Boy01_body.dna    Boy01_head.dna
   Boy02_body.dna    Boy02_head.dna
   Boy03_body.dna    Boy03_head.dna
   ...

Every character in that folder is added in one click, and each body is paired with its own head automatically. That folder is now your library — collect the characters you blend with into one place and you can load them all whenever you start a new blend.

Important:

• Both files must be in the same folder, named so they match (Name_body.dna and Name_head.dna). A body with no matching head is still added, but it can only contribute a body shape.
• Only the folder you pick is read — characters in sub-folders are not included. Point it at the folder that directly holds the .dna files.
• The addon's own base_dna/ folder holds a single reference character, so picking it adds only that one. That is expected — use Use Base DNA for it instead.

Weights don't need to add up to anything in particular — they're normalized automatically. Use Base DNA starts at 1.0; all other sources start at 0.0.

The primary row:

The highlighted row is the primary source — it supplies the topology, skin weights and face rig. Every other row just contributes its shape. If you only add library entries (no real .dna row), the addon quietly uses its own reference character as the primary behind the scenes, so you can build purely from a library.

Building:

1. Add and weight your sources.
2. Click a row to make it the primary.
3. Pick a LOD level.
4. Give it a Name.
5. Click Build Blended Body.

Replace:

Turn on Replace to overwrite your last Body Blend character in place instead of adding a new slot every time.

Live Preview:

After a Build, dragging any weight slider re-blends and updates the character already on screen. Turn Live Preview off if it slows things down.

Good to know:

• The head only blends if every weighted row has head data. If one is missing, the body still blends but the head is skipped and a note explains why.
• Textures: after building, the addon looks for a Maps folder next to the primary DNA, then falls back to base_dna/Maps.
• Shape keys on the blended head are copied from the primary head source only.
• Posing/expressions work normally on a blended character, and stay correct even after you go back and adjust the weight sliders.

The base_dna/ folder:

Put your own reference Body.dna and matching Head.dna here (metabridge_dna/base_dna/). This is what Use Base DNA adds, and what Build falls back to when nothing else is weighted.

Compact archetype libraries:

Two libraries ship with the addon, both in the base_dna/ folder:

• Load Library... — loads a library, one row per archetype. The file browser opens on MH_All_Body.json; pick MH_Boy.json from the same folder for the child bodies.
• Both can be loaded at once. Load one, then load the other, and all 38 stay in the list — so an adult body type and a child body type can go into the same blend. Loading the same library a second time just refreshes its own rows; nothing doubles up.
• Your own .dna rows are never touched by either.
• Export... — packs exactly the sources currently listed in the panel into one compact .json library. If the list is empty, it instead scans a folder you pick (including subfolders). You don't need to keep the original .dna files around once you have a library.
• A library built from a different skeleton cannot be mixed with one already loaded — the addon says so when you try, rather than letting it fail at Build.

7. Proportions

Change the body shape of the character you loaded — lengths, widths, sizes, head size and heels. Found in its own Proportions panel, collapsed by default.

Steps:

1. Load a character with a body (section 1), or build one with Body Blend.
2. Open Proportions and drag the sliders. The character changes as you drag.
3. Long Legs gives a long-legged look in one click. Reset puts the character back exactly as it was loaded.

Set the proportions before Build Rigify Rig. While a control rig is on the character the sliders are hidden — remove the control rig, change the proportions, then build it again.

What follows along:

• The feet stay on the ground; the whole body rises by however much the legs grew.
• Legs and arms get longer without getting thicker, and knees, hips and shoulders still bend smoothly.
• Size sliders change only the flesh. The character bends at exactly the same places, and the waist narrows most at its narrowest point.
• Heels lift the heel to Heel Height and keep the toes flat on a sole of Front Height; the body rises with them. The heels go to Unreal with the exported DNA, and the arched feet follow the animation.
• The head stays joined to the neck with no gap. Facial expressions grow and shrink with Head Size.
• Clothing and hair already on the character follow — clothing gets longer, wider and thicker with the body under it, and so does clothing put on after the proportions were changed.
• Body Blend keeps the proportions when you move its weight sliders.
• Export Head DNA and Export Body DNA both carry the new proportions — export both and use them together in Unreal.
• Import FBX Animation lengthens the stride with the legs, so the feet don't slide.
• MD Live and Send to Cascadeur send the character with its new proportions. Send to Cascadeur again after changing them.

Good to know:

• The sliders apply in Object Mode. Changed in another mode, they apply as soon as you return to Object Mode.
• While you drag a slider the body follows straight away; facial expressions and clothing catch up a moment after you let go.
• Head Size goes up to 10% either way. In Unreal, facial expressions keep the strength they had at the original head size.
• Heel Height goes up to 15 cm and Front Height up to 5 cm.
• Saving the .blend keeps the proportions, and Reset still gives back the original after reopening it.

8. Wearables (experimental)

Beta — weights can still look off during animation/posing in some cases. Being actively improved; touch up in Weight Paint mode if needed.

Attach clothing (FBX) and hair/grooms (Alembic .abc) to the active character — found in its own Wearables (experimental) panel, collapsed by default. Works on any assembled or Body-Blend-built character.

There are two ways to dress a character: import a clothing FBX built for a MetaHuman skeleton, or rig any mesh already in your scene yourself. Both end up following the character the same way afterward.

Clothing (FBX): - Top... / Bottom... / Full... — import a MetaHuman-compatible clothing .fbx and attach it to the body, tagged with that category. - Head Accessory... — same idea, for things that attach to the head instead (glasses, earrings, ...). - Retarget To Body Proportions (on by default): fits the garment to this character's own proportions instead of the body it was originally made for — without going skin-tight, so a loose shirt stays loose. - Clothing automatically avoids clipping into the character's skin. - Clothing Offset slider — floats all worn clothing slightly off the skin, if you want extra breathing room. Updates live. - Categories replace what they conflict with: a new Top clears any worn Top/Full; a new Bottom clears Bottom/Full; a new Full clears both. Head accessories never auto-remove anything. - LOD0 only: if the FBX bundles multiple LODs, only LOD0 is kept.

Scene Mesh Garment (Make + Bind): For a mesh already in your scene that doesn't have a MetaHuman skeleton of its own.

1. Select the garment mesh and click Make Top / Bottom / Full / Shoes / Gloves / Head Acc — this fits it to the character and rigs it to move with the character's skeleton. Works best on a garment already modeled to roughly fit the character.
2. Click Bind Garment To Character — attaches it to the active character, exactly like an imported clothing FBX from here on (category replacement, Body Blend live follow, Refit, Clothing Offset all apply).

If deformation looks off in an extreme pose at a tight spot (armpits, between the thighs), touch it up in Weight Paint mode — everything else is unaffected.

Hair (Alembic):

• Import Hair... — imports a .abc groom and parents it to the head. Defaults are tuned for MetaHuman groom exports (Scale 0.01, Rotation X -90°, Z -180°) — adjust in the operator panel (bottom-left after import) if your source is different.
• Bind To Head Surface (on by default) — hair follows the head as it deforms, including through Body Blend changes, without collapsing onto the scalp.
• Bind Hair To Head — for hair that came from somewhere else: a groom already in your scene, a beard that came with the character, or anything imported outside this addon. Select it and click. It then follows the head exactly like hair imported here, Body Blend included. Hair already attached is simply re-attached to where the head is now.
• If hair sits still while the character's shape changes, the reason is written to the console — usually that it was never bound. Select it and use Bind Hair To Head.

Good to know:

• Clothing FBX placement depends on the file sharing bone names with a MetaHuman skeleton.
• Imported/rigged wearables aren't tracked as part of the character slot the way body/head meshes are — rename, move, or export them like any other Blender object.
• Clothing follows Proportions too, whether it was put on before or after them — see section 7.

9. Live Corrective Sculpting (Beta)

Beta — a correction sculpted with only one pose holds steady if you pose further than that; sculpt more than one pose for the same correction if you want it to keep changing shape further into the pose. Head corrections can be written back into the character's .dna and used in Unreal — see Sending a correction to Unreal below. Body corrections stay inside Blender.

Pose the character, then sculpt directly on top of that pose — the sculpt becomes a correction that fades in and out automatically from then on, every time the character moves toward and away from that pose. No keyframing needed. Works on both the face and the body, and automatically carries over to any clothing worn on the character.

Steps:

1. Open the Live Corrective Sculpting (Beta) panel.
2. Pose the character the way you want to fix or add detail to (a bent elbow, a stretched shoulder, an expression...).
3. Type a name for the correction in the Corrective field.
4. For a body correction, also pick which bone should trigger it from the Body Driver Bone list.
5. For a face correction, you can also pick a Head Driver Bone. Do this when the character has a custom head that breaks as the controls move — the correction then follows that bone as well as the expression.
6. Click Begin (Face) or Begin (Body) — this enters Sculpt Mode on a fresh shape key, already at full strength.
7. Sculpt the correction.
8. Click Finish Sculpt.

If a correction doesn't fade all the way out:

Return the character to its rest position and click Set Neutral on that correction. It then reads 0 at rest. A custom head often needs this.

Editing an existing correction:

Click the sculpt icon next to a correction's slider to re-enter Sculpt Mode on it directly and refine it further. Pose the character close to where it was originally sculpted first, for the most accurate result — this doesn't return the character to that pose for you automatically.

Manual mode:

Click the tool icon next to a correction to switch it to Manual — its slider can then be dragged by hand instead of following the pose. Useful for previewing a correction at any strength, or hand-animating it. Click it again to go back to automatic.

Clothing:

A correction sculpted on the skin automatically carries over to any clothing worn on that character. This happens on its own whenever you finish a sculpt or import one — click Sync to Wearables if you add new clothing afterward and want it to catch up. Each garment gets its own copy of the correction, with the same Manual/slider/edit controls as the skin's, listed right underneath it.

Sharing corrections:

• Export... saves every correction on a character to a .json file.
• Import... brings corrections from a file onto another character. It only works if that character has the same body/head as the one the file was exported from (built by this addon at the same LOD) — importing onto a mismatched character is rejected rather than corrupting the mesh.

Sending a correction to Unreal (head only):

Use the Write to DNA (head only) box. It writes a new .dna file and leaves the original untouched. There is no equivalent for the body — a MetaHuman body has no expression shapes to write into, so body corrections stay in Blender.

There are two ways to do it.

Fixing an expression that breaks — Export Edited Shape Keys

This is the one to use when a face folds, spikes or collapses on a particular expression. You fix the character's own expression by hand and send that fix back into the .dna.

1. Make the expression with the face controls. Move the controls until the problem is on screen — for example open the jaw until the mesh breaks.

2. Find the shape key that expression is using. With the head mesh selected, look at its shape key list: the ones the controls are driving are the ones whose value is above 0. Opening the jaw, for instance, puts a jaw shape key at 1.0. That is the one to fix.

Leave the face controls where they are. The shape key you are about to sculpt is only showing its shape because the controls are holding it there.

1. Sculpt it. With that shape key active, enter Sculpt Mode and shape the face the way it should look. You are editing the character's own expression, not adding a new one.

2. Check it with the controls. Leave Sculpt Mode and move the face controls through the expression again. The fix should follow the controls in and out. Keep sculpting until it does.

3. Click Export Edited Shape Keys and save. Every expression you changed goes into the new .dna; the ones you didn't touch are left exactly as they were.

Good to know:

• You can fix several expressions in one session — pose, sculpt, pose the next, sculpt — and one click sends them all.
• The button refuses to export if you haven't actually changed any of the character's expressions, so it never writes an empty file.
• With more than one character loaded, the active character is the one exported — the one with the filled dot next to it in Assembled Characters.

Sending your own corrections

Click the ⇱ button on a correction and choose which expression it should ride along with. Bake All Correctives then writes every assigned correction at once. Always use this rather than sending them one at a time.

In Unreal: bring the new .dna in with MetaHuman Creator ▸ From DNA, and choose Replace with Import Whole Rig turned on. Mesh Fit rebuilds the expressions from scratch and will discard your edits.

10. Exporting

• DNA: separate Head and Body buttons (head and body are always two separate .dna files). To send a sculpted correction into the head .dna instead, use Write to DNA in section 9.
• FBX / glTF: Full / Head / Body buttons. Choose whether to include the control rig and animation in the export dialog.

Batch Tools:

• Assemble All Characters — loads every character found in your folder in one go.
• Export All Slots — exports every loaded character at once.

11. Opening a File Someone Else Saved

A .blend remembers where each character's .dna files were on the computer that saved it. On your machine those files are somewhere else, so the character appears but nothing about it responds.

You'll see this in MetaHuman Assembler ▸ Assembled Characters — the character is marked with a warning instead of a checkmark, and shows the file it's looking for:

⚠ Head DNA not found: D:\SomeoneElse\MetaHumans\Bob\head.dna Relink Head DNA...

Click Relink Head DNA... (or Relink Body DNA...) and pick the same file on your own machine. The character comes back to life immediately, and the warning disappears. Save the file afterwards so you only do this once.

If you pick the wrong file, nothing is broken — it's refused and the character stays as it was.

To avoid this when sending a file to someone, send the .dna files along with the .blend. They still need to relink once, but they'll have the files to point at.

12. MD Live (Marvelous Designer)

Make clothes on this character in Marvelous Designer, and bring them back already wearing.

MD Live is its own panel in the sidebar, next to MetaBridge DNA.

Set up once

1. Pick a Shared Folder — any empty folder both programs can reach. Left empty, ~/MetaBridgeDNA/MDLive is used.
2. Click Open MD Plug-in Folder.
3. In Marvelous Designer: Plug-in ▸ Plug-in Manager ▸ Add, and register the scripts in that folder — mb_live.py for Live, mb_load_avatar.py and mb_send_garment.py for one round trip at a time.

The folder and every setting are remembered, so this is a one-time step.

Live

1. In Blender's MD Live panel, press Start Live.
2. In Marvelous Designer, click mb_live in the Plug-in menu once. The panel shows MD: mb_live running.

From now on both sides follow each other with no buttons:

• When the character changes in Blender (pose, face, Body Blend, sculpt), the avatar is re-sent once it holds still, and Marvelous Designer replaces its avatar.
• If there is a garment, Marvelous Designer simulates it for MD Simulate Frames and sends it back (Auto-Return Garment). Turned off, it sends only when you press Get Garment Now.
• What comes back is worn straight away as Wear As, and replaces the previous Live garment instead of piling up.
• Get Garment Now asks for the garment as it is, without waiting for a simulation.

To stop, press Stop Live in Blender and click mb_live in Marvelous Designer again. Opening another file stops Live by itself. A garment that arrives while you are in Edit Mode is worn when you return to Object Mode.

Sending the character (one at a time)

1. Click Send Body to MD.
2. In Marvelous Designer, click the MetaBridge avatar entry in the Plug-in menu.

The character appears as the avatar. No import window, no settings to fill in. Change the body in Blender, press Send Body to MD again, click the same menu entry again — the avatar is replaced, and you never end up with two.

Include Head is on by default — Marvelous Designer refuses an avatar without a head, and hats and collars need it too.

Bringing the clothes back (one at a time)

1. In Marvelous Designer, click the MetaBridge garment entry in the Plug-in menu.
2. In Blender, click Import Garment from MD.

The garment arrives at the right size, is fitted to the character, and follows the rig straight away — the same as any other clothing in section 8. Pick the Category so it replaces what it should.

Skip Stitches & Trims (on by default) leaves out the topstitch, button and zipper meshes. They carry most of the file's weight and none of it is needed to wear the garment.

If the import takes a while

The wait is the fitting: every vertex of the garment has to be matched to the body so it moves with the character. A garment carrying its topstitches as 3D geometry can reach three million vertices, and almost all of them are stitching.

The MetaBridge plug-ins switch topstitches to texture only while exporting (and switch them back after) and leave hidden objects out. Blender filters stitch, button and zipper objects out before reading the file, so even a big file exported from Marvelous Designer's own menu arrives in seconds. Nothing is lost — they aren't needed to wear the garment, and they're still in your Marvelous Designer project.

You can also lower Particle Distance in Marvelous Designer if the garment is denser than it needs to be.

Good to know

• The panel shows the garment waiting to be imported and how big it is. Above 100 MB it warns you.
• Send Scale and Import Scale are already correct. Garments the MetaBridge plug-ins send carry their own unit, and a file exported by hand in another unit is corrected to the unit that puts it on the body. Blender tells you the size it imported in the status bar.
• Marvelous Designer's own Auto Fit expects avatars from its library. Prepare for Auto-Fit (on by default) asks it to treat this character the same way.

13. Send to Cascadeur

Put this character into Cascadeur, ready to animate.

Before the first time

1. Edit ▸ Preferences ▸ Add-ons, find MetaBridge DNA, and expand it.
2. Click Install Cascadeur Plugin. It offers C:\Program Files\Cascadeur; type a different path if Cascadeur is somewhere else. Leave KimodoEngine Folder blank — that is for a separate product, and nothing here uses it.
3. If a Windows prompt for Administrator rights appears, accept it — Cascadeur's folder normally needs it.
4. Restart Cascadeur.

Animation Scripts ▸ Receive Poses (Blender) now appears in the menu. The plug-in brings a few extra tools of its own along with it; ignore them.

There are two things you can send, chosen at the top of the panel.

The first time — Character and Bones

1. In Cascadeur: Animation Scripts ▸ Receive Poses (Blender).
2. In Blender: open Send to Cascadeur in the sidebar and click Send Character.

The character opens in a new Cascadeur tab with its rig, its meshes and whatever animation is on it. Head and body arrive as one character, so the face stays on the body when you move it.

Include Head is on by default. Turn it off to send the body alone.

Face Bones is off by default, and should stay off. On, the face's 843 joints go too. Off, the face rides the head joint and only the body skeleton is sent — a quarter of the character, and all Cascadeur needs to animate a body. Turn it on only if you want to pose the face there.

Include Animation is on by default. Turn it off to send the character standing in its rest pose.

After that — Keyframes Only

Once the character is in Cascadeur, switch to Keyframes Only and click Send Frame Range to send a new pose or animation onto it. Nothing is created in Cascadeur; the character already there simply takes the motion.

Current Frame sends just the pose you are looking at.

Append adds after what Cascadeur already received. Off starts again from frame 0.

Send the character again after restarting Cascadeur

Keyframes only land correctly on a character Cascadeur received in that session. If you restart Cascadeur, press Send Character once more before sending keyframes. Skip it and the limbs come out turned the wrong way, with nothing reporting an error.

Good to know

• The character on screen is the one that goes — whichever slot is active.
• Cascadeur Status tells you whether Cascadeur is listening.
• Only change Port if Receive Poses was started on a different one.

Bringing the work back

Animate in Cascadeur, then press Receive from Cascadeur. It comes back onto the same character, in the same scene, with nothing to import by hand.

Animation Only keys onto the character already here. Nothing new is created.

Mesh + Animation brings the character back as new objects instead, for when the mesh changed over there too.

Onto Rigify Controls puts the animation on the control rig rather than the deform bones, so it can be adjusted, offset and layered like anything you keyed by hand. The body rig goes back to being driven by the controls, so nothing fights for the same bone.

Whole Take reads every frame Cascadeur holds. Turn it off to read only the scene's frame range.

Reading a full MetaHuman take takes under a second, and root motion comes with it — the character travels instead of walking on the spot.

Live

Once the character has been sent over, click Live: Mirror This Rig to keep the two in sync as you work, with nothing to send or receive by hand. Click Stop Mirroring to end it.

• Blender to Cascadeur — pose here, watch it there.
• Cascadeur to Blender — pose there, watch it here.
• Both Ways — whichever window you are posing in drives the other.

Mapped Bones mirrors the set Send and Receive already agree about, and is the one with a track record. Whole Skeleton mirrors every bone the two characters share by name — only correct when the Cascadeur character came from this rig.

If this body is built with a Rigify rig, Onto Rigify Controls appears and is on by default. Poses coming in from Cascadeur land on the control rig instead of the deform bones, so the character stays fully posable while mirroring runs.

Send the character over once before turning Live on, and once more after restarting Cascadeur — the same rule as everywhere else on this panel.

14. Unreal Engine

There is one plugin on the Unreal side. Which of Blender's features it is talking to is decided by the port, so the port is the setting to get right.

Two of these can run at once — sending the face on 9561 while a body stream uses 9560 — as long as they are on different ports.

ARKit Live on 11111 is the exception — it listens for the iPhone directly and needs no plugin in Unreal at all.

Installing the Unreal plugin

Unlike the other two, this one is not inside the addon — it is fetched from GitHub the first time it is needed.

1. Edit ▸ Preferences ▸ Add-ons, find MetaBridge DNA, expand it, and click Open Unreal Plugin Folder. The first click downloads the plugin (needs an internet connection); every click after that just opens the folder it landed in.
2. Copy the MotionForgeLiveLink folder into your Unreal project's Plugins folder, so you end up with:

<YourProject>\Plugins\MotionForgeLiveLink\MotionForgeLiveLink.uplugin

Create the Plugins folder yourself if the project has none.

1. Restart the editor. Unreal builds the plugin as it opens, so the first launch takes longer than usual and needs a C++ project or the build tools installed.
2. Enable Live Link in Edit ▸ Plugins — this plugin extends it rather than replacing it.

One plugin covers all three ports. Install it once, whichever direction you are working in.

Its own guide.md, inside the folder, goes through the Unreal side in more detail.

Unreal Live — the face performs in Unreal as you work

A MetaHuman face animated in Blender performs on the MetaHuman in Unreal, live, with nothing exported.

1. Port — leave it at 9561 unless something else has it.
2. Rate — frames a second to send. It is sent at a steady rate whether the face is moving or not, because Live Link treats a source that goes quiet as a source that died.
3. Press Start Unreal Live. The panel then says how many controls are ready and how many listeners are attached.
4. In Unreal, add a MotionForge source in the Live Link window, pointed at that port.

Mirror settles the handedness difference between Blender and Unreal. Y is the default and is right for a normal MetaHuman; change it only for a rig built the other way round.

Press Stop Unreal Live to end it. This one cannot be undone with Ctrl+Z — use the panel's own Stop.

Follow Unreal — the character here copies the one in Unreal

The mirror of Unreal Live. Whatever is moving the character in Unreal — a Control Rig in a sequence, a baked animation — arrives here and drives this character.

1. Host and Port — 127.0.0.1 and 9562 for Unreal on the same machine.
2. Apply Rate — how many times a second the pose is applied here.
3. Body and Face — follow one, the other, or both.
4. Press Follow Unreal, then run MotionForge.Send.Start in Unreal.

While following, the panel shows the skeleton's name, its bone and curve counts and how many frames have arrived.

Rigify is stood down while following. Its constraints exist to drive this character, and the pose is now arriving from somewhere else. They come back exactly as they were when you press Stop Following.

15. Other Useful Tools

• DNA RC Inspector: shows how the control bones are connected to the character's DNA data. Mainly for troubleshooting a specific control.
• DNA Validation: Validate DNA File checks a .dna on disk before you use it; Validate Active Slot checks the character already loaded.
• Pose Reset: Reset Face Pose puts the whole face back to neutral. Reset Selected Controls does only the controls you have selected.
• Animation Baker: Bake Face Animation turns a live or keyframed facial performance into permanent, exportable keys. Clear Baked Animation removes them again.
• Export Face CSV: writes the face's shape values over the frame range to a spreadsheet file, one file per mesh. Useful for taking a performance to another program.

Batch Tools — for a folder of characters rather than one.

• Assemble All Characters builds every character in the scanned folder, each into its own slot. On a large folder this takes a long time.
• Export All Slots writes every assembled slot out to a folder, as FBX or glTF.

External Preset Converter — for expression presets that came from somewhere else.

• Convert & Import (Maya/Houdini)... takes a preset JSON from Maya or Houdini and renames its bones to the ones this add-on uses. Anything it cannot match is reported rather than dropped silently.
• Convert ARKit Payload... turns an ARKit remap payload into a board-pose preset.
• Edit Name Mapping is where you fix a name it could not match by hand.

Bake to DNA

A correction you sculpted lives in the scene. Bake to DNA writes it into the character's .dna file instead, so it belongs to the character from then on — in a new scene, on another machine, or in Unreal.

Bake Corrective to DNA does one correction. Bake All to DNA does every correction on the character at once.

The original .dna is not overwritten; a new file is written and you choose where.

Undo

Ctrl+Z works on the steps that build or remove things:

Assemble · New · Delete Slot · Load Head DNA · Load Body DNA · Build Meta-Rig · Generate Rigify Rig · Apply Retarget · Link Head Rig · Unlink Head Rig · Remove Rigify Rig · Reload Materials

Undo a step and the face rig follows it — undo past an Assemble and it switches off with the character, redo and it comes back on. Ctrl+Shift+Z redoes.

Some things are one-way, because Undo cannot put them back:

• Saving a .dna, an FBX, a glTF or a CSV — the file is already written. Delete it yourself if you did not mean to.
• Save / Reset Material Defaults — same reason.
• Connecting ARKit Live, Start Unreal Live, Follow Unreal, Send to Cascadeur — these talk to something outside Blender. Use the panel's own Stop or Disconnect.
• Face Rig ON/OFF and the Rig ON/OFF on each character — just press the button again.

Quick Tips

• LOD 0 is always the highest quality — use it unless you need better performance. It is also the only level that carries facial expressions; see section 1.
• You can combine live ARKit tracking with manual Preset Sliders — nudge sliders by hand if the tracking doesn't quite nail an expression.
• If something that used to work suddenly doesn't move, check that Face Rig or the character's Rig ON/OFF isn't accidentally switched off.
• For the most realistic shoulder deformation when raising the arm, key both the arm control and the shoulder.L/R bone together.
• ARKit Smoothing: low is raw and immediate, high is smooth and slightly behind. If you are coming from an older version, note that this slider used to behave the opposite way round — see What's New.

Panel Reference

Every button and option, panel by panel, under the name it carries on screen.

MetaBridge DNA

The main panel. The DNA inspector rows near the bottom are for troubleshooting one control's wiring and are not part of normal use.

• Append GUIArmature — From gui_mapping.blend (resets existing GUIArmature)
• Toggle Face Rig — Enable or disable RigLogic face evaluation for this character slot
• Refresh Character List — Re-scan the MetaHumans directory to refresh the character list
• Head
• Body
• Textures
• LOD — RigLogic evaluation LOD (0 = full detail). Applied when DNA is loaded or re-assembled, and immediately to the active slot
• Re-Assemble — Load selected MetaHuman into the active slot (replaces existing)
• Assemble — Load selected MetaHuman into the active slot (replaces existing)
• New — Add the selected character as a new slot (keeps existing slots)
• Load Head DNA... — Import head .dna (face mesh + face rig controls)
• Load Body DNA... — Import body .dna (body mesh only, no face controls)
• Activate Slot — Set this character slot as the active one for editing
• Rig: ON — Enable or disable RigLogic face evaluation for this character slot
• Delete Slot — Remove this character slot and all its objects
• Relink DNA — Point this character at a .dna file that has moved. Use this after opening a .blend saved on another computer
• Rebuild Meta-Rig — Create the Rigify meta-rig with bones aligned to the MetaHuman skeleton. Inspect and tweak bone positions, then click '2. Generate Rigify Rig'.
• Regenerate Rigify Rig — Generate the Rigify control rig from the meta-rig. Run AFTER '1. Build Meta-Rig' and any manual bone adjustments. MetaHuman meshes are protected during generation.
• Remove Retarget — Reverse Apply Retarget: restore original MetaHuman Armature modifier
• 3. Apply Retarget — Copy vertex weights from MetaHuman bone names to Rigify DEF- bone names and redirect the Armature modifier to Rigify_Ctrl. Animate with Rigify FK/IK controls — the body mesh follows directly.
• Unlink Head Rig — Remove retarget constraints from the Head Rig shared bones
• Link Head Rig — Apply Rigify retarget to the MetaHuman Head Rig shared bones (spine_04, spine_05, clavicle_l/r, neck_01, etc.) so head mesh stays attached to the body animation.
• Toggle RBF — Enable/disable the RBF solver pass within Body Correctives (Twist/Swing always stay active)
• Body Correctives: none in this DNA — Enable/disable the RBF solver pass within Body Correctives (Twist/Swing always stay active)
• Driver Bone
• Show RBF Controls — Reveal and select the manual RBF controller bones linked to the currently selected Rigify control (e.g. shoulder.L), so their corrective bulge/twist can be hand-tuned.
• Hide — All manual RBF controller bones again
• Import FBX Animation...
• Remove Rigify Rig — Delete Rigify objects and clean up constraints/modifiers for this slot
• Toggle IK Stretch — Allow or prevent the leg/arm IK controls from stretching the limb
• Toggle Heel Pivot — Pivot the toe around the heel when foot_spin_ik is rotated backwards. Keep this OFF while rotating the foot_ik controller - when ON, the foot leaves the controller on one rotation direction
• Toggle Finger IK — Pose the fingers by dragging a target at each fingertip instead of rotating each joint. Stock Rigify has no finger IK. Switching it on keeps the fingers exactly where they are
• IK to FK — Hand the fingers' current pose over to the other set of controls without changing how they look
• FK to IK — Hand the fingers' current pose over to the other set of controls without changing how they look
• Snap Fingertip Targets to Pose — Move every fingertip target onto where that finger is right now, without changing the pose
• Show — Filter which DNA channels are listed
• Parent
• Re-Auto Link — Reload gui_mapping.json and rebuild all bone to RC connections
• Clear All — Reset runtime connections: clears manual_map and bone ml_rc tags. gui_mapping.json is NEVER modified. Use Re-Auto Link to restore.
• Print Full Map (console) — Print the complete bone to RC mapping to the system console
• < Prev — Navigate pages in the DNA RC channel list
• Next > — Navigate pages in the DNA RC channel list
• Change Bone — Open a dialog to assign a GUIArmature bone to a DNA raw- control channel
• Edit Bone Mapping — Edit the RC channel, axis, and directional mapping for this bone
• Connect — Open a dialog to assign a GUIArmature bone to a DNA raw-control channel
• Add Bone to JSON — Add a new bone-to-RC-channel entry to custom_mapping.json
• Assign Bone to RC Channel — Open a dialog to assign a GUIArmature bone to a DNA raw-control channel
• Disconnect Bone — Remove manual RC override for this bone

Expression Presets

• Save Current Expression — Overwrite the preset selected in the dropdown with the current face board pose
• Save As Current Expression... — Save the current face board pose as a NEW preset file. Opens a file dialog so you can pick the location and type a file name
• Delete Expression Preset — Delete the selected preset file
• Apply Preset — Add this preset as a 0-1 slider (see 'Preset Sliders' below) instead of snapping instantly. It starts at 1.0 so the pose shows right away, and can be dialed back or blended with other active presets afterward
• Import... — Copy a preset .json file from anywhere into the addon presets folder so it appears in the preset list
• Set Folder... — Choose the folder where presets are stored and listed. Select the addon's own presets folder to return to the default
• Open Presets Folder — Open the current presets folder in the system file browser

ARKit Live

• Disconnect — Start or stop listening for Apple Live Link Face UDP data
• Stop Recording — Record the live stream as keyframes starting at the current frame - one frame per received tick (~30fps) - instead of only being able to load a CSV exported after the fact. Keyframes the Preset Sliders, and head rotation too if that's enabled
• Track Head Rotation
• Invert Pitch
• Invert Yaw
• Invert Roll
• Load Live Link Face CSV... — Load a Live Link Face CSV recording and bake it as keyframes onto the Preset Sliders (the same controllers you can drag by hand), starting at the current frame
• Export Face CSV... — Write the evaluated shape key values over the frame range as CSV - one file per mesh, ready for Cascadeur's MetaArKit importer
• Rebuild Name Mapping — Rebuild the ARKit-name lookup tables and reload preset bone data from disk. Use after regenerating ARKit presets (Convert ARKit Payload), hand-editing a preset JSON file, or editing gui_mapping.json

Retarget Rigify Animation (Beta)

• Retarget Rigify Animation — Bake the source armature's animation onto the target Rigify control rig

Body Blend (experimental)

• Use Base DNA — Add the Body.dna (+ matching Head.dna) from the addon's base_dna/ folder as a source - this is meant to always be your PRIMARY row, since library entries can never supply RigLogic/correctives data on their own
• Add Folder... — Scan a folder for _Body.dna files (Epic's own body- archetype naming) and add every one found as a blend source, auto-matching each with its _Head.dna. Remembers the folder for next time
• Add Body DNA — Add a body.dna file as a blend source
• Load Library... — Load a compact .json archetype library (see Export Archetype Library) and add every archetype in it as a blend source. These can only be used as NON-primary sources - keep at least one real .dna file (e.g. your own character) as the primary/highlighted row
• Export... — Export the CURRENT Body Blend source list (added .dna rows and loaded library entries - exactly what you see, nothing else) as ONE compact .json library. With an empty list, falls back to scanning the chosen folder (including subfolders) for body .dna files instead
• Name
• LOD
• Build Blended Body — Blend the listed body DNA files (weighted) into a character. WARNING: adjusting blend weight sliders AFTER building may cause face rig errors - if the face misbehaves after changing weights, click Build again (with Replace on) to rebuild it cleanly
• Replace — Build overwrites the last Body Blend character slot in place instead of adding a new one (falls back to adding if there's nothing to replace yet, e.g. the first Build this session)
• Live Preview — After a Build, dragging a weight slider re-blends and updates the built character live instead of requiring another Build click

Proportions

• Leg Length — Length of the thighs and shins
• Torso Length — Length of the spine from the pelvis to the neck
• Neck Length — Length of the neck
• Arm Length — Length of the upper arms and forearms
• Shoulder Width — Width across the shoulders
• Hip Width — Width between the hip joints
• Waist — Size around the waist
• Chest — Size around the chest
• Hips — Size around the hips and buttocks
• Thigh — Thickness of the thighs
• Calf — Thickness of the calves
• Upper Arm — Thickness of the upper arms
• Forearm — Thickness of the forearms
• Neck Thickness — Thickness of the neck
• Head Size — Size of the whole head, face included
• Heel Height — Height of the heel above the floor, in cm
• Front Height — Thickness of the sole under the ball of the foot, in cm
• Long Legs — Longer legs, a slightly smaller head, a slimmer waist and hips
• Reset — Back to the character as it was built

Wearables (experimental)

• Import Clothing (FBX)... — Import a MetaHuman-compatible clothing FBX (same skeleton bone names) and attach it to the active character - reuses the character's OWN skeleton, and retargets the garment's rest shape to this character's actual bone proportions (not a Shrinkwrap - loose clothing stays loose)
• Head Accessory... — Import a MetaHuman-compatible clothing FBX (same skeleton bone names) and attach it to the active character - reuses the character's OWN skeleton, and retargets the garment's rest shape to this character's actual bone proportions (not a Shrinkwrap - loose clothing stays loose)
• Refit Clothing To Body — Re-run the bone-position retarget for every worn clothing item on the active character. For a Body Blend character, this also forces the body/head armature itself fully up to date first (bypassing Live Preview's mode-safety pause), so this is the reliable manual fallback when live tracking didn't already catch a shape change
• Clothing Offset — Pushes ALL currently worn clothing outward along its own surface normal by this distance, uniformly everywhere - not a scale, so it floats just slightly off the body instead of clipping into skin. Adjustable anytime, not just at import time - applies live to everything already worn on this character
• Make Garment Rig — Rig the SELECTED mesh as a garment for the active character: transfers skin weights from the character's own body mesh (nearest-face projection - the same technique MetaHuman clothing uses in Unreal), limits/normalizes them, and adds an Armature modifier driving it with the character's own skeleton - the mesh then deforms exactly as if the character were wearing it. Follow with Bind Garment To Character
• Bind Garment To Character — Attach the selected Made garment (see Make Garment Rig) to the active character, exactly like an imported clothing FBX: replaces whatever worn category it conflicts with, records the character's CURRENT shape as the garment's reference fit, and from then on it follows Body Blend weight changes live and the Refit button - the same pipeline as FBX clothing
• Import Hair... — Import a MetaHuman-compatible hair/groom Alembic (.abc) and parent it to the active character's head. Defaults are tuned for MetaHuman groom exports (Scale 0.01, since Blender's Alembic importer doesn't do the cm-to-meter conversion this addon's own DNA pipeline does elsewhere) - use the Scale/Rotation options (bottom-left after importing) to adjust for a different source
• Bind Hair To Head — Make the selected hair/beard follow the active character's head when Body Blend changes its shape. Needed for grooms that came in without Bind To Head Surface, or from outside this addon - hair already bound is simply re-bound to where the head is now
• Align Active Mesh to DNA Head — Move the selected mesh's points onto the character's own head shape, so a head made elsewhere matches this character
• Retarget Hair to Selected Mesh — Re-attach the selected hair to the mesh you pick, so it follows this character's head instead of the one it came with

Live Corrective Sculpting (Beta)

• Corrective — Name of the corrective to sculpt - reuse an existing name to add another anchor pose to it, or type a new name to start a new one
• Begin (Face) — Enter Sculpt Mode on a new correction for the pose the character is in right now. Sculpt the fix, then click Finish Sculpt
• Body Driver Bone — Body armature bone whose rotation this corrective should react to - only bones that actually drive a Twist/Swing/RBF corrective are listed
• Begin (Body) — Enter Sculpt Mode on a new correction for the pose the character is in right now. Sculpt the fix, then click Finish Sculpt
• Finish Sculpt — Leave Sculpt Mode and start playing this correction back automatically whenever the character returns to that pose
• Export Edited Shape Keys — Write every DNA blend shape key you sculpted back into the .dna, replacing that channel
• Bake All to DNA — Write every corrective that has a blend shape target assigned, in one pass
• Export... — Save every correction on this character to a .json file to reuse or share
• Import... — Load corrections from a .json file. Only works on a character with the same body and head as the one they were saved from
• Sync to Wearables — Copy the skin's corrections onto the clothing worn on this character, so a sleeve bulges with the arm underneath it. Use after adding new clothing
• Set Neutral — Record the CURRENT pose as this corrective's neutral (weight 0). Put the character back to rest first. Use this when the corrective does not fall all the way to 0 at rest - on a custom head the driver bone does not sit exactly on its rest pose at neutral, and the assumed neutral leaves a constant offset
• Toggle Manual Override — Switch between following the pose automatically and being dragged by hand with the slider
• Remove Corrective — Delete this correction and its shape key. The character keeps its shape; only the correction is removed
• value
• Edit Sculpt — Go back into Sculpt Mode on this correction to refine it. Pose the character close to where it was first sculpted for the best result
• Bake Corrective to DNA — Write this corrective into the .dna as blend shape deltas

Export (DNA / FBX / glTF)

• Head — Save the active slot's head.dna, including any Blender mesh edits
• Body — Save the active slot's body.dna, including any Blender mesh edits

MD Live

• Start Live / Stop Live — Start or stop Live: the active character is re-sent to Marvelous Designer whenever it changes (pose, face, Body Blend, sculpt), and every garment Marvelous Designer writes is worn here as Wear As, replacing the previous one. Run the mb_live plug-in in Marvelous Designer as well
• Wear As — What a garment arriving from Marvelous Designer is worn as (and what it replaces). Remembered for the next file
• MD Simulate Frames — Live: how many frames Marvelous Designer simulates after the avatar changed, before it sends the garment back. 0 sends it without simulating
• Auto-Return Garment — Live: after a new avatar, Marvelous Designer simulates and sends the garment back by itself. Off: it waits for Get Garment Now
• Get Garment Now — Ask Marvelous Designer (mb_live running) to send the garment now; Live wears it when it arrives
• Shared Folder — The folder Blender writes avatars to and Marvelous Designer exports garments into. Left empty, ~/MetaBridgeDNA/MDLive is used. Remembered for the next file
• Open Shared Folder — Open the shared folder in the system file browser
• Send Scale — Marvelous Designer units per Blender metre when SENDING. Blender works in metres, so 1000 sends millimetres and 100 sends centimetres
• it has to match the unit picked in Marvelous Designer's own import dialog. Remembered for the next file
• Include Head — Send the head mesh along with the body. Marvelous Designer refuses an avatar with no head, so this is on by default; it is also what hats and collars need. Remembered for the next file
• Prepare for Auto-Fit — Ask Marvelous Designer to build arrangement points and a fitting suit while it loads the avatar. A plain OBJ has neither, and the tools that expect a prepared avatar turn it away. Turn off if the import misbehaves
• Send Body to MD — Write the active character's body out to the shared folder as an OBJ avatar for Marvelous Designer at the Send Scale, in its current pose. Always the same filename, so reshaping the character and pressing this again is the whole round trip - then run the MetaBridge plug-in in Marvelous Designer
• Import Scale — Marvelous Designer units per Blender metre when RECEIVING a garment exported by hand. Garments the MetaBridge plug-ins send carry their own unit, and one that still arrives in the wrong unit is corrected to the unit that puts it on the body
• Import Garment from MD... — Bring a garment Marvelous Designer exported back in, in metres. With Rig To Character on it goes straight through the normal clothing pipeline - skin weights from the character's own body, then worn as a garment that follows the rig
• Open MD Plug-in Folder — Open the folder holding the Marvelous Designer plug-in scripts. Register mb_live.py (and the two one-shot scripts if you like) once in Marvelous Designer under Plug-in > Plug-in Manager > Add

Send to Cascadeur

• Send
• Include Head — Merge the head rig and its meshes into the body skeleton on the way out. Off sends the body alone
• Face Bones — Send the 843 facial joints too. Off keeps the face on the head joint and sends the body skeleton alone, which is a quarter of the character and all Cascadeur needs to animate a body. Turn on only to pose the face there
• Include Animation — Bake whatever animation is on the rig into the FBX. Off sends the character in its rest pose
• Append — Add after whatever Cascadeur already received. Off starts again from frame 0
• Send Frame Range
• Current Frame
• Port — The port Cascadeur's Receive Poses command listens on. Change it only if that command was started on another one. Remembered for the next file
• Cascadeur Status
• Receive — Animation Only keys onto the rig already here. Mesh + Animation brings Cascadeur's scene back as new objects.
• Onto Rigify Controls — Put what comes back on the control rig instead of the deform bones, so it can be adjusted there.
• Whole Take — Read every frame Cascadeur holds. Off reads the scene frame range instead.
• Receive from Cascadeur — Bring the work back.
• Live: Mirror This Rig / Stop Mirroring — Keep Blender and Cascadeur in sync while you work, in either or both directions.
• Live direction — Blender to Cascadeur, Cascadeur to Blender, or Both Ways, where whichever side you are posing drives the other.
• Bones — Mapped Bones (the set Send and Receive already agree about) or Whole Skeleton (every shared bone name, only for a character sent from this rig).
• Onto Rigify Controls (Live) — Poses coming in land on the control rig instead of the deform bones, so the character stays posable while mirroring.

Unreal Live

• Port — Loopback port Unreal's Live Link source connects to. Keep it off the port a body stream is using, so the two can be attached at once
• Rate — Frames a second to send. Live Link reads a source that goes quiet as a source that died, so this is sent at a steady rate whether the face is moving or not
• Start Unreal Live
• Stop Unreal Live
• Mirror — Blender and Unreal disagree on handedness, and Y is the reflection that settles it - derived from Unreal's own bone transforms and confirmed on the character. Left as a switch for a rig built the other way round

Follow Unreal

• Host — Where Unreal is. 127.0.0.1 when it is on this machine.
• Port — 9562. This is what tells the Unreal plug-in it is sending here rather than to one of the other features.
• Apply Rate — How many times a second the arriving pose is applied.
• Body — Follow the body bones.
• Face — Follow the face.
• Follow Unreal — Start. Then run MotionForge.Send.Start in Unreal.
• Stop Following — Stop, and give Rigify back its constraints.

Animation Baker

• Bake Face Animation — Evaluate the face board over the frame range and bake the result into keyframes on the head rig bones and shape keys
• Clear Baked Animation — Remove baked actions from the head rig and shape keys of the active slot

Pose Reset

• Reset All Controls — Reset all face board controls of the active slot to the neutral pose
• Reset Selected (Pose Mode) — Reset only the selected face board bones to neutral (Pose Mode)

DNA Validation

• Validate DNA File... — Check a .dna file for corruption and print a content report to the console
• Validate Active Slot — Validate the head and body DNA files of the active slot

Batch Tools

• Assemble All Characters — Assemble every character found in the scanned directory into its own slot. This can take a long time for many characters
• Export All Slots — Export every assembled slot to a directory as FBX or glTF

External Preset Converter

• Convert & Import (Maya/Houdini)... — Import a Maya/Houdini preset JSON, converting its bone names to the GUI board names. Unmatched names are written to name_mapping.json for manual editing
• Convert ARKit Payload... — Convert an ARKit remap payload JSON (arkit52 target/contributor weights) into one board-pose preset per ARKit target
• Edit Name Mapping