“Desynchronization Issue Using Animated Blendshapes: Eyebrow and Eyelash Animations are out of sync with the Facial Animation in Maya”
Hello, I’m experiencing a problem with my head/face animation when using animated blend shapes. The animations for the eyelashes and brows are not synchronized with the facial animation. Additionally, they exhibit more deformation compared to the facial expressions. I’ve been grappling with this issue for weeks, so any ideas would be greatly appreciated. :) My project involves a basic custom Maya head mesh with distinct left and right eyes, eyebrows, and eyelashes. I’ve outlined my workflow below…
Step 1: I import my custom head mesh (Not a Metahuman or Real Illusion Mesh) from Maya to A2F.
Step 2: I create a Full Face Character Setup (Character Transfer), establish correspondences, and add the eyelashes and eyebrows as additional dynamic meshes.
Step 3: I go through the Mesh Fit and Post Wrap processes.
Step 4: In the Stage window, I select the Head result, Mesh, then choose the dynamic Eyelashes and Brows Meshes and apply the Prox UI.
Step 5: I connect Audio2Face to the gray Mark head using the “english_voice_male_p3_neutral.wav” file using all of the default settings. As a result, everything, including the face, both eyes, eyebrows, and eyelashes, moves together as expected.
Step 6: I generate Blendshapes clicking on the Preview in Stage, creating 46 NV Poses. I save those as a .usd file and import them into Maya.
Step 7: I select all 46 heads, then the rig head; I choose “deform” and add blend shape. Similarly, I do the same for the brows and lashes, selecting all 46 of them, then the corresponding mesh parts, and applying the blend shape.
Step 8: I create a group in Maya containing the head, brows, and lashes. I export this group using the Omniverse connector as a .usd Skeletal Mesh and then import it into my previous A2F scene.
Step 9: For Blendshape Conversion, I select my custom result head mesh still driven by the grey Mark as the Input Anim Mesh. Then, I select the imported blend shape group head as the blend shape mesh. I set up the blend shape solve and export the JSON for the face at 30 fps. I repeat the process for the brows and eyelashes.
Step 10: In Maya, I run the import JSON script for the face, brows, and lashes. This process successfully creates animated keys for all of the blend shapes but plays out of sync.
Here is a video of the issue in Maya:
