Mesh to MetaHuman — Considerations

Two routes turn a sculpt or scan into a rigged MetaHuman in Unreal Engine 5.8. Pick one per character.

Route	Input	Output	Use when
MetaHuman Identity → From Mesh ("Mesh to MetaHuman")	Head mesh (FBX/OBJ), any topology	Rigged head DNA via cloud Identity Solve and Auto-Rig	The head likeness matters most; body built in Creator
MetaHuman Creator → From Custom Mesh (5.8)	Full character or head + body, any topology	Standard MetaHuman topology in A-pose, head and body conformed	A sculpted full body (period build, age, height) must be kept

From Mesh (Identity) steps

Import the mesh (OBJ recommended above about 200k vertices; enable Combine Meshes).
Prepare: fix materials; remove UV-split or vertex-split artifacts.
Create a MetaHuman Identity asset; Create Components → From Mesh.
Set viewport lighting: Unlit for albedo-textured meshes; otherwise flat, front-facing, symmetrical light.
Frame the neutral pose with a camera field of view of 20° or less.
Promote frames: a frontal frame is required; extra frames for ears and nostrils help.
Track markers, lock frames, correct misplaced markers by hand (eye corners, lip corners, nostrils).
Run Identity Solve, then Auto-Rig (cloud service; needs an Epic account connection).
Open the result in MetaHuman Creator.

Problem	Symptom	Fix
Closed eyes, empty sockets, no sclera contrast	Trackers miss the eyes	Model open eyes with white sclera (ZBrush — Sculpting for MetaHuman)
Lips parted or intersecting	Mouth corners and lip line solve badly	Seal the lips cleanly
Hair mass on the sculpt	Forehead and cranium distorted	Sculpt the skull; hair becomes a groom
Poor lighting on an untextured mesh	Markers jitter	Use albedo or flat symmetrical light
Wrong scale or orientation	Solve fails or head is tiny/huge	Fix in DCC before import
Loose clothing on the body mesh	Body fits the garment, not the anatomy	Sculpt the body nude or in tight clothing
Stylized proportions	Pinching and volume loss in animation	Keep realistic morphology
Large FBX	Import problems	Use OBJ

No living subject to scan. Likeness comes from a sculpt, so the solve smooths toward the MetaHuman database of real heads. Expect to reintroduce distinctive features later in Maya's Neutral Pose editing (MetaHuman for Maya — Considerations).
Solve first, sculpt second. Epic recommends Mesh to MetaHuman auto-rigging as the first pass, then refinement on the rigged head, rather than perfecting a sculpt that will be smoothed anyway.
Keep the texture evidence. The original textures transfer to the auto-rigged mesh; keep the albedo so the Creator skin can be matched to it.
Version everything. Save the Identity asset, promoted frames and DNA per iteration so the historian can compare versions.
Label the reconstruction. If the face comes from a sculpt rather than a photograph-accurate scan, the splash card says so.

Owner: character artist. Tutorials: MetaHuman — Tutorials