How does the game design/animation industry feel about using Unreal Engine MetaHumans?
I’m curious what people who work in game design, animation, 3D, or related fields think about Unreal Engine’s MetaHumans.
Do you see MetaHumans as a useful professional asset that can speed up character creation and let artists focus more on animation, storytelling, environments, customization, etc.? Or is using them sometimes looked at as lazy compared to modeling and creating a character completely from scratch?
I’m also wondering how accepted they are in professional settings. Are MetaHumans commonly used in actual game, animation, cinematic, or virtual production pipelines, or are they more seen as a prototyping/previs tool?
And from a student/portfolio perspective, is it okay to use a MetaHuman in a portfolio if you’re transparent about what you did? For example, if someone used a MetaHuman as a base but created/customized the clothing, hair, textures, animation, lighting, environments, and overall presentation themselves, would employers still consider that a strong portfolio piece?
Would it depend on the role you’re applying for? Like, would it be more acceptable for someone applying for animation, game design, technical art, cinematics, or Unreal-related positions than someone applying specifically as a character modeler?
I’m interested in animation/game design rather than specifically becoming a character modeler, so I’m trying to understand where the line is between using professional tools efficiently and relying too heavily on premade assets.
Would love to hear from people currently working in games, animation, Unreal, virtual production, or anyone involved in hiring/reviewing portfolios.