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Skeleton & Root bone

BleuRaven edited this page Jun 11, 2025 · 9 revisions

Root Bone at Zero

Depending on your use case, you may need to set the root bone's location and rotation to zero in Unreal Engine.
Below are some presets to help you position the root bone correctly in Blender:

Note: You will need to re-import the skeletal meshes and animations after every change.

Default Blender Root

  • Head: X=0, Y=0, Z=0
  • Tail: X=0, Y=0, Z=1
  • Roll: 0°

Default Blender Root

Result in Unreal Engine

Standard FBX:

  • Rotation: (Pitch=0.0, Yaw=0.0, Roll=90.0)

Standard FBX

Custom FBX:

  • Rotation: (Pitch=90.0, Yaw=-90.0, Roll=-90.0)

Custom FBX

Standard glTF 2.0 (Recommended):

  • Rotation: (Pitch=0.0, Yaw=-00.0, Roll=0.0)

Custom FBX

Get Root at Zero (Standard FBX)

  • Head: X=0, Y=0, Z=0
  • Tail: X=0, Y=1, Z=0
  • Roll: 0°

Standard FBX Root at Zero

Get Root at Zero (Custom FBX)

  • Head: X=0, Y=0, Z=0
  • Tail: X=1, Y=0, Z=0
  • Roll: 90°

Custom FBX Root at Zero

Get Root at Zero (Standard glTF 2.0 (Recommended))

  • Head: X=0, Y=0, Z=0
  • Tail: X=0, Y=0, Z=1
  • Roll: 0°

Default Blender Root at Zero

Add Root Bone Option (Not Recommended)

By default, Blender's standard FBX I/O API exports the armature object as a root bone.
This addon removes the armature root bone by default. You can modify this behavior in the Addon Preferences:

Addon Preferences

You can also specify the desired root bone name and scale.
Warning: If the root bone is named "Armature," Unreal Engine will remove it.

Notes

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