Make your ped

Skeleton and joints

Check where the joints landed, drag the ones that are off, mirror a good side, and choose how fingers, face, hands and head are rigged.

Checking the joints

The Ped Creator finds the joints of your model during the first preview. Until then the Skeleton step says “The joints show up here after the first preview.”

The Skeleton step of the Ped Creator: the model in the Source view, front on, with every joint as a point and one joint selected.

The step switches the viewport to the Source view in the rest pose. Every joint shows as a point inside the model. A note above the list sums up the result:

“All 15 key joints found”, plus how many you moved and, when the joints came from your file, from which rig.
“2 key joints not found”, followed by the names of the missing joints. Check the model, or try another Joint source.

The 15 key joints are pelvis, neck and head, plus shoulder, elbow, wrist, hip, knee and ankle on each side. The list shows the left and centre joints first. A line such as + 9 more on the right side opens the rest, with the finger and face joints.

The Joints group of the Skeleton step: the note on the key joints, the joint list with auto or the distance moved, the selected joint with its x, y and z fields, and Reset joint and Reset all.

Each row says auto, or how far you moved the joint, for example +4 cm.

Moving a joint

To move a joint in the Ped Creator, click its point in the view or its row in the list. Arrows appear on the point: drag one to move the joint along that axis.

The fields x, y and z show the position in metres; y is the height. Type a value and press Enter for an exact move.
The name of the selected joint shows moved 4 cm in yellow once it differs from where it was found.
Reset joint puts the selected joint back. Reset all puts back every joint you moved.
Then press Update preview. Moves only take effect in the next preview.

Joints can only move on the model they were found on, so the list locks in two cases:

While a preview runs: “A preview is running. You can move joints again when it is done.”
After a change in Source or Fit & size: “The model moved since the last preview. Update the preview first, then move joints on the new one.”

Good to know

Play Walk and Sit (car) before you move anything. A knee that bends above the knee of the mesh, or an elbow in the upper arm, shows you the joint to move.

Mirror and the left and right check

After each preview the Ped Creator compares the left and right joints of the body. When a pair is more than 5 % of the height apart when mirrored, a note shows above Mirror, for example:

“Your left and right wrists are 58 cm apart when mirrored, so the joint detection probably missed one side. This often happens when an extra part or a limb touches the body. Check both markers, or mirror the good side below.”

Normal models stay under 2 %. In our tests a generated brute had its right wrist found at its foot, 34 % off.

When exactly one side of such a pair sits where that joint belongs on a normal body, the Ped Creator mirrors it onto the other side itself and says so under WATCH FOR: One side of the joint detection was implausible and was mirrored from the other side: wrist (right side). The note above Mirror only stays when the check can't tell which side is right. Joints you placed yourself, a Mirror setting and joints taken from the model's own rig are never mirrored automatically.

Option	What it does
Off	The default. Both sides keep their own joints.
Left → right	Copies the left side onto the right side.
Right → left	Copies the right side onto the left side.

Off
The default. Both sides keep their own joints.
Left → right
Copies the left side onto the right side.
Right → left
Copies the right side onto the left side.

Mirror copies every joint of the good side, found or moved, finger and face pairs included. The line under it speaks of your corrections, but it copies the whole side. Left and right are the ped's own sides.

Extra limbs

A part that touches the body, such as an extra arm, confuses the detection. Pin it to a bone in Attachments; the joints are then found on the body alone.

Joint source

Joint source decides where the Ped Creator takes the joints from. The default is Auto.

Option	What it does	Use it when
Auto	Finds the joints in the mesh. If that fails and your file has a rig, takes the rig instead, with a warning.	Almost always.
From mesh	Finds the joints in the mesh and never uses the rig.	The rig in your file is broken or does not match the mesh.
From rig	Takes the joints only from the rig in your file.	A clean Mixamo, Ready Player Me or Unreal rig sits better than the detection.

Auto
What it does:Finds the joints in the mesh. If that fails and your file has a rig, takes the rig instead, with a warning.
Use it when:Almost always.
From mesh
What it does:Finds the joints in the mesh and never uses the rig.
Use it when:The rig in your file is broken or does not match the mesh.
From rig
What it does:Takes the joints only from the rig in your file.
Use it when:A clean Mixamo, Ready Player Me or Unreal rig sits better than the detection.

From rig stops with No rig found in your file when the file has no rig. With a rig of another kind it stops with We couldn't find all joints.
Fingers come from the rig whenever it has finger bones, whatever this setting says.

Fingers, face, hands and head

The Detail group of the Ped Creator decides how hands and face are rigged. All four switches are on by default.

The lower part of the Skeleton step: Mirror with Off, Left → right and Right → left, Joint source with Auto, From mesh and From rig, and the Detail switches Fingers, Face, Fit vanilla hands and Fit vanilla head.

Switch	On	Off	Turn it off for
Fingers	Every finger joint is rigged.	The hand stays rigid.	Models whose fingers tear in hand gestures.
Face	19 face bones for eyes, jaw and brows.	The head moves as one piece, without facial animation.	Masks, helmets, robots.
Fit vanilla hands	The GTA hand is fitted to your hand, for more precise hands.	The hand follows your mesh only.	Claws, mittens, non-human hands.
Fit vanilla head	The GTA face is fitted to your head, for a more precise face.	The head follows your mesh only.	Masks, helmets, animal heads.

Fingers
On:Every finger joint is rigged.
Off:The hand stays rigid.
Turn it off for:Models whose fingers tear in hand gestures.
Face
On:19 face bones for eyes, jaw and brows.
Off:The head moves as one piece, without facial animation.
Turn it off for:Masks, helmets, robots.
Fit vanilla hands
On:The GTA hand is fitted to your hand, for more precise hands.
Off:The hand follows your mesh only.
Turn it off for:Claws, mittens, non-human hands.
Fit vanilla head
On:The GTA face is fitted to your head, for a more precise face.
Off:The head follows your mesh only.
Turn it off for:Masks, helmets, animal heads.

A head made from a picture has painted lips and eyes on closed skin. With Face on, the Ped Creator cuts the mouth open along the lip line and adds the inside of the mouth, teeth and a tongue, so the mouth opens with GTA's facial animations as far as on a GTA ped. The painted eyes stay still: they don't blink or look around yet.

A model with its own mouth keeps it and gets matching weights. Lips without an inner side, common on VRoid models, would tear open, so that mouth stays still. A model with its own eyes keeps its lids, and only the eyeballs follow the gaze. If no face is found, for example under a mask, jaw and lips stay still instead of stretching the face.

Fingers tear when the finger joints do not sit on the real fingers, mostly on models without a rig. After each preview the Ped Creator measures the hands in two gestures and warns: Fingers tear in hand gestures. Move the finger joints, or turn Fingers off. In our tests that took the worst stretch on a plain base mesh from 12.5 cm to 1.3 cm.

A model under 15,000 triangles without its own rig gets no finger joints at all, and the fingers move as one piece with the hand. Its hand is too coarse to bend: on a model with about 6,000 triangles, finger joints tore the hand by 7 cm in gestures. A model with its own rig keeps its fingers.

Creature profile

With Profile set to Creature in Skin weights, Face, Fit vanilla hands and Fit vanilla head are off and locked. Their line then reads “Off for the Creature profile (Skin weights step).”

1. Off for the Creature profile: set back with Profile Human

Examples, pricing and FAQ on the FiveM Ped Creator page.