Free tool: get character animation from Cinema 4D to Unreal Engine

Maxon’s free Cineware for Unreal plugin now transfers character animation from Cinema 4D to Unreal Engine. Video recorded by motion graphics artist Jonathan Winbush.

Maxon has updated Cineware for Unreal, its free plugin for transferring content between Cinema 4D, its 3D animation and motion graphics software, and Unreal Engine.

The add-on lets users import Cinema 4D scenes into UE5 and edit them directly inside the game engine, with any changes made automatically being transferred back from Cinema 4D.

The latest update, Cineware for Unreal 2025.2, greatly extends animation workflows, making it possible to transfer rigged and animated characters as well as animation caches.

Edit Cinema 4D content directly inside Unreal Engine for motion graphics or VFX
First released in 2021, the Cineware for Unreal plugin streamlines the process of working with Cinema 4D content inside Unreal Engine.

The add-on makes it possible to import a Cinema 4D file into Unreal Engine, edit its parameters, and have the scene update inside Cinema 4D and transfer the changes back to Unreal.

You can find more details in this story on the original version of Cineware for Unreal.

Now transfers rigged, animated characters from Cinema 4D to Unreal Engine 5.5+
In the initial release, it was possible to transfer geometry, materials, lights and cameras, but support for animation was largely limited to simple object transforms and material changes.

While it was possible to import more complex animations as geometry caches, the workflow did not support skeletal meshes.

That changes with the latest update, which makes it possible to transfer rigged and animated characters via Unreal Engine’s new Interchange Framework.

To do so, you need to be using Unreal Engine 5.5: while the plugin is also available for previous versions of Unreal, those versions use the older Datasmith API.

However, Datasmith currently supports a greater range of Cinema 4D materials, lights and cameras, so it is still available as an option, even in Unreal Engine 5.5.

You can see a detailed comparison table of the types of Cinema 4D content you can transfer using Datasmith and the Interchange Framework in the online release notes.

System requirements and availability
Cineware for Unreal 2025.2 is compatible with Unreal Engine 5.3+ and Cinema 4D 2024.0+ on Windows and macOS.

Read a full list of changes in Cineware for Unreal 2025.2

Download Maxon’s free Cineware for Unreal plugin

Have your say on this story by following CG Channel on Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter). As well as being able to comment on stories, followers of our social media accounts can see videos we don’t post on the site itself, including making-ofs for the latest VFX movies, animations, games cinematics and motion graphics projects.