Upload and Rig Your Own Character

If you already have a character design, you can upload it and rig it, so it plays the same action library as the ready-made cast. An SVG becomes a vector character with movable parts. A PNG or JPG picture becomes an image character: the picture stays a picture and is animated as a whole, like a paper puppet.

Start the rig wizard

Click Character in the left rail
Click New Character. The button shows how many character slots your plan has left, and a saved character uses one
In the Character Editor, click Upload your own SVG (“Rig your own artwork and animate it”)
Click Choose file, or drag and drop your file onto the upload area

What happens next depends on the file type.

	SVG	PNG or JPG picture
File size	Up to 2 MB	Up to 6 MB (WebP also works)
Becomes	A vector character	An image character
Wizard steps	Upload, Map body parts, Place joints, Test, Save	Prepare, Place joints, Test, Save
Library actions	Yes	Yes
Blinking	Yes, if you map the eyes	No
Lip sync	Yes, if you map the mouth	No
Expressions	The face parts you add	Generated by AI on first use
Recolor and outfits	Yes	No

Prepare an SVG that rigs well

The wizard reads the groups in your SVG, so a little preparation saves a lot of mapping:

Put each body part in its own group (head, torso, upper arm, forearm, hand, thigh, shin, foot), drawn facing forward
“Left” means the character’s left, which is the viewer’s right
Let parts overlap a little at the joints so no gaps open when limbs bend
Add separate eyes, eyebrows and mouth groups if you want blinking, expressions and lip sync
Keep the file under 2 MB and under 3,000 elements, and make sure it has a viewBox (or a width and height)

Not sure how to structure it? On the upload screen, click Download template. Draw each part into its named group over the gray guide bone, delete the guides, and upload the result.

Rig an SVG character

Upload. After you choose the file, the wizard reports how many groups it found and how many body parts it matched automatically. Click Next
Map body parts. On the Body parts tab, select a body part, then click the matching artwork on the canvas, or pick its group from the list. Torso, Head, both arms and both legs are required. Hips, forearms, hands, shins and feet are optional, as are Eyes (enables blinking), Eyebrows (enables expressions) and Mouth (enables lip-sync). When you map one side, the wizard may offer to map the mirrored part too: click Yes, map it
Place joints. Drag each dot to the natural pivot of that body part. Everything below a dot follows it, so start at the hips, then the chest, then each hand and foot. Hollow dots (shoulders, elbows, knees) bend automatically. Hold Alt to move a single dot without its chain. Keep Mirror left/right on to move both sides together, and click Reset to auto-fit to start the joints again
Test. Pick a test animation and watch your character move, or choose Pose it yourself and drag a wrist or ankle. Set Motion energy to Subtle, Normal or Exaggerated. If a limb bends in the wrong place, click Something’s off — fix joints. When it looks right, click Looks good — continue
Save. Enter a Character name and click Save my character

Your character appears under My Characters in the Character panel, ready to add to any design.

Help while mapping

Smart match: the wizard asks the AI to match your groups to body parts automatically (1 AI credit). Double-check the result. If it’s unavailable, the wizard matches by group names, and you can click Smart match with AI or Retry smart match
Automatic joints: the wizard also tries to detect the pose and place the joints for you. If it can’t read the drawing, it uses a standard-proportions estimate that you drag into place
Layers tab: fix the artwork itself. Click shapes (Shift adds more) and use Group selected to make loose shapes mappable, Ungroup, reorder what draws in front, rename or delete a layer. Every change can be undone
An arm or leg drawn as one piece can be mapped as the whole arm or leg. It moves as one piece, with no elbow or knee bend
Undo and redo work in the mapping and joints steps: Ctrl+Z, and Ctrl+Y or Ctrl+Shift+Z (Cmd on a Mac)

Give an SVG character expressions and swappable hands

On the Save step, under Swappable hands and face parts, you can add extra SVG drawings. Choose a Slot (Left hand, Right hand, Mouth, Eyes or Brows), type a Part name, choose the SVG file and click Add.

Face parts that share a name become one expression. For example, eyes named “smile” plus a mouth named “smile” give your character a Smile expression in the Expressions panel. Hand variants are available when you create your own animations for this character. A character can have up to 40 parts, each up to 512 KB.

Turn a picture into an image character

When you upload a PNG or JPG, the wizard switches to image-character mode.

Prepare. The wizard removes the background if the picture has one (1 AI credit) and finds the skeleton (3 AI credits). The first time, it also downloads a pose model of about 90 MB, which is cached afterwards
If the arms touch the body, click Fix pose with AI (12.5 credits) to redraw the picture in an A-pose first. When preparation finishes, click Next
Place joints. Drag the dots onto your character; everything below a dot follows, and Alt moves one dot alone. The small teal dots mark the face (eyes, brows, nose, mouth, chin). They guide the AI expressions, so drag them if they’re off
Test. Watch the test animations. Under Rig style, choose Cutout parts (each part is cut at its joints and moves rigidly, like the library characters) or Soft mesh. With cutout parts, Soft joints makes elbows, knees, wrists, ankles and the neck bend smoothly, and Draw hidden parts can have the AI fill in artwork hidden behind limbs (the button shows the cost). Click Looks good — continue
Save. Enter a Character name and click Save my character

The character keeps its neutral face. The first time you pick an expression such as Smile or Angry, the AI draws it for this character, for 12.5 AI credits each. Each face is kept, so you only pay once.

Convert a picture into a vector character instead

On the Prepare step you can click Convert to a vector character instead. The AI redraws your character as separate body parts, with the clothes drawn separately, and shows you the result under Does this look like your character?

Click Continue if every piece is there and nothing is joined up. The wizard traces the parts and puts the character back together, then you continue with Map body parts as for an SVG
Click Regenerate for another attempt, or Start over to choose a different file
After two attempts, you can also choose Keep going anyway or Use the simple conversion

This path costs AI credits: 12.5 for the body parts, 12.5 for the clothes and 1 for each traced sheet. Regenerate costs another redraw, and the simple conversion costs 13.5. If you convert the same picture again in the same browser, the wizard reuses the parts sheet it already made and charges nothing; click Generate a new one if you want a fresh one.

Edit a rig later

In the Character panel, hover your character under My Characters and click the pencil
In the Character Editor, click Edit rig & parts
The wizard opens on the Place joints step. Adjust the joints, go Back to change the mapping, or add swappable parts on the Save step
Click Save changes

For your own vector characters, the Character Editor also has an Outfits section. Click Add outfit to upload an outfit SVG (a shirt, a hat, a held prop), pin its pieces to body parts and preview it moving. A character can have up to 8 outfits; switch between them, recolor them, or choose No outfit.

Troubleshooting

“This file is larger than 2MB”: simplify or compress the SVG. For pictures, the limit is 6 MB
“too complex to animate smoothly”: the SVG has more than 3,000 elements. Merge paths and remove hidden layers
“This SVG has no size information”: re-export it with a viewBox
Next is greyed out on Map body parts: the footer lists the parts still needed. Torso, Head, both arms and both legs must be mapped
The character won’t blink or lip-sync: map Eyes and Mouth on the mapping step (vector characters only)
New Character shows 0 left: you’ve used all your character slots. Upgrade your plan for more