Virtual meetings have become an integral part of our lives in today's digital age. While there are undeniable benefits to virtual meeting platforms like Zoom, sitting through countless video conferences can quickly grow monotonous.

One way to inject a dose of fun and creativity into your Zoom meetings is by turning yourself into a cartoon character. With Adobe Character Animator's powers, you can create your own character, set up a scene, and use it to join a Zoom meeting.

How to Stream Adobe Character Animator to Zoom

Adobe Character Animator is a tool that lets you create and animate custom characters or puppets. The software employs your webcam and microphone to capture facial expressions, gestures, and voice in real-time. These inputs are then mapped onto your digital puppet, allowing it to mimic your movements and expressions.

However, since Character Animator is using your webcam, other apps like Zoom can't access it. This is where NDI comes in—a tool that creates a virtual camera on your computer and relays the scene from Adobe Character Animator to the virtual camera.

Once you have set up Adobe Character Animator and NDI Tools, all that's left is to start a Zoom meeting and choose the virtual NDI webcam as your video input. This will display your animated cartoon character to everyone else in the meeting. Since the animations are all in real-time, your puppet will talk and move just as you do in real life.

So, without further ado, let's get started!

1. Download and Install NDI Core Suite

The first step in bringing your animated character to Zoom is downloading and installing NDI Core Suite. NDI, short for Network Device Interface, is a technology that allows high-quality audio and video to be transmitted over a local network.

NDI Core Suite provides a set of applications that enables you to utilize NDI for various purposes, including streaming video between different software applications. To start, visit the official NDI website and download the NDI Core Suite package.

Once downloaded, run the installer and follow the on-screen instructions to install the tools on your computer. After the installation is finished, launch NDI and select Webcam. There's nothing more to do in NDI for now.

2. Launch and Set Up Adobe Character Animator

Once you've installed NDI Core Suite, launch Adobe Character Animator. If you're new to the app, take some time to familiarize yourself with Adobe Character Animator.

To begin, you can either start with a pre-designed puppet template or create a character from scratch. You can also download free Adobe Character Animator puppets from third-party websites.

After you import a puppet, you can calibrate the puppet to your face by clicking the Calibrate button under your webcam preview. Next to the same Calibrate button, you'll find options to disable body tracking, face tracking, or voice control.

Select Stream on the top-left to enter the streaming workspace. In the bottom-right corner of the character preview, click Background and then select a background for your scene. Now, try out your puppet by talking and moving your head. Your character should move accordingly!

There are tons of customizations and features you can use for your puppet, but that's all up to you. The bare minimum to turn into a cartoon character in Zoom is that you have a puppet and a background.

3. Select Adobe Character Animator in NDI Tools

With your character fully prepared, and your scene set, it's time to establish a connection between Adobe Character Animator and NDI. As mentioned, NDI acts as the middle-man between Adobe Character Animator and Zoom.

1. Open the NDI app.
2. Select Webcam in the NDI Launcher.

3. Expand the hidden icons in your taskbar and click NDI Webcam to open it.
4. Click the cog icon in Video 1.

5. In the menu, go to your username and select Adobe Character Animator.

You should now be able to see your character in the NDI webcam preview. From now on, any video conferencing app that uses this as its video input will display your cartoon character instead of your face.

4. Set Up Your Zoom Video

Now that your character's feed is available in NDI, you can bring your animated cartoon into Zoom. All you need to do is to select NDI Webcam Video as your video input in Zoom.

1. Open Zoom and go to the Settings menu.
2. Go to the Video tab.
3. Under Camera, select NDI Webcam Video 1.

Voila! Zoom should show your cartoon character in the camera preview! You can now host a Zoom meeting and appear as a fun cartoon to your friends and colleagues. If your cartoon character resembles a human, you can even use Zoom to blur the background on your video.

Zoom Like Never Before

Virtual meetings have become a cornerstone of modern communication, and just like any other regular part of life, they've become boring. As a result, any break in the monotony of video conferences is welcome.

Following the steps above, you can turn yourself into a living cartoon character and add a splash of fun and creativity to your Zoom meetings. You can use the same method to turn into a cartoon character in any other video conferencing software. All you have to do is to set your video source to NDI!