Character Factory is a free, open-source, locally-run text-to-3D character pipeline. Prompt in, rigged character out.

A retired astronomy professor, tweed waistcoat, round spectacles, white beard
1 / 6
“A retired astronomy professor, tweed waistcoat, round spectacles, white beard”
A Nigerian marathon runner mid-career, shaved head, racing singlet and shorts
2 / 6
“A Nigerian marathon runner mid-career, shaved head, racing singlet and shorts”
A young female Japanese street courier, undercut with dyed teal tips, cropped windbreaker
3 / 6
“A young female Japanese street courier, undercut with dyed teal tips, cropped windbreaker”
An Afro-Caribbean bartender, locs tied back, rolled-sleeve shirt and vest
4 / 6
“An Afro-Caribbean bartender, locs tied back, rolled-sleeve shirt and vest”
A tall Scandinavian nurse, blonde hair, scrub top
5 / 6
“A tall Scandinavian nurse, blonde hair, scrub top”
An Indian grandmother, silver hair in a tight bun, fitted knit cardigan
6 / 6
“An Indian grandmother, silver hair in a tight bun, fitted knit cardigan”

Quickstart

pip install "character-factory[generation]"
character-factory make "A retired astronomy professor, tweed waistcoat, round spectacles, white beard" -o professor

First run downloads ≈36 GB of model weights. After that, generation is local and offline.

$ character-factory make "A retired astronomy professor, tweed waistcoat, round spectacles, white beard" -o professor
create      80.9 s
bake       131.2 s
assemble     4.6 s
professor/character.char.json
professor/scene.glb

Use it with your coding agent

Paste this into Claude Code, Codex, or any coding agent. No additional API key or account required.

Set up Character Factory (NVIDIA GPU, 24 GB recommended):

1. pip install "character-factory[generation,server]"
2. character-factory make "<character description>" -o <dir>
   Writes <dir>/character.char.json and <dir>/scene.glb; stdout is exactly those two paths.
   Interpreter: Qwen3.5-9B, local by default (Apache-2.0, ungated — no token, no account).
   First run downloads ≈36 GB of model weights.

Optional doors:
- Unity (6000.0+): run character-factory serve, add
  "com.character-factory.unity": "https://github.com/character-factory/character-factory-unity.git"
  to Packages/manifest.json, then:
  unity cmd cf-create --prompt "<character description>" --walking true --json
  unity cmd cf-verify --target "<scene-object-name>" --json
  Unity README: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/character-factory/character-factory-unity/main/README.md
- MCP (Claude Code / Codex): pip install "character-factory[mcp]", then add character-factory mcp to your MCP config.

Source of truth: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/character-factory/character-factory/main/README.md

Comparison

Character Factory MetaHuman Meshy MakeHuman
Use case Agent-built game characters AAA photoreal humans Generative 3D meshes Open-source human authoring
Create with Text prompt Presets & sculpting Text / image prompt Sliders / Blender
Cost / license Free · Apache-2.0 Free¹ · proprietary Freemium · proprietary Free · open source
Offline Yes Partly No Yes
Agent end-to-end Yes · CLI / HTTP API / MCP / JSON Partial · Unreal Python Yes · CLI / API / MCP Partial · Python
Character standard Fixed topology, rig & face Standard rig; assets vary One-off generated mesh Standard body; assets vary
Clothing Generated from prompt² Wardrobe / custom assets Baked into mesh Asset library
Stored as Few-KB JSON³ Unreal assets Generated mesh Preset + assets
Runtime target Fixed · web / mobile / VR LOD-dependent Generation-dependent Asset-dependent
Fidelity Stylized-realistic Photoreal Variable Realistic / stylized

¹ Subject to Epic's current licensing and revenue terms.

² Garments and shoes are separate generated meshes with their own cloth materials over a skin-only body.

³ Diffable, versionable source document that regenerates the character under pinned versions.

Every character:

Triangles
~15–50k, hair-dependent
Texture size
1024² per surface — skin, eyes, garment, shoes, hair albedo + normal
Rig
127 joints, exact-LBS, 54-bone Unity Humanoid map in the manifest
Blendshapes
72 named facial morphs + jaw
Materials / draw calls
10–11 primitives
Alpha passes
0 — fully opaque by design
GLB size
~1–10 MB
Source document
2–6 KB JSON
Generation time
~1–5 min depending on hardware and settings

Hardware

Generation
NVIDIA GPU, 24 GB recommended — bake measured at 17.4 GB VRAM (bf16) or 8.9 GB (nf4); smaller-card setups in the README
Disk
≈1.1 GB install + ≈36 GB model weights
Assembly & consumption
No GPU — document→GLB runs on CPU