{"id":332,"date":"2006-08-14T09:16:00","date_gmt":"2006-08-14T17:16:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/?p=332"},"modified":"2006-08-14T09:16:00","modified_gmt":"2006-08-14T17:16:00","slug":"better-faces-in-computer-animation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/?p=332","title":{"rendered":"Better faces in computer animation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a title=\"Mova moving closer to reality with images (14 Aug 2006)\" href=\"http:\/\/seattletimes.nwsource.com\/html\/businesstechnology\/2003197001_btmova14.html\">This Seattle Times article<\/a> talks about the problems of realistic human faces in computer animation.&nbsp;&nbsp; The biggest problem facing computer animators is known as the \"<a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Uncanny_Valley\">uncanny valley<\/a>\".&nbsp; As animation techniques get better, the tiny remaining errors are magnified.&nbsp; Paradoxically, this makes the face seem less realistic.&nbsp; I've always believed that the answer to the uncanny valley is to digitize the performance of real actors, then use that digitized performance in computer animation.&nbsp; (Some directors hope that computer animation will eliminate the need for <span>prima<\/span> <span>donna<\/span> actors, but I suspect that that the most cost-effective technique will always involve actors in some form.)<br  \/><\/p>\n<p>Production companies have been doing full-body <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Motion-capture\">motion-capture<\/a> for several years by attaching a few dozen reflective spots to an actor, then using cameras and computers to track those dots.&nbsp; These dots are then used to build the digital motion model.&nbsp; But to get past the uncanny valley for digital faces, thousands of points would need to be tracked.&nbsp; The current main-stream techniques aren't practical at these scales.<br  \/><\/p>\n<p>The Seattle Times article reports on the technology of <span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mova.com\/\">Mova<\/a><\/span>, a silicon valley startup.&nbsp; Their solution begins by sponging green fluorescent paint onto a performers face.&nbsp; They record the actors performance with a set of cameras, then use a program that uses imperfections in the sponged-on paint to build up a detailed digital model of the face for later use in computer animation.&nbsp; <span>Mova<\/span> claims their system has sub-millimeter accuracy which will be necessary to get past the uncanny valley.&nbsp;&nbsp; Their web site has a few movies and Flash presentations, but only a tiny bit of the final product.&nbsp; That little bit looks very good, so if <span>Mova<\/span> can deliver large <span>quantities<\/span> of this type of animation they have an excellent future in front of them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This Seattle Times article talks about the problems of realistic human faces in computer animation.&nbsp;&nbsp; The biggest problem facing computer animators is known as the \"uncanny valley\".&nbsp; As animation techniques get better, the tiny remaining errors are magnified.&nbsp; Paradoxically, this makes the face seem less <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/?p=332\">Read More &#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tech"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=332"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.netjeff.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}