Nick Doff from Artemis Digital has supplied a video showing their new live action/mocap service in action. They've already offered to do up to 2mins of mocap on CD for free so maybe deal possibilities.
Download video (MPEG1)
Posted by .M. at August 17, 2004 06:46 AMWent out to see them today and sat in on a mocap recording session for "Big Mutha Truckers II". Whahey!
The Facial Capture software they're demo'ing isn't quite ready for production but may be good enough for Sanctuary. There's real interest in contributing so that Sanctuary works as a demo for them as well.
Once we've appointed a VFX supervisor we should go back to them and get a test done. There are three areas where they can probably help:
* Mocap sessions to record CD
* Blake's exploration of different virtual looks
* The glimpse of Blade money shot
Technically (before I forget), their process boils down to image processing via depth mapping and optical flow. It works in similar fashion to the process used on Matrix Revolutions except that it doesn't require markers.
The main problem with their technology is that the algorithm isn't entirely stable so the mesh around the mouth and eyes the mesh isn't consistent enough to allow new geometry to be placed. That said, in the demo shot above, for quick shots you can get away with simply using the original scans. Story-wise there's no need for lingering close-ups and there is a context for any artifacts (i.e. dodgy systems).
Posted by: .M. at August 27, 2004 03:16 PM