MOCAP systems

[cgisoul]

Hi,

For the last few days I've been in the hunt for a free or a not so expensive facial motion capture for my own personal project. One thing besides testing the different systems, I also love doing the research (whatever interests me, in this case MOCAP).

After discovering the ipisoft DMC that does full body motion capture, in which, I did a short tutorial explaining the workflow at Maya to ipisoft back to Maya - Part 1 ( Creating HumanIK ) - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7bQPf4J5WQ)

I am now in the hunt for a facial motion capture system / software. Thinking to add a facial motion to my Alien (the one shown in my avatar or http://www.mduque.com

During my research I came across few tools and tutorials that might be of your interest:


Cheap Facial Motion Capture - Introduction ( this one explains the workflow in capturing your facial motion all the way to your own mesh ). I might build my own helmet this weekend or next week. That gonna be fun.

Cheap Facial Motion Capture - Introduction - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9d9o8D04K74)


Another program that was referred to me and works with Maya is FaceWare from image-metrics at http://www.image-metrics.com/
You can download a free trial and test it with Maya. It basically analysis your video and sets key points for you in the timeline. Looking at the training videos, it looks very intuitive to use. Have installed it but haven't try it yet. I'm testing the Cheap Facial Motion Capture first now.

Another is Face Robot. This one doesn't show the MOCAP implementation, but shows you how to setup the whole Face for animation. Looking at http://softimage.wiki.softimage.com/xsidocs/char_mocap_MotionCaptureOverview.htm, we might be able to add the mocap data on it. Need to figure that one out later if nothing works. The following tutorial is consisted of 16 short videos.

1 - Picking Parts and Landmarks - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53aRC5ZpUec)


We also have this FAT (Facial Animation Tools) software. You can register and after that they will send you the download link. http://research.animationsinstitut.de/44.0.html

Still researching for alternatives.

[daverave]

Face robot does look easy to setup, I would like to see the solution to say add mocap and face robot and animation of the hand all together. now if only I could get the 2 xboxes 360 I have in the house to help render:).............dave

[NextDesign]

If you had a ps3, it's possible.

[cgisoul]

Hello there,

I've been trying the cheap facial mocap. One thing is for certain, your head needs to be stable otherwise you will have a lot of curve fixing in the graph editor.

However, I have one problem. All facial mocap locators move on the right hand side. But after parenting constraining, some of the bones still don't follow the facial locators movement.

Example: While the jaw moves up and down following the data from my facial mocap, the eye brows, upper lids and lower lids don't move at all. So, some move, some don't, leaving me wondering what is wrong.

Any ideas? Thank you :happy:

http://i48.tinypic.com/wbsbis.jpg

http://i47.tinypic.com/j16452.jpg

[PixalZA]

If you had a ps3, it's possible.

ND, you have my attention. I have a PS3 just sitting there gathering dust most of the time. How?

[cgisoul]

Fixed the problem! It works!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I now need to fix the sharp movements in the graph editor.
I'm going to make a new version next week with better skin weight painting.
This was a proof of concept and it works!

I can finally have a good night sleep. :happy: :D

Facial Motion Capture - Test1 - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYu2nEEAXaA&feature=youtu.be)

[NextDesign]

ND, you have my attention. I have a PS3 just sitting there gathering dust most of the time. How?

With older versions of the PS3, you could install linux onto it. Sony disabled it with later versions of the firmware however.

@cgisoul: Looks cool, and with a little data cleaning to reduce the noise, it would be pretty useful as a base animation. Did you use frapper for this?

[PixalZA]

Thanks. Pity Sony is now blocking it. Would have been a good interrim solution until I upgrade my current machine.

Edit: @cgisoul, appologies for hijacking the thread :)

[cgisoul]

Some updates on my research.

As the video shows, on the left hand side, I was holding my mobile Samsung GS2 both hands with my elbow on the table while capturing the facial expressions. The jittering was quite visible and very shaky.

However, on the right hand side, I made my own facial mocap "Fork" as you can see in the photo. It's basically 3 pieces of wood, attached together with some metal plate and that's it. The camera goes between as well as my head. Pretty simple and the results were stunning in comparison without using the DIY fork.

I hope this helps and explains how important Stability is needed while doing facial motion capture.

Next? Building my real helmet. The metal guy in the shop can build me the gig for $40 bucks!
I just have to come up with the helmet.

Facial Motion Capture - Jittering Comparison - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4DCZMIhwTQ&feature=youtu.be)