Posted on 08/18/2008 7:09:14 PM PDT by GraniteStateConservative
Extraordinarily lifelike characters are to begin appearing in films and computer games thanks to a new type of animation technology.
Emily - the woman in the above animation ^ - was produced using a new modelling technology that enables the most minute details of a facial expression to be captured and recreated.
She is considered to be one of the first animations to have overleapt a long-standing barrier known as 'uncanny valley' - which refers to the perception that animation looks less realistic as it approaches human likeness.
Researchers at a Californian company which makes computer-generated imagery for Hollywood films started with a video of an employee talking. They then broke down down the facial movements down into dozens of smaller movements, each of which was given a 'control system'.
The team at Image Metrics - which produced the animation for the Grand Theft Auto computer game - then recreated the gestures, movement by movement, in a model. The aim was to overcome the traditional difficulties of animating a human face, for instance that the skin looks too shiny, or that the movements are too symmetrical.
...
He said that AMD's new chip - the Radeon HD 4870 X2 - was able to process 2.4 teraflops of information per second, meaning it had a capability similar to a computer that - only 12 years ago - would have filled a room. AMD's chip fits inside a standard PC.
But he said that the line between what was real and what was rendered would not be blurred completely until 2020. ...
(Excerpt) Read more at technology.timesonline.co.uk ...
...porn 3.0
It won’t be long before human actors become obsolete.
Didn’t fool me for a minute......I’ve dated her......
I thought that Keeanu reeves was the first simulated human actor.
Oh, sure. That’s what drives technology always. But, imagine the fun a political campaign can have with this technology. We ultimately in the future won’t be able to rely on our senses for any input. We’ll only be able to trust someone and have them tell us what is true and real.
Great, then we can have cartoons trying to tell us how to vote.
Whew! This is all just getting a little too threatening!
I can't wait for my vacation to Mars next month!
The perfect tool for the totalitarian state to abuse.
The perfect tool for the totalitarian state to abuse.
hmmmmmm ....so one day soon a bunch of guys in pajamas sitting in front of their computers down in the basement will replace Hollywood by creating the next batch of blockbuster movies.
Leftoids look out I have some script ideas already.
Sounds great. When will one of the “uncanny” animations run for President? Or maybe.....it already is!
Only the face is animated. It’s motion tracked to a real actress’s body.
fantasy-reality-line-blurring alert.
Charlie Sheen was one of the early failures.
Yes, we’re getting close to the movie “Looker”.
This is just gen 1 of this technology. It's impressive, though.
Their site: http://www.image-metrics.com/ has another cool vid.
I’ll be more impressed when they can do it without motion capture from a living actor.
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