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Building you own mocap system

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Building you own mocap system

Hi folks:

I'm new to this forum, and got a referral over here from the Renderosity forum. I've always been into animation, and have gravitated to art film animation as an adult. I'm not such a fan of cell animation, but hand painted animation like "The Old Man and the Sea" by Aleksandr Petrov and "The Man Who Planted Trees" by Frederic Back are right up my alley. I've personally done a 6 minute 2D computer painted piece about my mother's death that was used in a Hospital Chaplaincy class.

However, my latest project is to build my own motion capture system. To that end, I've started a new yahoo group for other DIY mocappers at:

http://movies.groups.yahoo.com/group/motioncapture/

I believe that 3D animation has finally achieved the level of fine art, and that motion capture can contribute to the new medium. At least I hope so.

Take care,

Michael Miles

Hello Scruff and welcome to the AWN Forums. I hope you won't get too put off to our forums when the flood of Mo-crap comments come flooding in. :D

I'd be interested to see your painted animation. Is it up somewhere to check out?

Aloha,
the Ape

...we must all face a choice, between what is right... and what is easy."

i think 3d can do just fine, and better, without mo-cap thanks. :p

if anything it will make it less of an art.

although i am curios about a home made device.

"who wouldn't want to make stuff for me? I'm awesome." -Bloo

Thanks

Hi folks:

Thanks for the welcome. Haven't seen the flood yet, but we've got a couple new guys on the motion capture group who are about as far along as I am in building their own system.

Unfortunately, the 2D work was produced on video, and the source material on computer didn't survive a hard drive crash (back when backup hw cost more than the original computer). Thank goodness for DVD-R!

As to the art of mocap, I expected this to be controversial due to things I've read. I would disagree about the art part however. The character of the art is changed though. It's more of a collaborative art, and the artistry comes from the movement actors and the direction. I don't think many would challenge the artistry of Andy Serkis's Gollum or Kong.

You won't have to defend 2D animation with me. I'm probably more demanding than most since I'm not a big fan of cell shaded characters. If you're gonna do it hard - do it really hard, and really good. If I could go buy a mocap rig for $199.99 and hack out some stiff Poser animation, I wouldn't. Part of the attraction is having to get into the nuts and bolts of the medium itself. I've got ideas for mocap that are outside of the mainstream, and probably would never get developed otherwise. I've actually got motion actors lining up to work with me because I'm serious about advancing the medium.

So, just wait and see,

Michael

I'll be interested to see what you come up with. I have a great deal of respect for people willing to push their chosen medium further.

Producing solidily ok animation since 2001.
www.galaxy12.com

Now with more doodling!
www.galaxy12.com/latenight

Hi folks:

I don't think many would challenge the artistry of Andy Serkis's Gollum or Kong.

Michael

Sorry, I would.

I know the media would love for you to believe that Andy did all the work for kong and gollum, but I think it is so over rated. People are not giving the animators they're very much due credit. Being friends with many of those animators, I think most people would be suprised how much of that mo-cap was thrown out and just animated. Andy was wonderful reference, but is not what made those characters work.

And don't get me wrong, I think there are some wonderful uses for mo-cap, we used quite a bit of it on Narnia, but there wasn't any piece that wasn't cleaned up by an animator, or motion editor, and there wasn't a bit used on any of the hero character, except some centaur stuff...but once again, highly corrected by the animator.

I am a fan of motion capture for many things, but it only captures bones, and their basic movement. As an animator, i have a problem with that, and thats also why some much of it looks dead and light.

anyhoo, thats my 2 cents, I think what you are doing is cool, and i support you in your effort, but the whole andy serkis is the best thing to happen to animation thing is just one of my pet pieves. (o:

-M

[b][size=3]Matt Shumway
Character Animator
Rhythm and Hues Studios
www.mattshumway.com

www.enigmathemovie.com
[/b][/size]

Fair enough

Hah! Fair enough Matt. I said it was a collaborative effort and then didn't credit the animators. I think it would be fair to say that what ends up on film is more of a motion collage. I personally haven't used any mocap without tweaking and adding hand keyframed animation. One of the things that LTR did for me was that enough people have seen the DVD extras that I can refer to Gollum when they ask me what mocap is.

Cheers,

Michael

Sorry, I would.

I know the media would love for you to believe that Andy did all the work for kong and gollum, but I think it is so over rated. People are not giving the animators they're very much due credit. Being friends with many of those animators, I think most people would be suprised how much of that mo-cap was thrown out and just animated. Andy was wonderful reference, but is not what made those characters work.

Totally, on Kong, the animators we worked with totally get the shaft as far as credit goes (along with the modellers, lighters, compositors, any one not on set basically). The coolest things kong did were done entirely without help of Andy. And even the stuff he did do needed to be tweaked and cleaned (and many times thrown out). The guys in the promo office have gotten it in their heads that new technology will sell a film, so they push mo-cap on everyone as if Andy and PJ made the film by themselves (when in actuallity the crew dwarfed EP3's crew in order to make up for everything that happened on set including the mocap).

But yeah, mocap definitely has it's place in the community. It worked very well for creating a host of characters for background deaths and such in Matrix: Revolutions, as it has for a number of background crowd scenes. I'm still not sold on it being for main characters yet (especially when the directors are bent on removing the animator from the equation). Someday possibly but not yet as far as I can tell.

I prefer to think it should be considered an extension or addition to the community rather than a replacement for animation.

Producing solidily ok animation since 2001.
www.galaxy12.com

Now with more doodling!
www.galaxy12.com/latenight

what are animators but actors?

"who wouldn't want to make stuff for me? I'm awesome." -Bloo

i think mo cap will be used more and more as a refrence point and as a way to maybe cut down on certain monotonous tasks. least thats the discussion i had with philipa timmins of Vicon Peak one of the biggest mocap firms in the world.