Motion Capture
We worked in team of two for four weeks and our goal is to successfully go through all the steps of motion capture to create a scene with realistic motion.
We also wanted to make sure we left room for our own creativity -- we wanted flexibility with transitions from scene to scene, character models, and camera movement.
After talked with our advisor, we decided to use sports motions for our project because they are diverse, malleable, and fun.
We also wanted to make sure we left room for our own creativity -- we wanted flexibility with transitions from scene to scene, character models, and camera movement.
After talked with our advisor, we decided to use sports motions for our project because they are diverse, malleable, and fun.
We went down to the CMU MoCap lab with people who played softball, basketball, and ping pong, and we also captured ourselves' motion.
Process
We first downloaded figure models from the Internet, and import the model with mocap data into MotionBuilder, which is a software for working with human character animation.
Then we cleaned up the data using MotionBuilder, for example, we kept the feet on the floor, and fixed some of the penetration parts. We also did some exaggeration on the arms to make is looks cartoony.
Next we import the characters with motion into Maya, and we don’t want to change the scale of the model and the animation, thus we built the environment around them. We also key framed the ping pong ball, basketball as well as baseball to complete the motion.
We mostly had to keyframe the ball’s motion -- some of the character’s motion had to be fixed slightly by just changing the keys of the wrists/hands in order to make it more realistic, but mostly we just added ball and camera motion.
One important thing we learned was that we need to shoot reference video while doing the motion capture, because we need to know how the motion looks as well as where the ball goes when doing the clean up and key frame animation of balls.
We first downloaded figure models from the Internet, and import the model with mocap data into MotionBuilder, which is a software for working with human character animation.
Then we cleaned up the data using MotionBuilder, for example, we kept the feet on the floor, and fixed some of the penetration parts. We also did some exaggeration on the arms to make is looks cartoony.
Next we import the characters with motion into Maya, and we don’t want to change the scale of the model and the animation, thus we built the environment around them. We also key framed the ping pong ball, basketball as well as baseball to complete the motion.
We mostly had to keyframe the ball’s motion -- some of the character’s motion had to be fixed slightly by just changing the keys of the wrists/hands in order to make it more realistic, but mostly we just added ball and camera motion.
One important thing we learned was that we need to shoot reference video while doing the motion capture, because we need to know how the motion looks as well as where the ball goes when doing the clean up and key frame animation of balls.