Post Magazine

24 Post • May 2009 www.postmagazine.com mated by animators to match the video pre- cisely frame by frame. The body tracking technology was used to augment his perfor- mance, to add things like subtle hand move- ments, for example." Gordon notes that "if you have an amaz- ingly talented actor" performing the motion capture it "helps connect the animation to the live-action performance." He also firmly believes that "the performance always looks best when the animators are in- volved. In this case, animation super visor Kenn McDonald and his team played a piv- otal role in bringing the Dr. Manhattan character to life." "The motion capture technique is pow- erful," he emphasizes. "It infuses the soul of the actor into the CG character." V I E W I N G E N V I R O N S I N R E A LT I M E A preeminent name in motion capture today, Los Angeles's Giant Studios (www.gi- antstudios.com) uses its proprietary motion capture pipeline for feature film, videogames and commercial production. The company's software-driven solution taps passive optical or passive color capture systems (the latter with color markers on the subject) to track motion on the set or on location.Their pro- prietary software processes this information in realtime to deliver a simultaneous 3D dis- play of the live performance. Unique to Giant Studios, whose R&D is done at their Atlanta location, is its Realtime motion capture technology, which permits di- rectors to view characters in virtual environ- ments in realtime. "The goal of the Realtime system is to bring the interactive process of live-action shooting into CG filmmaking," says Matt Madden,VP of production and develop- ment. "The ability to make spontaneous deci- sions based on the framing of live visuals of the characters acting in their environments is a key part of the creative process for the di- rector, so it's important that we maintain that dynamic whenever possible." This capability is a key component of the vir tual production system which tracks the physical location of the camera and streams it to a graphical viewer. "This allows productions to have more elaborate graph- ics and visuals in a live scene along with any type of camera motion needed, from dolly tracking to crane moves to handheld," Madden explains. Back in 2005, Giant Studios began a col- laboration with director James Cameron and his production team at Lightstorm En- ter tainment for the motion picture Avatar, due for release this Christmas. Giant has also collaborated with Weta Digital on Steven Spielberg's fully-animated Tintin, due out in 2010. Avatar has posed a number of challenges due to the mix of live- action and photoreal animation, says Madden. Giant Studios began testing its performance capture pipeline for Avatar four years ago. "In early prepro Jim [Cameron] pushed the system to see how far it would go, then pulled back to right before the breaking point," he notes. "The results allow him to shoot with the same, if not even greater, flexibility he has in the live- action portion of the shoot." Giant Studios has motion cap- ture performance stages in its LA facility as well as a separate camera volume stage that's used for bigger productions when it's not practical to get all the camera work done on the day of the performance. Instead, the production can bring just the di- rector and a smaller crew to the camera volume stage later. "It's an economical way to finish shots," Madden points out. Despite Giant Studios' own advances, Madden sees "plenty" of hurdles still to overcome in motion capture. "Like crowd scenes. We'd love to be able to do that. We can capture 20 people, but not live. The live limit is around seven people, including props and set pieces." Never theless, "a combina- tion of hardware improvements and our in- ternal software improvements are helping us make those goals a reality." PA RT O F T H E TO O L K I T When VP of production Brian Rausch joined Vicon House of Moves (www. moves.com) in Los Angeles a year ago, the company was primarily a motion capture ser vice provider for the videogames, film and television industries. Then he added a full keyframe animation staff and today the company is shipping its fifth title with no motion capture base and two titles which feature a hybrid motion capture/keyframe animation approach. "We're now an animation house with this massive tool called motion capture, which gets us far along the animation path ver y quickly," says Rausch. "Motion capture allows us to go super far super fast so we can make more creative decisions earlier in the process." And instead of feeling they are competing against motion capture, keyframe animators "respect it and are able to use it for the tool it is," he reports. Another change since Rausch came on board was the addition of Stage 2. A sound- stage for full performance capture, Stage 2 also simultaneously records finished audio with everything timecode synced for a com- pletely integrated animated product. "We're working hard to take motion cap- ture out of the warehouse," says Rausch. "Stage 2 is carpeted and has an environ- ment more attuned to the creative process and advances in technology. Since it's no longer necessar y to book an ADR booth and do motion capture separately, directors are changing the way they work.They're not that concerned about hitting every inflection in the audio but are focusing on the overall performance and the feel of that perfor- mance. Sometimes they'll leave in a stutter or off-breath for a more realistic live perfor- mance, something you're not able to get when you separate out the two." The change has also meant "legitimate di- rectors are coming in to direct cinematic se- quences," he notes. "They are directing and gauging a performance, not individual bits and pieces they hope will match up in the end." Another major change has occurred in the interaction between Vicon House of Moves' animators and the client's animation team. "Clients used to get motion capture data delivered in the target app baked onto the skeleton," Rausch explains. "Now, with tools like Vicon's Blade, we can go in early in the pipeline and solve problems where they occur for better quality and efficiency." The company also offers a full body stage for general motion capture (gross motion of the body, low-res fingers, head) in a 70x40 space with 26 feet of ceiling height. Dubbed Stage 1, it boasts 70 Vicon T160 cameras, the company's latest; more than 200 T160s will soon be installed on Stage 2. Among the company's recent videogame credits are SCEA's Resistance 2 Giant Studios is currently working on the hush-hush Avatar from James Cameron. T E C H N O L O G Y motion capture

• Cover