Facial Animation

Digital Humans: Crossing the Uncanny Valley in Unreal Engine 4 – GDC 2016

March 31, 2016 0 comments

Take your time and go through this video! Some clever techniques here for ‪#‎mocap‬ facial animation. Looks like it’s time to stick my gopro on a head mount to do some perfomance capture and cross the uncanny valley (hehe)… As for the rig here since it is optimised and needs to be driven real-time in UE4, is fairly based on blendshapes and joints. The details come from the wrinkle maps and shading networks. I like the idea how they are using stereo camera to capture the facial performance in pseudo 3D, this helps in realistic facial animation! And yeah the blood flow gives added realism, but looks like they missed the skin pores and dynamics!

Bottom line is 3D facial scans (Blendshapes based on FACS + Multiple combination shapes) + Stereo facial performance capture + Texture Analysis + Dynamic Facial Shading + Realtime Rig Logic system to sync between Maya and UE4 …

September 24, 2014 0 comments
Ryse: 3Lateral face rigs in action from 3Lateral on Vimeo.

I
was thinking about the possibility of integrating 3d scan for facial
performance rig and today I came across this demo video using
the same principle. A rig built from the overlaying 3d scan of actor’s
expression (serving the purpose of a corrective shape) based on FACS (different LOD of joint based facial rig) then driven through facial motion capture.

Check out the making of these facial rigs here. Great insights on LOD of the setup. The rigs are primarily joint based and the 3d scan serves as a corrective shape to enhance the realism of facial deformation. (Thanks Cesar Saez for sharing it to me): http://www.chrisevans3d.com/pub_blog/multi-resolution-facial-rigging/

Anyways, thinking of purchasing the scans here and building a facial
rig out of it, let’s see how it goes (For study it’s a great reference).

You can purchase yours here: http://www.3dscanstore.com/index.php?route=product/category&path=90_105

P.S. I saw this technique first used in Matrix movies when Neo punches the agent in the face.

Hyper Real Facial Setup Demonstration

July 16, 2014 0 comments
Hyper Real Facial Setup Demonstration from Puppeteer Lounge on Vimeo.

Here is a quick video demonstration showcasing
the facial rig that I created and taught to students for Puppeteer Lounge’s Hyper Real Facial Setup training
workshop. The rig features a combination of musculo-skeletal
deformation and corrective shapes. You can also see the rig being
driven by the facial motion capture performance which is covered in
Puppeteer Lounge’s Facial Motion Capture Setup workshop.

For more info about Puppeteer Lounge’s training workshops in character rigging: https://www.puppeteerlounge.com/rigging-workshop

Apply here to start learning: https://www.puppeteerlounge.com/apply

“Ajar” Roars!

February 5, 2014 0 comments

HRFS ~ Ajar Roars! from Puppeteer Lounge on Vimeo.
Check out this short clip on Hyper Real Facial Setup. This workshop is one of the mini-workshops at Puppeteer Lounge where we build a photo-realistic facial rig for films based on facial sculpts and musculo-skeletal deformation!

For more information on Puppeteer Lounge’s rigging workshops, click here!

You can watch the facial rig demonstration below!


HRFS ~ Facial Rig Demo from Suchan Bajracharya on Vimeo.