Research Artefact 2: Plotting Mocap to 3D Actor

This artefact demonstrates the difficulties associated with capturing motion and plotting it to a computer generated character. The first motion capture lab session was ineffective at producing the correct amount of dada needed for creating a character rig for the CG actor. This data when plotted to the actor produced a frozen state where none of the body parts had motion. A second lab session was taken with corrections made based on the analysis of the first motion capture lab session. More reflective markers were used in this session raising the amount used from 12 in the first session to 48 in the second. This larger amount of markers aloud a successful character rig to be created for the CG actor. This however now raised a new issue of marker detection being difficult, as throughout the capture markers were getting confused with each other due to the short distance between them. Major areas affected by this were the hands, wrists and elbows and produced erratic behaviour when the data was cleaned up. The motion capture software used utilises an automatic data cleaning system, which fills in the gaps for missing markers by predicting intended trajectory based on the existing motion curve. Gaps occur when marker area blocked by extremities or due to having to much light in the room or on the surface the marker is attached. When large gaps appeared in the data produced in the second lab session the automatic cleaning system filled in these areas leaving the motion deformed. This was also aided by individual markers disappearing and the cleaning system thinking a nearby marker was the initial marker. This produced negative affects and deformed the motion further.