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< Programming ~ Realtime generated character animation |
| Michael |
 Posted: Thu Sep 26, 2002 3:57 pm |
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Joined: 07 Jun 2002
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Location: Gent, Belgium
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To make a character move in a natural way in realtime 3D, the traditional method is to have a large amount of static skeletal animations and play them when appropriate, preferably with some kind of blending between them. This is an enormous job and is always limited by the number of animations.
I wonder if it would be possible to build a realtime system that would allow for the programmer to tell the character "Go and take that thing there", e.g. and the character would generate its own motion based on a small set of parameters. This could be done with a realtime footsteps system (a la Character Studio) combined with inverse kinematics. I think.
The next step then would be to author the parameters of this system in order to create different characters: some people walk with small steps, others clench their fists often, etcetera. |
Last edited by Michael on Mon Nov 04, 2002 12:57 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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| Michael |
| Posted: Mon Nov 04, 2002 12:52 pm |
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It seems that the Unreal2003 developers have created a system called "Rag Doll" which allows characters to fall realisticaly when shot, obeying the laws of physics, rather than falling according to predefined animations.
Once again, humankind shows great creativity in destruction! 
Seriously, this could be the first step in a system like the one I described above. If you can make a character fall realistically as if he or she had been shot in the shoulder, how hard could it be to make that character pick up a cup of tea and put it to his or her mouth? |
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| Michael |
| Posted: Mon Nov 04, 2002 3:18 pm |
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I had a look a the Unreal2003 demo.
The characters do fall very realistically when they are shot. But it doesn't look as sophisticated as inverse kinematics. The falling is "just" a response to gravity (and some other physical parameters probably). It looks like they had a rigid object fall for each joint and then connected the dots, the tricky part being that the dots had to be connected with bones that don't stretch, some kind of hinge system, I guess... Smart!...  |
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| Michael |
| Posted: Mon Feb 24, 2003 9:46 am |
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Maybe this is something that is going in the right direction: http://www.naturalmotion.com
The site is so full of markenting-speak that I couldn't get much information about the product. |
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| UNDERdog |
| Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2003 1:21 pm |
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Joined: 10 Jun 2003
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Location: Ghent/Belgium
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| Check www.havok.com for another real-time collision sollution for games. |
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| Michael |
| Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2003 6:33 pm |
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| Havoc, if I'm not mistaken, is a physics engine. It could be used to aid programming the kind of character animation I was talking about. But in and of itself it would not be sufficient by far. Physics are just one aspect of programming animation. |
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| cyberdigitus |
| Posted: Mon Nov 24, 2003 10:38 am |
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Joined: 24 Nov 2003
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Location: Belgium
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trigering animation loops on certain actions is one thing, even if these are triggered by an autonomous disicion making ai mind of the character. this is being done for example in Massive,developed for and used in the battle scenes of lord of the rings. it's a procedural crowd animation system based on neural nets, and autonomous behaviors such as creg reynolds research.
to really do a system you describe, however; creating dynamic animation itself, would require true locomotion. that is, the model moves not becose it is moved by it's pivot together with a loop walk, but it actually moves it's feets and based on that the pelvis moves etc. this is to my knowledge not very researched yet, or at east not implemented. but it is possible. actually, valve looked into it for hl2.
i do however have a pdf here of a scription that researhes this and related technology. in it, a virtual characetr is able to move it's arm and even grasp objects all by itself. it even discerns those objects by synthetic vision. i don't have the url anymore, but i might put it up for you.
i guess searching for inverse kinematics, pathfinding and locomotion can get you somewhere already. |
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| cyberdigitus |
| Posted: Mon Nov 24, 2003 11:04 am |
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Joined: 24 Nov 2003
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| ApellA |
| Posted: Wed Nov 14, 2007 9:07 am |
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Joined: 12 Nov 2007
Posts: 19
Location: De Pinte (near Ghent, Belgium)
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Ragdoll isn't something entirely(sp.?) new, and based on quite simple rules (I say quite simple, but the implementation isn't simple, don't get me wrong, the theory behind it is).
For real dynamic animations, I think we better take a look at spore. There, all the animations of the creatures are calculated on how it looks, nothing of the animations (and actually, allmost nothing in the game) is predifined, but procedural.
It's my dream to one day, find a system like that, but the fact that Will Wright and his friends needed at least five years to develop those systems, I think I would do a lifetime on it.
Anyway, procedural stuff is the way to go in the future (and I'm not the only one to believe that), for the simple fact that games get more and more complex, textures need to get bigger, we want more and better animations, we want bigger worlds, we want ...
All that takes up space, and some math formula's take up a lot less space. (duh)
Anyway, I'm gonna read those papers, really fascinated about all this stuff. |
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| Moogie |
| Posted: Wed Nov 14, 2007 10:22 am |
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Joined: 24 Jan 2007
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| It's not new now, but it was when this thread was created. |
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| ApellA |
| Posted: Wed Nov 14, 2007 3:42 pm |
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Joined: 12 Nov 2007
Posts: 19
Location: De Pinte (near Ghent, Belgium)
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ow, woops, didn't notice the last post was from 2003...
that explains the fact that some links are dead now |
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| shadedeer |
| Posted: Wed May 21, 2008 7:09 am |
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Joined: 04 Jan 2008
Posts: 44
Location: middle o' nowhere, Ohio
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i Stumbled on this and i thought immediately of you, Michael.
http://www.naturalmotion.com/euphoria.htm
in this engine, the characters don't just fall realistically, they BEHAVE realistically. dodged objects or being pushed or pulled along like a real human-being.
i can't wait until they begin implementing this into games - and i'm kind of hoping that this is what they have used for the A.I. for the Force Unleashed game. i've heard rumors that the A.I. act differently, so maybe it is. |
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| Michael |
| Posted: Wed May 21, 2008 8:09 am |
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Site Administrator
Joined: 07 Jun 2002
Posts: 8065
Location: Gent, Belgium
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| We've been following the work at Natural Motion for a while now. Very exciting, indeed! We'd love to try our hands at their technology some time. |
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| Trinket |
| Posted: Wed May 21, 2008 9:58 pm |
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Joined: 15 Mar 2008
Posts: 1795
Location: Your bathtub.
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shadedeer wrote: i Stumbled on this and i thought immediately of you, Michael.
http://www.naturalmotion.com/euphoria.htm
in this engine, the characters don't just fall realistically, they BEHAVE realistically. dodged objects or being pushed or pulled along like a real human-being.
i can't wait until they begin implementing this into games - and i'm kind of hoping that this is what they have used for the A.I. for the Force Unleashed game. i've heard rumors that the A.I. act differently, so maybe it is.
That is just too amazingly cool. -Begins researching and learning more- |
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| Mayar |
| Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 9:47 am |
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Joined: 30 Jul 2008
Posts: 1042
Location: On the Forum, adding his Mustard to anything in his interest (no art or anything that may offend me)
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I´m searching euphoria on the net, but naturalmotion is nowhere to find (free i mean)...
So, the technology is really great, but i think, endorphin is still goodenough for me... (Will post a video from a massive slaughter) |
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