Virtual Lives' Animation

How to generate virtual lives' animation is an interesting and important topic in computer animation. It includes how to create the geometry of the virtual lives, how to edit or generate the motion of the virtual lives, and how to specify the behavior of the virtual lives.

To edit the key-frame poses of a 3D model (of a virtual life), model deformation with a surface (MDS) is a new and efficient technique which is proposed by borrowing the idea of texture-mapping for free-form surfaces. By using MDS, the shape of the deformed model due to a given parametric surface can be predicted easily. For the virtual lives which are hardly edited by MDS, free-form deformation (FFD) is a good choice. Using auto-generated multiresolution lattices by refining a bounding box of the model and generating a set of finer lattices, both global and local deformations of the model can be achieved easily.

For simulating human hair animation, we provide a practical approach at an interactive frame rate. In this approach, the hair is modeled as a set of loosely connected particles (LCP) that serves as sampling points for the volume of the hair, which covers the whole region where hair is present. The dynamics of the hair, including hair-hair interactions, is simulated using the interacting particles.

To generate the geometry and motion of the character model together, character model creation from cel animation and character animation creation using hand-drawn sketches are proposed, which are easy-to-use approaches for creating a set of consistent 3D polygon models that correspond to the input frames of a cel animation or hand-drawn sketches. The created models can be used in cel animation editing systems for adding shadowing effects or helping to make cel animations.

To duplicate the motion of the virtual lives, cloning skeleton-driven animation including skeleton, binding weights and key-frame poses, is an efficient technique. With the proposed technique, users will only need to specify few common features between the source (animation) model and the target (static) ones, and our system can transfer the animation data automatically.

Conceptual farm provided a virtual reality platform for generating and observing the behaviors of different autonomous characters (virtual lives).

• Yosuke Bando - The Univ. of Tokyo
• Bing-Yu Chen - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Sheng-Yao Cho - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Jieqing Feng - Zhejang Univ.
• Shuen-Huei Guan - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Jian-Bin Huang - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Ming-Kei Hsieh - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Masaaki Ishii - The Univ. of Tokyo
• Henry Johan - The Univ. of Tokyo
• Rung-Huei Liang - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Pin-Chou Liu - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Wan-Chi Luo - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Wan-Chun Ma - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Tomoyuki Nishita - The Univ. of Tokyo
• Yutaka Ono - The Univ. of Tokyo
• Ming Ouhyoung - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Yu-Te Shen - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Fu-Che Wu - Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• Kuei-Yuan Zheng - Natl. Taiwan Univ.

Domain Connected Graph: the Skeleton of a Closed 3D Shape for Animation

Fu-Che Wu, Wan-Chun Ma, Bing-Yu Chen, Rung-Huei Liang, Ming Ouhyoung.

The Visual Computer

Motion Retargetting and Transition in Different Articulated Figures

Ming-Kei Hsieh, Bing-Yu Chen, Ming Ouhyoung

Proc. CAD/Graphics 2005

Character Animation Creation using Hand-drawn Sketches

Bing-Yu Chen, Yutaka Ono, Tomoyuki Nishita

The Visual Computer (Proc. PG 2005)

Toward Gesture-Based Behavior Authoring

Edward Yu-Te Shen and Bing-Yu Chen

Proc. CGI 2005

Cloning Skeleton-driven Animation to Other Models

Wan-Chi Luo, Jian-Bin Huang, Bing-Yu Chen, and Pin-Chou Liu

Proc. ICS 2004

3D Character Model Creation from Cel Animation

Yutaka Ono, Bing-Yu Chen, and Tomoyuki Nishita

Proc. CW 2004

Composite Mouse Gestures: Toward an Easier Tool for Behavior Authoring

Edward Yu-Te Shen, Kuei-Yuan Zheng, and Bing-Yu Chen

SIGGRAPH 2004 Posters - accepted for Student Research Competition

Animating Hand-drawn Sketches

Yutaka Ono, Bing-Yu Chen, and Tomoyuki Nishita

SIGGRAPH 2004 Posters

Prong Features Detection of a 3D Model Based on the Watershed Algorithm

Fu-Che Wu, Bing-Yu Chen, Rung-Huei Liang, and Ming Ouhyoung

SIGGRAPH 2004 Sketches

Conceptual Farm

Shuen-Huei Guan, Sheng-Yao Cho, Yu-Te Shen, Rung-Huei Liang, Bing-Yu Chen, and Ming Ouhyoung

Proc. ICME 2004

Automatic Animation Skeleton Construction Using Repulsive Force Field

Pin-Chou Liu, Fu-Che Wu, Wan-Chun Ma, Rung-Huei Liang, Ming Ouhyoung

Proc. PG 2003

Animating Hair with Loosely Connected Particles

Yosuke Bando, Bing-Yu Chen, and Tomoyuki Nishita

Computer Graphics Forum (Proc. EG 2003) - Best Paper Award (3rd Prize)

Skeleton Extraction of 3D Objects with Radial Basis Functions

Wan-Chun Ma, Fu-Che Wu, Ming Ouhyoung

Proc. SMI 2003

Free-Form Deformation with Automatically Generated Multiresolution Lattices

Yutaka Ono, Bing-Yu Chen, Tomoyuki Nishita, and Jieqing Feng

Proc. CW 2002

3D Model Deformation along a Parametric Surface

Bing-Yu Chen, Yutaka Ono, Henry Johan, Masaaki Ishii, Tomoyuki Nishita, and Jieqing Feng

Proc. VIIP 2002

• NCS grants 94-2213-E-002-097, 93-2213-E-002-084, 92-2213-E-002-015, and 91-2213-E-002-066
• Natl. Taiwan Univ.
• The Univ. of Tokyo