In nuce: The technology company Rokoko has released free, AI-supported software: Rokoko Video. This software, supported by artificial intelligence, is tailored to motion capturing – and can be controlled via the web browser. Rokoko announced the release of Rokoko Video on 6 December 2022 via the website 3dvf.com .

Start animating with our free AI mocap tool Rokoko Video I Tutorial

In toto: According to the announcement on the company website, Rokoko Video is comparatively easy to use. The first step is for users to upload a video using a webcam, smartphone or comparable moving image recording device. It should be noted that the entire body should be recorded, which users can then edit using motion capturing. The motion data is generated automatically by the software. If required, the same data can be edited using Rokoko Studio (also from Rokoko)(Manuel Skroblin reported in detail for Digital Production on 1 March 2019 about how character animation can look with Rokoko Studio and associated hardware and software solutions). Finally, users import the finished motion capturing into common DCC software such as Maya, Blender, Cinema 4D or Unreal Engine. According to the company, a free version of Rokoko Studio is also available.

Click further: Further information is available via the aforementioned website at 3dvf.com . An alternative to Rokoko Video is Maxon Moves, an app for mobile devices, which Digital Production reported on 5 March 2020 .

The post Motion capturing with Rokoko Video? first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

In nuce: Russell Midfield, a Blender fanboy with a focus on creating characters, has published a ten-minute video in which he compares four motion capture programmes. The highlight: all four programmes work on the basis of artificial intelligence.

In toto: For his video, Midfield takes a look at the programmes Plask, Radical, DeepMotion and Pixcap (Plask was presented by Digital Production on 26 January this year ) – and uses iClone 8 to solve some of the typical teething troubles of motion capture software, such as posture correction, shaky movements and slipping feet.

Click further: Digital Production reported on the release of iClone 8 on 7 June 2022. Russell Midfield’s entire video is linked below.

Russell Review: AI Motion Capture – Who is the best?

The post What can iClone 8 from Reallusion do that the competition can’t? first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

In nuce: Adobe has released Character Animator version 23.0. Character Animator is a real-time tool for motion capturing and character animation. For example, the comedy series Our Cartoon President was realised with Character Animator. A mocap library has now been added (see below for details). Character Animator 23.0 was announced at the Adobe Max creative conference (Digital Production reported on 19 October this year). The software is available for Windows and Mac operating systems.

Motion Library (Adobe Character Animator Tutorial)

In toto: For the new version, a library with over 350 full-body mocap movements (including combat, dance and sports movements) has been installed. These movements can be customised using the timeline within the software. How the so-called motion library works is explained at helpx.adobe.com .

Click further: The corresponding release note provides information about Character Animator 23.0. A free trial version of the software is offered, the full version costs 61.95 euros per month – included in the Creative Cloud subscription. Further information can be found at adobe.com/en . In a video lasting almost half an hour, Adobe’s Senior Experience Designer Lead, Dave Werner (aka Okay Samurai), explains what the new Motion Library has to offer (see above).

The post Adobe’s Character Animator now includes a Motion Library! first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

In nuce: A group of eight computer scientists has published Rich – a database containing 142 video recordings in 4K resolution (recorded from various perspectives). The recordings show people interacting with a real environment. The acronym Rich breaks down as follows. R: Real Scenes. I: Interaction. C: Contact. H: Humans. The computer scientists involved in the project are Chun-Hao P. Huang, Hongwei Yi, Markus Höschle, Matvey Safroshkin, Tsvetelina Alexiadis, Senya Polikovsky, Daniel Scharstein and Michael J. Black.

What is special about Rich? According to the developers, Rich is the first time that human-scene contact (HSC) has been successfully generated using a single image. According to the developers, HSC is the first step towards understanding how people interact with their environment. The computer scientists go on to explain that significant progress has now been made in recognising 2D human-object interaction (HOI) and restoring 3D human pose and shape (HPS) – HSC, on the other hand, is an ongoing challenge.

Click further: All further information on the Rich project. In the following video “Capturing and Inferring Dense Full-Body Human-Scene Contact”, the project participants explain how Rich works in general and HSC in particular.

[CVPR 2022] Capturing and Inferring Dense Full-Body Human-Scene Contact

The post Computer scientists research human-scene contact first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

In nuce: Adobe releases its Character Animator in version 22.5. The Character Animator is a real-time tool for motion capturing and character animation. We last reported on the Character Animator on 9 November 2021 , when it was released in version 22.0.

New functions: At the heart of the new features is the Starter Mode, which is available to all users free of charge. Starter Mode primarily offers functionalities relating to the presentation, recording and exporting of characters. However, the free version of Starter Mode is limited in its range of functions compared to the paid version. Nevertheless, the following functions are also available to users of the free Starter Mode.

• Contains sample puppets: It is also possible to import puppets.
• The settings for the behaviour of your characters: Simply drag and drop from the behaviour panel, which you can find at the top right of the user interface.
• You can customise the backgrounds using the background button.
• Adjust aspect ratios: So that your character fits into the film image.
• Triggerable poses, emotions and backgrounds: Can now also be displayed in the preview.
• Quick export function: Export animations directly as an H264 file.

Click further: You can get an overview of the features in Character Animator 22.5 at helpx.adobe.com. The following video uses application examples to illustrate the advantages of Starter Mode.

FREE Adobe Character Animator: Starter Mode

The post Adobe releases Character Animator 22.5! first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.