What is the future of Motion Capture?
Motion capture is the process or technique of recording patterns of movement digitally. Usually, motion capture provides more realistic action than computer animation because it is based on the actual movements of human beings. As we recently announced our collaboration with Move.ai, this piece aims to learn more about motion capture, its future and how a startup named Move is revolutionizing it. But before, let’s make a bit of history.
From the early 1900s to the XIst century
The first concept of capturing human movements was developed in the early 1900s by Max Fleischer and was called rotoscopy. It is an animation technique used to trace over motion picture footage, frame by frame, to produce realistic action. Originally, animators projected photographed live-action movie images onto a glass panel and traced over the image.
Motion Capture has evolved over time, with the first-ever mocap suit being created around the 1960s by Lee Harrison III and his system called ANIMAC. Potentiometers were attached to the bodysuit and were able to pick up any movements and translate them into rough animation on a monitor. (it is very complicated to find archives of this but there is an exciting PDF we discovered here).
Until today, motion capture has mainly evolved thanks to the cinema industry: released in 2000, Sinbad: Beyond The Veil Of Mists is famous for being the first feature-length computer-animated film created exclusively using motion capture. The development and evolution of motion capture for animation brought with it groundbreaking characters, such as the fully computer-generated Jar Jar Binks, played by Ahmed Best, in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, and, of course, the Lord of the Rings’ Gollum.
Since the beginning of the article, we only mentioned the importance of the cinema and movies in developing this technology, but we should not forget video games. They were also precursors in the use of this technology to animate in-game characters such as fighters, athletes, etc. and so since the late 90s.
If historically motion capture was created as an analysis tool in biomechanics research, its use has been more oriented to entertainment purposes as mentioned above. And the recent technological progress combined with the hyper-digitalization of our current world will open the doors to many other uses that we will soon discover.
Technological improvements in capturing human motion
Talking about technological advancements in regard to motion capture essentially means the methods to capture. Historically, motion capture has always relied on markers to identify the motion by the positions or angles between the different markers. If a lot of different technics and markers have been developed (passive markers, active Markers, Semi modulated markers, etc.), performers always have to wear something and be in specialised studios to record and retrieve their motions.
Recently in the XIst century, significant progress in machine learning and computer vision has enabled motion capture to be done without markers, suits or even dedicated studios. Special computer algorithms have been designed to analyze multiple streams of optical input and identify human forms, breaking them down into constituent parts for tracking.
The future of motion capture lies in the ability to be able to capture the highest fidelity of performance motion in any situation and environment, especially in scenarios where it’s impossible for performers to wear suits or markers (just think about live concerts, sporting events, training, dance shows, etc.). The future of motion capture lies in the technological advances that will greatly reduce capture and production efforts. To this end, flexibility and ease of use will be key, and that's where Move comes in.
The UK-based startup uses the human body itself to calibrate and capture motion. They retrieve a volumetric data feed, giving the exact position and motion of any subject, with tens of thousands of new performance data points. Therefore, the extracted movement is authentic human movement, as opposed to precedent methods of tracking the number of markers placed over a body and propagating that data back together.
The technology they are currently building is made with the ultimate goal to revolutionize and democratize motion capture, making it accessible to millions of people and creators.
How does the Move technology work?
The use of Move’s technology can be summarized in 3 different steps: capture, convert and create.
Capture: obviously you will need some cameras. If you can use existing motion capture installs, Move also supports plenty of different cameras, including action ones such as GoPros. Some pre-requisites are required (Horizontal FOV, Sensor, resolution and FPS) and some set-up needs to be done prior to recording. Also, videos can be recorded locally and then uploaded into their cloud-based MoCap platform. Transfer can be done manually, via API or via software.
Convert: once your videos are recorded, you will need to process the recordings. This is where the magic happens! By following some simple steps on Move’s platform (creating a project, a session, calibration, actor profiles and running takes), you’ll be able to review and & download the results, should it be data or motion extraction results, retargeted to your selected rig.
Create: Mocap results are of course available on Move’s platform, but they can also be exploited by importing them on other platforms (especially on animation software) so that you can free up your creativity and inventiveness. Move’s output files are compatible with a lot of different software such as Maya, MotionBuilder, Unreal, Unity, and Blender to name just a few of them.
Move is certainly one of the best technology we have seen recently. Their product represents the future of motion capture as it is pushing the limits of what it is possible to do today. There’s no doubt that their technology will be used at scale, they are already developing amazing use cases in gaming, web3, sports, entertainment, etc. and are likely to become a key player when it comes to importing real-life performances within virtual worlds. Companies that wish to enter that space or need motion capture for their business should highly consider working with Move.