Winner Choose: Digital Reside Seize & Animation for Anapamorphic “Monkey Band” | Character Creator, iClone, Unreal
Anthony Evans / Digital Puppets UK
Hello, my identify is Antony Evans, and I’m the co-founder of Digital Puppets, an animation studio based mostly in the UK. I’ve labored as a personality designer for a few years, specializing in real-time animation, and collaborating with studios comparable to Disney, Warner Bros, and the BBC. Along with creating real-time performing avatar puppetry, I concentrate on creating and designing customized characters for purchasers in a variety of kinds.
My workforce and I can replicate any present licensed character or firm/product mascot. Our studio not solely creates movement seize characters for on-line entertainers, educators, and advertising/promoting companies, however we additionally produce totally animated exhibits for our purchasers utilizing the characters we design.
Not too long ago, we accomplished a 50-episode sequence for the UK nationwide radio station ‘RADIO X’, the place we animated the hosts and reworked their weekly podcast into participating content material for his or her on-line viewers. We additionally work with globally acknowledged broadcasters such because the BBC and Cartoon Community, amongst others, although many tasks stay undisclosed resulting from NDAs.
Idea & Character Creation
Final yr, we submitted a clip of “Monkey Band” to the Reallusion 2024 Character Contest and gained “Finest Mocap Use” within the “Particular Awards” class. This contest allowed us to discover new workflows and combine our present practices with modern applied sciences and methods. It’s additionally the inspiration behind this text, the place I’ll be sharing the total creation course of.
The choice to create the Monkey Band stemmed from our want to discover fur creation inside Character Creator. Moreover, monkey characters offered a singular alternative to make the most of the humanoid base mesh, granting entry to the clothes and hair programs. This allowed us to design distinctive outfits and appears for every band member, thereby, enhancing their individuality.
The idea was impressed by our long-standing curiosity in digital bands that may carry out in actual time. To attain this, we ensured the characters have been outfitted with detailed facial morphs to maximise efficiency throughout reside facial seize. The band was particularly designed to allow real-time digital avatar management for the lead character, permitting us to stream pre-recorded performances seamlessly. You’ll be able to see an instance of this in motion right here
The characters have been developed utilizing a mixture of Character Creator 4 (CC4) tools and ZBrush by way of the GoZ workflow. ZBrush was instrumental in including intricate particulars to the bottom mannequin and in sculpting facial morphs. Its capabilities in creating natural shapes allowed for speedy exploration of various seems, which vastly contributed to giving every band member a singular persona.
Whereas designing the monkey characters, we utilized preset hair cards to create their fur. Particularly, the “Fur Collar” and “Fur Cuffs” presets from the “Stylings” pack in CC4 proved invaluable. By leveraging the Edit Mesh device, we custom-made and duplicated these hair playing cards to realize a full-body fur impact. For a extra in-depth have a look at the method, you’ll be able to discuss with our video on customizing hair.
iClone Movement LIVE for Facial Animation
When using Reside Face for facial seize, it’s necessary to magnify expressions. Overacting ensures that refined particulars are captured, because it’s simpler to tone down exaggerated expressions throughout post-processing than so as to add lacking nuances. Moreover, the standard of mix shapes is important. Take time to assessment them within the Facial Profile Editor, making certain they work properly, notably for stylized characters just like the monkeys. Modifications to the bottom mesh for a stylized look can typically distort mix shapes, so correct setup is important to realize high-quality facial seize.
Facial mocap is very environment friendly and permits for a fast turnaround. For this animation, I mimed the music whereas recording the efficiency utilizing an iPhone and LIVE FACE. Afterward, I reviewed the recording and made changes to refine expressions and mouth shapes. Concurrently, I recorded the audio monitor and used AccuLips to generate a viseme track.
By mixing the viseme monitor with the expression monitor, I achieved extra pure outcomes. The viseme monitor ensures correct mouth shapes for speech, whereas the expression monitor provides emotional nuance. This workflow considerably lowered the time required in comparison with handbook facial animation.
iClone for Physique Animation
For this mission, we utilized the Xsens Hyperlink movement seize swimsuit, which delivered extremely correct outcomes with minimal cleanup. Every character’s actions have been recorded in single takes, one after the opposite. The movement knowledge was processed in Xsens MVN software and exported as FBX recordsdata. Importing the mocap knowledge into iClone was seamless—merely drag and drop the FBX file onto the character and choose the Xsens profile.
The primary cleanup concerned aligning the characters’ fingers with their musical devices. For instance, refining the hand placement for the keyboard took essentially the most time. Utilizing an precise keyboard throughout the mocap session would have been useful, as bodily props present clear factors of contact and enhance accuracy in hand positioning.
Listed here are some Dos and Don’ts when animating physique movement in iClone:
DO:
-Exaggerate your actions to make sure the seize conveys dynamic movement.
-Use real-world props so as to add weight and realism, particularly for interactions like taking part in devices.
-Enable ample area for pure motion throughout seize.
DON’T:
-Keep away from miming contact with imaginary objects; it’s difficult to copy constant positioning with out actual props.
-Don’t neglect refining hand and finger alignment throughout cleanup, particularly for detailed duties like taking part in devices.
Remaining Render in Unreal
The workflow between iClone and Unreal is very environment friendly, particularly with the Auto Setup plugin. This device makes it easy to switch animations to Unreal whereas retaining the unique look of the characters with out the necessity to recreate supplies. For this mission, all animations have been created in iClone and transferred to a pre-built stage scene in Unreal utilizing Reside Hyperlink. As soon as transferred, the remaining steps concerned organising cameras and adjusting the lighting immediately in Unreal.
The Unreal Sequencer is intuitive and capabilities equally to different timeline instruments. One standout function of iClone’s Reside Hyperlink is its capacity to robotically configure the Sequencer when transferring animations. On this case, transferring animations for 4 characters was simple, as Reside Hyperlink arrange the Sequencer robotically, saving a major quantity of effort and time.
Unreal was chosen for its capacity to deal with massive environments seamlessly. Whereas iClone’s renders have been nice, Unreal’s render provided entry to an intensive stage asset full with pre-configured particle results and dynamic lighting. This allowed us to effortlessly combine our animations into the scene, reaching professional-quality outcomes with minimal setup.
Moreover, Unreal’s real-time capabilities made it splendid for a reside present setup. By connecting the Xsens swimsuit, we might carry out reside interactions, such because the lead singer participating with the viewers in actual time. This setup additionally allowed us to set off pre-animated sequences, like songs, with a single button press, earlier than seamlessly transitioning again to the reside efficiency. Unreal’s real-time triggers enabled one individual to orchestrate a complete digital band efficiency.
Closing Ideas
Engaged on the “Monkey Band” mission alongside my brother Scott has been an extremely rewarding expertise. At Digital Puppets UK, we’ve at all times strived to push the boundaries of real-time animation and digital avatars. Utilizing instruments like iClone, Character Creator, and Unreal Engine, we’ve been capable of create detailed characters and fluid animations with a outstanding degree of effectivity. By mixing motion capture with real-time performances, we will ship extremely participating content material, remodeling easy concepts into polished, professional-quality animations that actually resonate with audiences.
Wanting again at tasks like animating RADIO X’s podcast and dealing with main broadcasters just like the BBC and Cartoon Community, it’s clear how far we’ve come. Every step of our workflow—from character design to reside efficiency seize—has been meticulously refined to make sure we’re at all times delivering one of the best. The “Monkey Band” mission, particularly, showcases how we will seamlessly combine these highly effective instruments to convey a digital band to life. It’s thrilling to see how these improvements are shaping the way forward for digital manufacturing, and we’re proud to be a part of that journey.
As we attain the conclusion of this text, I can’t consider a greater solution to wrap issues up than by providing you some extra Monkey Band on your leisure:
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