RPGDX > Forums > General Discussion > RPG Spell animations...

Mobius · Posted: Fri May 30, 2003 12:14 am Post subject:

hehe ....
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twinsen · Posted: Fri May 30, 2003 12:18 am Post subject:

Okay, now does anybody know how much motion capture hardware costs? :)
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BigManJones · Scholar Joined: 22 Mar 2003 Posts: 196

Cheap motion capture would be cool; I have an interest in machinima as well :P

twinsen · Posted: Fri May 30, 2003 1:12 am Post subject:

Unfortunately I don't think there really is any cheap way to do motion capture. You could probably do something primitive like the old Nintendo Powerglove does and have ultrasonic sensors which measure the length of time it takes sound to reach them from a fixed point and then triangulate a 3D loation.

But unless somebody out there knows enough about electronics to interface that sort of system to a PC, and then write the software to perform the triangulation, and then convert that to some kind of meaningful data... On second thoughts, I think it'd be easier to wait until I can I'm filthy stinking rich and can afford a commercial system.
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Mobius · Posted: Fri May 30, 2003 3:48 am Post subject:

true that...not to mention that its the recorder that costs the most in mocaping the rest is just some reflective ping pong balls and some lights oh yeah we can;t forget the software thats a pretty hefty wad of cash also

but you can get free mocap data online if you want and then use free software to read/sort it (Blender comes to mind, www.blender3d.com)

but whats wrong with normal hand animating? Lord of the Rings 2 used it for their models I'm using it for my game, why not you?
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It is best not to meddel in the affairs of dragons for you are crunchy and taste good with a varity of condoments.

twinsen · Posted: Fri May 30, 2003 4:02 am Post subject:

On second thoughts, I don't see why it couldn't be done cheaply really. It just requires someone with the right skillset. All you need to do is measure the time it takes a high-frequency sound, or a radio wave to reach a number of target receivers. Do that 30 times a second and you've got all the necessary data.

The components themselves aren't that expensive. You can get cheap general purpose processors with built in high resolution timers, you can even get free samples of them from certain website. Its just a matter of somebody wiring them up to some transmitters/receivers, then outputting that data serially to a PC via an RS-232 or whatever takes your fancy and perform the necessary triangulation on the timers.

twinsen · Posted: Fri May 30, 2003 4:06 am Post subject:

Actually and while we're crapping on about motion capture, I remember watching the special DVD edition of Lord Of The Rings, and in the scene from the first movie where they were fighting the Cave Troll in Moria, Peter Jackson wore a head mounted display and used a wooden "camera" which had mocap sensors on it. This meant he could run around inside the computer generated animation with a virtual camera and the result was a scene which looked like somebody was a really cool action scene which looked like it had been filmed by some guy running around with a handycam.

Okay so nobody here has millions of dollars to purchase the necessary hardware, and nobody has a huge empty film studio to run around in. But shhh- I can dream.
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Mobius · Posted: Fri May 30, 2003 2:58 pm Post subject:

I ment the game
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DrV · Posted: Fri May 30, 2003 11:44 pm Post subject:

Hmm... I thought it was called Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, and Smegel is spelled Smeagol in the book...
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Ninkazu · Posted: Sat May 31, 2003 12:29 am Post subject:

DrV · Posted: Sat May 31, 2003 12:42 am Post subject:

Yeah, you're right... and it took me over 5 minutes to find it, the last 3 of which I spent paging through the appendicies of The Return of the King... how I do hate accents. It screws up my wonderful spelling skills because I don't remember them, unless they're in German words because you can tell by the pronunciation. And the only people I've ever heard (besides myself) pronounce words from the Lord of the Rings are the actors on the (horridly innacurate) movie, and I've only seen each movie once. I'm not so sure I'm even going to waste my time watching the third one, because the storyline is so completely different than that of the real thing, and it'll confuse my understanding of the *real* story. :)

Man, this is off-topic. :P
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Don't ask no stupid questions and I won't send you away.
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twinsen · Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2003 12:57 pm Post subject:

BigManJones · Scholar Joined: 22 Mar 2003 Posts: 196

The thing about doing animations by hand is - motion capture looks much more realistic. Besides if your doing cutscenes/machinima than how much time are you willing to spend animating a character smoking a cigarette or sitting in a chair? Sure doing it manually is the cheapest way, but mocap would be the way to go for alot of content.

So far as a mocap system - use any digital camera to generate avi/mpeg or whatever; use a blue backround, a person in black tights and bright white balls attached at the joints; film the person jumping around; use whatever image editing software to extract the frames then the balls from every x frame of the recording; then attach your bones to the ball images in your modeling program. Cost: videocamera (light and backdrop), photoshop, 3ds, time! Hmm, this sound interesting...

[Neodog] Solar · Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2003 2:32 pm Post subject:

Mobius · Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2003 11:58 pm Post subject:

thats good to know
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It is best not to meddel in the affairs of dragons for you are crunchy and taste good with a varity of condoments.