Seminar Computer Animation Arjan Egges

Overview Seminar goals Seminar organisation

Seminar goals Introduction to current research in Computer Animation –Motion capture & synthesis, facial animation, IK, … Developing academic skills –Giving presentations –Reading and evaluating research papers –Discuss research issues Hands-on experience with motion capture –Mocap lab assignment

Seminar organisation Grading: –Presentation: 40% –Discussion: 10% –Literature study: 50% –Mocap lab assignment: no grade, but an oscar Attendance of all sessions is mandatory

Seminar organisation Papers/presentations: –Everyone presents one paper –Everyone is discussion leader for one paper –Two presentations per session –25 minutes per presentation –20 minutes evaluation/discussion –Peer review determines 20% of the presentation grade

Seminar organisation Papers/presentations –Before the presentation sessions, everyone writes a summary between words of each paper. –Send by to –Deadline for sending these summaries is always one day before the presentation session of the papers. –Send the summaries on time! –Presenters/discussion leaders do not need to send a summary of their assigned paper or the other paper that is presented in the same session

Mocap lab assignment To be done in teams of 4/5 Assignment: short animation movie –Record a couple of animations in the mocap lab –Put it on a character and make a nice rendering Tools: –In the GMT lab: MotionBuilder + Maya –We have a number of 3D models of characters –Look on the Internet for additional resources Planning of the motion capture lab visit –BBL building, room K61 (basement) Show movies during last session!

Sessions Presentations Visit the mocap lab Guest lectures –Ben van Basten (PhD student at UU)

Presentation 25 minutes Presentation should discuss the contents of the paper –What is it about, what is the contribution, what are the drawbacks of the proposed method… After the presentation, there is time for discussion/questions (20 minutes)

Discussion The discussion leader is in charge of the 20 minutes discussion time. Can take different shapes –Discussion points –Other papers that do almost the same –Etc. Collaborate with the presenter on this

Presentation Presentations will be evaluated by all using the evaluation form. –Content –Visual aids –Delivery –Ability to answer questions Presentation grade and evaluations will be given to you at the next session. Discussion leader will get a grade from me

Presentation outline Introduction Background Paper content Contributions of the method Drawbacks of the method Conclusion Discussion points

Presentation preparation Preparing the presentation –Read the paper thoroughly –Read a few of the background papers to place the research –Identify advantages, drawbacks, and discussion points –Collect images/movies –You may contact the author in case of specific questions –Do a ‘test-drive’ at home to check the presentation is not too long-short

Presentation preparation Tips for showing movies: – –VLC standalone player –Or: use Windows Media Encoder! Please make sure that your movies work properly on the machines in BBL!

Seminar organisation Literature study: –8-10 pages document, including references –Can be on any topic related to animation Motion capture (inverse) kinematics Motion synthesis (graphs etc.) Facial animation Hand animation Animation & interaction (gestures etc.) Animation & emotions Skinning

More info Check the website regularly for updates: