We are incredibly sensitive to human movement and appearance, which makes it a big challenge to create believable computerised crowds, but researchers at Trinity are working on improving that. Getting those computer-generated avatars to act in engaging and more human ways is trickier than it looks. But researchers at Trinity College Dublin are delving into how we perceive graphical characters and coming up with insights to create more socially realistic virtual humans without hogging too much computer processing expense. Getting the crowds right in this computerised cityscape is important, according to researchers.
The team has been trying to work out smarter ways of making simulated crowds look more varied without the expense of creating a model for each individual, and they are finding that altering the upper bodies and faces on common templates is a good way to get more bang for your buck. Researchers from the team also sat together and attached markers to themselves so they could capture their movements and voices on camera as they conversed. That built up a large corpus of data to tease out the subtle synchronies between gestures and sounds that our brains register without us even thinking about it.
More information:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sciencetoday/2010/1209/1224285096674.html
More information:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sciencetoday/2010/1209/1224285096674.html