Project 1:

Overview:

There is a need to have well documented ideas before going into a motion capture session. In general, time is money, and the more prepared you are, the happier everyone will be. Normally, a motion capture session will have people that are working to come up with the shots, those responsible for capturing and delivering the shots, and those who will make something useful out of the shots. You will eventually be put into all of the rolls, but for this project, you’ll need to approach everything as if you’re a client about to go into a motion capture shoot.

Software:

Example documents are in Word format, but you can use whatever you’d like to get the information down.

Assignment:

There are some guidelines on the minimum number of captures you’ll need, etc. Everyone in the class should work in a group. Groups have to be at least two people and can’t be more than four people. For each person in the group, there has to be two captured motions. ex: four people equals eight captured motions. This is a minimum requirement, so feel free to do more. The only real ground rule is that all the captured pieces should be of the same subject, and at least two of the pieces need to blend together. What you need to look for as far as blending will be discussed in class.

All the projects are group projects. You will have time to capture for individual projects outside of the class. Outside captures are encouraged for people trying to use motion capture for different projects, but they need to be involved in the group project for the class. There are no exceptions.

People within the same major are not allowed to be in the same group. There are 3 Design students, so each one must be in a different group. Same goes for dance, art, etc. There are no exceptions. There are enough people in the class this quarter that this should not be a problem.

At this time, you will need to decide on a marker set up as well. The marker setup must be different than the default marker set up used by Vicon (currently a 41 marker setup). Extra markers make the data a little harder to clean, but gives you better and more stable information. Vicon's marker set is here, and a commented version is here. These should be used as a reference.

You will need to create a storyboard, a Planning Sheet, and a shot list. The shot list also needs to point out which shots are to be blended. (Planning Sheet and Planning Sheet Example, Shot List Example, Storyboard Template, and Example). You will be evaluated on your ability to get all the paper work together by the deadline as well as have all the parts of the capture make sense.

Instructor:

If any one has trouble or questions, feel free to talk to me about them. This first project is a team project. Everyone needs to come together and decide what type of motion capture you’re going to do and how to do it. I recommend full body capture since that will be the brunt of my lectures, but other captures are also acceptable as long as you can figure out a way to blend one capture into another.