Cynematik

Motion capture and CG character advancement is featured in the NY Times Article on Robert Zemeckis’ Polar Express starring Tom Hanks. Zemekis and Hanks have taken motion capture and digital performing to a whole new level. This method of motion capture seems to have reintroduced acting into the digital process. It’s visually stunning and very true to the original book.

According to the Times, “There was little that resembled a traditional shoot at a warehouse in Culver City, Calif., where the film was being made in April. In place of a soundstage, there was a domelike structure built of scaffolding that surrounded a playing area roughly 10 feet square. Attached to the scaffolding were several dozen infrared sensors, which could pick up and digitally record the light bounced back by the dozens of small reflectors on Mr. Hanks’s black bodysuit, as well as by the 150 smaller reflectors attached to his facial muscles. With his face dotted by the tiny jewels, as the crew called the reflectors, Mr. Hanks looked like the pincushion man from the “Hellraiser” series. But after a few days of working with the reflectors attached, he said, he no longer noticed them.”

Equally fascinating is Liam Kemp’s This Wonderful Life. Kemp received special recognition and awards at SIGGRAPH for the CG characters in his short film. I could NOT believe they weren’t real. Check it out for yourself. You can view the film at CG Channel.Com! It’s amazing!