“A tech demo video by VFX artist Elisha Hung shows how data from the iPhone X’s TrueDepth camera system could be used to animate 3D characters and objects in a CGI movie,” Benjamin Mayo reports for 9to5Mac.
“Apple gives developers access to the same face mesh that Animoji uses to animate pigs, rabbits and piles of poo,” Mayo reports. “The data streaming from the iOS API can be transformed into a format that traditional 3D editing software can interpret, as shown by Hung in this demo.”
“Rather than using expensive motion capture equipment, Hung coded an ARKit app to record his live-updating face mesh as he made various expressions,” Mayo reports. “He then used the depth map to animate a 2D texture of his face.”
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Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: When we first tried iPhone X’s Animoji, we instantly thought, “Hey, they could bang out episodes of Thomas & Friends and Jay Jay the Jet Plane with this!”
I remember many years ago Apple applied for a patent in head tracking 3D. Like what is shown in this video https://youtu.be/h9kPI7_vhAU. I have to think the True Depth camera would work for this now…. right?
That is amazingly impressive. Not long ago that sort of thing being shown in a research Lab would have wow’d us. I think we now know why Face ID is the future if only as part of a far bigger movement.
Just as an aside what will stop people in the future doing FaceTime calls (other visual communications software is available) as someone totally different to the person they are supposed to be? That is a tad scary to imagine.
Good point, SpyInTheSky.
A way to FaceTime with someone who wanted to mask their identity, like in a whiteness relocation program?
“Talk to the pig-man face”.