More Realistic Virtual Humans

Researchers at the National Center for Computer Animation have devised a computer program that automatically adds realistic muscle shape to simple wire frame and skeletal figures. These virtual muscles will move and change shape realistically, under skin and clothing, when the figures are animated. From the NewScientist article:

Zhang and his colleague Xiaosong Yang have developed a system that takes the outward appearance of a character and automatically generates a skeleton and muscles to fit inside.

"It works by using geometric processing of the still character to determine where muscles should go," he told New Scientist. "If there's an important muscle it will show through the skin so the tool can infer where the major muscles should be."

The software guesses at a suitable skeleton to attach the muscles to by adapting a standard humanoid skeleton to fit the character's overall shape. With skeleton, muscles and skin all in place, the character can be made to move in more realistic ways.

The software simulates how the muscles affect the outward appearance as they contract, relax and slide in relation to joints and other muscles.
Other mammals

"Our method could also be applied to characters based on other mammals," says Zhang. As long as the basic shape of an animal's skeleton is known and the skin is designed, it would work just as well, he says.

But the team first plans to improve the technique's accuracy in generating human-like characters. "We plan to add detailed knowledge of the human anatomy," he explains. "We hope to be able to take a character and fit a very accurate anatomy to it."

This could even have medical applications, says Zhang, allowing doctors to infer the biomechanics of a patient's anatomy from their outer appearance.

Initially you will see this approach used in computer gaming and entertainment animations. Then you will see this improved realism utilised in virtual reality programming, such as virtual surgery tutorials, and other technical tutorial programming.

Judging by the illustration at the top of the page, it may not be long before Chippendale's creates an animated showcase using virtual male strippers. Virtual female strippers and more erotic virtuality is inevitable, given the money flow.