Layered acting for character animation

Figure 1: While watching a real-time display of her actions, an animator performs a hopping motion, sketching the trajectory of a kangaroo. We introduce an acting-based animation system for creating and editing character animation at interactive speeds. Our system re-quires minimal training, typically under an hour, and is well suited for rapidly prototyping and creating expressive motion. A real-time motion-capture framework records the user's motions for simulta-neous analysis and playback on a large screen. The animator's real-world, expressive motions are mapped into the character's virtual world. Visual feedback maintains a tight coupling between the an-imator and character. Complex motion is created by layering mul-tiple passes of acting. We also introduce a novel motion-editing technique, which derives implicit relationships between the anima-tor and character. The animator mimics some aspect of the charac-ter motion, and the system infers the association between features of the animator's motion and those of the character. The anima-tor modies the mimic by acting again, and the system maps the changes onto the character. We demonstrate our system with sev-eral examples and present the results from informal user studies with expert and novice animators