Hi, I am looking to create a dancing animation.
I need dancing performed really good as its one of the main parts of the game.
How do I do it? I guess I need to pay a dancer and capture them via motion capture?
Anyone has stories about motion capture process - how to organise it, what must be done before, how much money do I need, buy hardware or rent a studio, where to do with a discount, how to negotiate, maybe access somewhere for free in some college in exchange of some mention of them, or involve ministry of culture…
Or there is a brilliant software to create complex animation?
I dont know any information on the topic.
List of animation software that can perform the task will help. Or motion capture software with hardware and their prices… Or studio in Australia when can I do it for a reasonable price. Thank you
I have recently purchased the Hardware/Software necessary to produce my own Mocaps.
For dancing I would say you will get the most accuracy from MotionCapture however, their will be some hand key animators that could do a really good job.
My set up including cost below:
(Pre-owned) Kinect v2 (Xbox One Kinect HD Camera) = £50
Kinect for Windows Adapater v2 (From Microsoft) = £29.99
Brekel Pro Body v2 commercial license = £120 (You could shop around).
Tripod for Kinect camera = £30
Total = £229.99
Projected costs
Hall Hire with Crash Mat = Approx £10 an hour
Ikinema WebAnimate = $19.99 per month Approx £16 P/m
I am hiring a hall soon to capture my first batch of motion capture however, I had a play with it in my computer room and it’s detection was very accurate for basic anims like walking, you capture your attitude with the animation which i’m sure you would want to capture for your dance styles.
The Bad Side…
1.) You can lose detection of a limb if it is hidden by your body (as you can understand with online having 1 camera) so swinging arms behind the body or leg passing behind the body may result in a small glitch in the mocap however, with all mocap you need to tidy up the data in a 3d modelling software (for me Blender) so you can fix these flaws.
2.) Unsure of the accuracy of a fast movement for example break dancing etc…
The mocap will be the foundation of your animation and you will pick up authentic movement and attitude that sometimes is very difficult to capture with ‘keyframe’ animating. I must stress tho work WILL need to be done in the 3d software to clean up the motion data. You will also need to re target the Motion data to your Skeleton. I suggest Ikinema as I have used it before and, has worked for me. If you’re unsure you can always contact Alex from Ikinema with questions.
Not a full answer i’m afraid but hopefully other more experienced people can expand.
EDIT: Forgot to mention the obvious prices I listed are UK prices.
Ha, I am certainly going to try twerking in my Mocap sessions.
No it will not capture muscles (Mesh). It creates a skeleton and copies your bones movements to drive the skeletons bone movements, you would capture the spine and hip moving like its twerking which will deform your mesh in your 3d software to complete the look of twerking.
However, if you’re thinking of a Beyonce like twerk with the gluteus maximus moving delayed or something you will probably need to set up Morph targets for that.
Take no offence but judging by your posts I think you need to start from the beginning and work little steps up to this as this will require a big learning curve for someone that is new to game development, I would say first off forget about the AAA quality set up the foundations and learn it first then start polishing the quality.
AAA quality of some aspects as graphics I guess can be achieved pretty easily nowadays. I plan to produce a simple but high quality in what its content is some life experience simulator
I aint got no time for creating not profitable projects in purpose of training for sake of training. It takes hundreds of hours each and that means thousand of dollars I could earn if spent time on work - and the project would be thrown away.
I plan to pick a medium project and do it until its commercially ready and get profit. For now I havent even buy a machine for that, doing researched on blind spots.
I do wish you the best of luck but at the same time don’t underestimate how much skill is needed for something that sells thousands in the gaming industries.
Just because engines can achieve AAA quality graphics it does not mean you can create that level of quality with no training. People have been teaching and learning for years it does not come overnight from one medium sized project. If you’re looking for a quick way to make cash this is the wrong way of doing it. That being said aim high and good luck!
If you have the ambition and passion I’m sure you can achieve what you want.