Animating Using the Kinect Point Cloud as Reference

Brazilian artist Jomário Murta used multiple Microsoft Kinects to generate a sequence of point clouds (a set of points in 3D space) as reference for creating animation. The process is akin to motion capture, but not the same:

      This is something like animating over the videos. Just like we usually do as 
      reference for timing and more complex movements. The difference is that I 
      can animate three-dimensionally “inside” the video; the advantage instead 
      of mocap is that the animation process is more free, where I can easily 
      exaggerate the movements and play a lot with the poses without
      compromising my style of animation.

Murta admits that he is still in a research phase and hasn’t figured out any practical applications for the technique, but that’s to be expected of any exploration of a new technology. The results are promising thus far, and it’ll be interesting to see how he and others build on the process.

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