Hollywood, a Lucasfilm studio.
A total of 18 cameras surrounded the site, making it look like a position locked by several cannons.
A dense network of cables lay scattered on the ground, eventually converging at a corner of the studio.
Several top-of-the-line graphics workstations from MicroNova are displayed here.
It's even more advanced than the current version from Industrial Light & Magic.
Rather than calling it a few workstations, it's more like a gold brick.
A dozen or so staff members surrounded the machines, pointing at the data and various indicators on them, chattering away endlessly.
The director of photography led a large group of photographers to adjust the camera positions one by one, while constantly communicating with the staff in front of the workstations.
At first glance, this place is completely different from the familiar movie set.
There were several times more staff than usual; you'd think they were extras if you didn't know better.
However, only Lucas, who was present throughout the entire event, knew that these were all his elite troops.
Each of them is a top-notch technical worker trained for many years at Industrial Light & Magic.
Recently, Gerald, GAMENOVA's chief hardware engineer, personally visited Lucasfilm and brought them something he had been looking forward to for a long time.
"Lin, Michael, you've arrived just in time. Everything is ready."
When Lin Lixin brought Michael here, Lucas had just finished the preliminary preparations.
"My God, what's going on here?"
Michael's gaze fell on the thick cable bundle on the ground, thicker than his waist, and he stared in horror at the vast array of camera positions.
As one of the biggest proponents of MTV, Michael has in fact had no shortage of contact with filming throughout his career.
But a scene of this scale and level is truly something I've never seen before.
"This is our world's first optical motion capture lab, developed in collaboration with Lucasfilm."
Lin Lixin's lips curled into a smile.
The money spent on developing this system was comparable to investing in a factory.
While rotoscoping techniques are usable, they have numerous shortcomings.
The biggest problems are the lack of spatial information and the need for a large investment of manpower.
However, the cost required to achieve this is astronomical.
The use of motion capture technology in the game industry dates back to the mid-1990s, even at its earliest.
The first company to use this technology was Sega, Gamenova's close partner.
In the world's first 3D fighting game, Virtua Fighter, Sega pioneered the use of motion capture to achieve smooth and gorgeous 3D action.
However, until the early 2000s, this technology remained an expensive and niche skill.
Based on the current level of technology, there are generally three types of motion capture.
The earliest and most accurate method was mechanical motion capture.
Its principle is similar to putting on a bulky exoskeleton suit.
When the actor performs, their body moves along with the costume.
The internal sensors then transmit the data to the workstation.
With its low cost, high accuracy, and acceptable latency, it is a very economical solution.
However, after watching Lucas's demonstration, Lin Lixin decisively abandoned this technology.
It's simply too bulky to be usable in scenarios like video games, which require high sensitivity.
Then came acoustic motion capture, which is actually based on Nintendo's " Power Glove " peripheral, which uses sound wave measurements from a transmitter and receiver to achieve motion capture.
shortcoming----
Nintendo has already made its dismal business results very clear.
The electromagnetic method is similar to this technology, but it also has many inconveniences and drawbacks.
Looking at the existing technology stack, it seems that each one has its own advantages and disadvantages, and it is difficult to find a truly suitable choice.
then----
Lin Lixin worked through the night and found a relatively perfect solution.
"Come on Maikou, go to the dressing room and change your clothes."
Filled with doubt and a touch of inexplicable excitement, Michael followed Lin Lixin backstage and saw the "clothes" he had mentioned.
This is a black bodysuit.
It's all the same color, with no fancy patterns except for the small ball-shaped things at the joints.
"Optical motion capture equipment type one, it may look a bit ugly, but the effect is absolutely powerful."
"Ugly? That's so cool!"
Michael's eyes lit up, and he quickly stepped forward and picked it up.
This small, unassuming garment embodies the most advanced technology in the film, television, and gaming industries.
Okay, maybe it does look a bit strange when worn.
However, Michael's exceptional qualities effectively masked this problem, and he even possessed a magical ability to turn adversity into opportunity.
" Michael, if you don't mind?"
Lin Lixin gestured with his lip towards the person next to him, where Kojima was standing there with his Nikon, looking on expectantly.
"Of course, please go ahead."
He stood up without hesitation and performed his signature moonwalk in front of everyone.
And the Kojima lived up to expectations, perfectly capturing that most beautiful moment.
It's clear that this suit isn't as bulky as mechanical motion capture equipment; in fact, it doesn't feel restrictive at all.
Michael's movements were even smoother than usual.
The entire garment contains no cables for power supply or data transmission, nor any redundant electronic components.
It looks exactly like that; it's just a black bodysuit.
"This is amazing! What's the principle behind it?"
Michael moved his joints, generously displaying his dancing talent, and curiously looked at the small balls on his body.
These are clearly the key reasons why this suit can be used for motion capture.
"Hehe, let's go, let's talk outside."
"0kay, Maikou, just stand in the middle of these cameras—perfect, great!"
Standing behind a group of staff, Lin Lixin watched as the workstations finally calibrated all the reference points, and then he shouted with satisfaction.
So-called optical motion capture is actually an extremely expensive technology.
Its soul, of course, lies in those little balls stuck to various parts of the bodysuit.
These small balls are attached to the bodysuit via Velcro fasteners and are themselves foam balls with multiple layers of highly reflective coating.
When the motion capture camera focuses its lens on it, these small balls reflect light waves of a specific wavelength back to the camera.
In the footage captured by the camera, they will appear as a strong reflective spot of light.
What Lin Lixin and his team needed to do was to combine the data from so many cameras through calculation and analysis to obtain a complete set of spatial data.
The benefits of doing this are obvious.
The most obvious advantage is that motion capture actors' movements are not restricted by clothing in any way.
The motion capture suit itself is even lighter than most everyday clothes.
If an actor like Brandon Lee, who excels in action scenes, were to participate in the filming, they could obtain the most perfect action data.
With a little processing, this data can be directly applied to pre-built 3D models.
Compared to rotoscoping, it's incredibly expensive; the initial investment for such a system already exceeded ten million US dollars.
However, the truly terrifying resource consumption occurs in the late game when playing this way.
"Come on, Maikou, show us your signature moonwalk!"
Upon hearing this, Michael immediately performed a smooth moonwalk, even adding a set of dance moves as a bonus.
"Perfect."
Nearly 20 motion capture cameras perfectly captured his movements from every angle without missing a single detail.
They were fully recorded on several workstations via cables.
However, these workstations did not start working immediately.
The reason is...
Naturally, this is because it's not something that can be resolved in a short time.
Based on current performance, processing those ten-second or so actions would likely take approximately ----
Lin Lixin quickly calculated on his fingers, then clicked his tongue in exasperation.
"Approximately 68 hours, which is roughly three days—"
This is still achieved using the efficiency of MicroNova's latest lab-grade graphics chip.
If we were using those old Hollywood workstations, this thing would probably last until Christmas.
Keep in mind that this action only lasted for a little over ten seconds.
What they're going to record this time is almost all of MJ's iconic dance moves.
This workload----
Just thinking about it is terrifying.
Fortunately, there are enough workstations to handle the problem separately, so it doesn't take too long.
On the bright side, at least it's usable.
Now, this is all Lin Lixin can do to comfort himself.
Hardware bottlenecks are an unavoidable hurdle.
Seeing that Michael seemed to be having a lot of fun, I didn't really care.
"It's even better than I expected."
Lucas walked up to Lin Lixin and shared his opinion.
As chairman of Lucasfilm and producer of many of its films, Lucas knew very well what this technology meant.
"If we use this technology to capture the actor's arm joints and wrists—theoretically, we could create truly CG lightsabers."
How to make the special effects in Star Wars more realistic and exaggerated has always been a problem that Lucas has been struggling with.
The emergence of motion capture technology gave him a seemingly viable direction.
Based on motion capture data, Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) was able to synthesize a lightsaber in real time during post-production.
This allows their development team to conceive of any effects the lightsaber can have, letting their imaginations run wild.
"Well, capturing it isn't a problem; after all, piling up materials will solve it."
Lin Lixin nodded in satisfaction.
The breakthrough in optical motion capture technology can be considered a project that benefits future generations.
Once this technology becomes more stable, they might be able to start considering large-scale 3D rendering.
"Rendering remains an issue; calculating for a whole day in just three or four seconds is still a bit excessive."
Upon hearing this, Lucas's lips twitched.
That's called being dissatisfied.
Lin Lixin is a typical example of someone who has always had a comfortable life and has never experienced the hardships and struggles of the film and television industry.
Before MicroNova delivered these workstations, let alone a few seconds or more than ten hours, even rendering a single static frame would take at least several hours.
"The semiconductor industry is developing at a truly rapid pace."
Lucas couldn't help but sigh.
He could vaguely sense that a corner of the new world was now beckoning to him.
What direction will the film and television industry take in the future?
Lucas couldn't see through it.
But he is certain that motion capture will be a mainstay in the field of CG special effects for at least the next ten years, no, at least twenty years.