Realtime rigging

Question

Hi,

Does anybody know how to rig a character in realtime like they do on XBOX 360 Kinect games?

In my thesis I have to rig a character in realtime exactly like it.

I wish to bind the joints of my model - which I intend to create using the 3ds Max Biped model - to the position and orientation information returned by the Kinect SDK API.

I heard of the KMotion capturer created by Akira32 however I think that he's API is used to record movements and place them into a model which is not realtime rigging. Therefore, I don't think I can use that for my project.

Thanks in advance,

Caio

Answer 1

His file contains a 3ds script that runs automatically if done correctly and makes it run in real time better. But if your looking for help directly implementing an add-on for 3ds max you need to talk at their forums about add-ons and experiment yourself because this looks like an add-on project.

I have tryed akiras kmotion some but did you make sure to try the newest version by another user that improved movement?

P.S. in the kinect they use a characters predefined movement included with the games character. edit: and/or an avatar from xbox.

For instance, in game development books you normally see the character have a sprite sheet with animation for each direction he moves in to make it appear as if he can move in every direction.

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Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. - "Sherlock holmes" "speak softly and carry a big stick" - theodore roosevelt. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering - Yoda. Blog - http://jefferycarlsonblog.blogspot.com/

Answer 2

You need to look at the preview bar for akiras xna preview section because he has a bunch of xna ball models attached to skeleton pieces.

For reference if you want to use xna to move models their is a createtranslation method in a vector and some other methods you have to learn how about. I just learned how to move objects in xna myself a few days ago.

I think kanes model viewer demostrates how to do this in xna but also adds rotating an object.

doing directly to 3ds max is not possible because you would have to learn maxscript and/or learn c++ programming language and they both require some knowledge of 3ds max except for c++ which requires technical knowledge (for maximum experience and speed).

I understand where you coming from because iam going into game development and will be using the kinect for 3d model importation possibly of characters i have hand molded or drawn and akiras program for bone animation/rigging.

Rigging is the hardest part of 3d modeling as anyone here playing around with the avatar samples with kinect sdk has learned and/or 3d modelers have learned.

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Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. - "Sherlock holmes" "speak softly and carry a big stick" - theodore roosevelt. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering - Yoda. Blog - http://jefferycarlsonblog.blogspot.com/

Answer 3

Hi

I don't want to associate an animation recorded from Kinect to a model in 3ds max. What I'm trying to accomplish is create a software, probably using XNA, where an user can do movements in front of a Kinect and see they reflecting real-time on the 3d model rigged into the screen.

I mentioned 3ds max because the model I'd like to use to bind the joints is the biped model provided by 3ds installation. Besides that, I've mentioned Akira32's API just to double check if that can help me out with this task, but as far as I could understand, it is used to record movements from Kinect and place those movements on a model which can be used in future, but not for real-time rigging as I want.

I need something pretty much like the XBOX + Kinect games, where a user stands in front of the kinect and can see his/her movements being performed in real-time by the 3d model on screen.

Regards,

Caio

Answer 4

Akiras can be modified to do that but changing up the avatar samples from kinect SDK v1.5 is better for accomplishing your goal. Just remove avatar place another character in the avatars place (requires xna knowledge) and then your done. for best results mix akiras code with the avatar sample code from Kinect SDK

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Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. - "Sherlock holmes" "speak softly and carry a big stick" - theodore roosevelt. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering - Yoda. Blog - http://jefferycarlsonblog.blogspot.com/