Mini Project 2: Motion Capture

Dec. 3, 2021 - Models, Defining Skeleton and Model, and Animation Cleanup

Following my last attempt, I have struggled immensely with obtaining a model from one of my favorite video games, No Straight Roads. There were plenty of mishaps and file corruptions while trying to obtain it, but I was finally able to get it to work. 

Model 

I decided to follow the rule to export the MayDay model from Autodesk Maya to Mixamo. After following some tutorials, I tried to export it as an .obj file instead of .fbx, and it was able to upload to Mixamo without any problems! There, I was able to auto-rig it and transfer it to Motion Builder! I had to make do without her textures, unfortunately.

The .fbx file did not upload well to Mixamo, but the .obj one did! The only issue is that she had no textures.

Defining Skeleton and Model 

The animation file was exported as a skeleton - for my last work, I cleaned up missing markers - so for this week, I had to define the animation so it can bake efficiently into MayDay's skeleton. 

By defining the skeleton, I had to set to a T-pose to better define the skeleton without any mistakes. Defining the skeleton went smoothly, but it was the model that was difficult. 

The model was automatically set in an A-pose, which caused issues with defining. I had to go back and assign MayDay with a T-pose on Mixamo. It wasn't as big of an issue as I thought - it just took a lot more thinking. From then on, I as able to define MayDay without any problem. 

Then, I brought both the model and the skeleton in the the same Motion Builder file to "bake" them. I combined the files so MayDay is able to animate without needing the skeleton. 

Animation Cleanup

Because the animation was exceptionally rusty, I decided to clean the feet and the knees. I was able to fix them most of the part, but halfway through her animation, her feet glitch. There are certain parts of her feet that I am unable to fix, considering that I can only adjust her bones. By next week, I plan to work on the feet, as well as touching the hands and face to give it a more natural feel. 

Nov. 19, 2021 - Capturing Motion Capture Data and Models

This is another mini animation project to help enhance my skills with Motive and Motion Builder, another program by Autodesk. Motive is an entirely new program purely meant for capturing motion capture animation and cleanup, so I picked a project that will help me improve my recording and cleanup skills. Motion Builder is rather new, but has the same features and functions as Maya, so I was able to learn it faster. Motion Builder is, in this project, responsible for characterizing the rigs I will be using and baking them onto the animation data. 

First and foremost, a lab partner was comfortable enough to wear the mocap suit and act a scenario (under my request, some dancing and fooling around). I was able to record and export without any issue on Motive. 

Following the recording, I had to convert the saved files from .tak to .fbx (so Motion Builder would be able to read them) and clean up any missing or overlapped markers on Motive. My animation was clean on the most part, but there were a few gaps and overlapped markers that were manageable to fix. Once I made sure the animation was mostly clean and had the frames I wanted, I exported the file as .fbx. 

Poor, low quality images of the Motive interface. Top picture depicts the missing gaps in animation (usually due to missing markers) and the bottom picture depicts a cleaned animation with the actor.

After the animation clean up, I went to gather my models that I plan to use. A friend of mine shared some models of MayDay and Zuke, the main characters from the indie video game "No Straight Roads". I'm quite fond of the game, so I wanted to use either one of the characters for this project. This is where the issues come in.  

Medium shots of the main characters Zuke (left) and MayDay (right).

They were originally Blender files, so I exported them as .fbx files in order to open in Motion Builder. I was hoping define MayDay's skeleton, but I was quite surprised to see the giant rings surrounding the models. I couldn't alter them without using the rings, so I thankfully didn't delete them. 

However, this meant that there was no way to start defining skeletons. Turning the characters on x-ray mode made it impossible to see their bones and I couldn't alter the appearance to only show the bones while hiding the rings. There were issues with textures. 

I had issues with the models, mostly with the rings. I was not able to actively work on the models because of them. Both images also have altered textures, although the bottom had MayDay filled with question marks, probably indicating that Motion Builder can't recognize the textures. 

I came across the decision to rig the models on Mixamo, an Adobe site filled with custom rigs and animations, and then export them to Motion Builder; however, Mixamo wasn't able to recognize the models, even in .fbx format. At this point, I had gotten extremely frustrated and, unfortunately, ran out of time. Meanwhile I consulted to some classmates and relied on tutorials to help my issue, I realized that I was dabbling into unfamilar grounds when my main intent was to become familiar with motion capture.

I still have hope that I might somehow get things to work and use the models I am passionate with. If not, then I will accept it and move on, using rigs that I have purchased or exclusively from Mixamo. By next week, I plan to bake the animation onto the character and perfect the animation to look more natural.