Modeling short-term dynamics and variability for realistic interactive facial animation.

Modern modeling and rendering techniques have produced nearly photorealistic face models, but truly expressive digital faces also require natural-looking movements. Virtual characters in today's applications often display unrealistic facial expressions. Indeed, facial animation with traditional schemes such as keyframing and motion capture demands expertise. Moreover, the traditional schemes aren't adapted to interactive applications that require the real-time generation of context-dependent movements. A new animation system produces realistic expressive facial motion at interactive speed. The system relies on a set of motion models controlling facial-expression dynamics. The models are fitted on captured motion data and therefore retain the dynamic signature of human facial expressions. They also contain a nondeterministic component that ensures the variety of the long-term visual behavior. This system can efficiently animate any synthetic face. The video illustrates interactive use of a system that generates facial-animation sequences.