Activision has shown off their newest technology meant to create more realistic characters for the next generation of consoles. At the Game Developers Conference, Jorge Jimenez displayed the company's ability to design and create characters that look realistic, while avoiding the uncanny valley. Javier von der Pahlen, Activision research and development director, also displayed a video of next-gen character animation.
The still photographs show various types of characters, from old men to young women, and show the level of details that Activision's technology is capable of creating. The images are the product of years of hard work attempting to recreate the intricate details of the human face. Jimenez is proud of his work, but has said that he believes that there still needs to be more work on making character's hair, eyebrows, and teeth.
In Javier von der Pahlen presentation video, the power of Activision's new technology with a real-time rendered character is displayed. The character is shown blinking, showing different emotions, and speaking with realistic face and lip movements. Eyebrows furrow, nostrils flair, and eyes bulge and narrow in the video. If not for a few details (the head has no body, and sometimes is shown without teeth) is would be easy to mistake the figure for an actual human being (depending on your resolution, of course).
It is unknown when we will be able to see this technology in an actual game, as both developers reminded audiences that these photos and video are from research and development assets, and are not part of actual game hardware. This presentations are also the produce of years of hard work and research from the development team, and represent the pinnacle of motion capture and video rendering technology. The next generation of consoles are expected to be out by the holidays this year, and with this kind of technology may one day be running on them.
Thanks to Gamespot