Workflow and techniques for mocap

[DJ-Nicke]

I find the best way to deal with mocap data is to, basically, use it as reference. Let me explain...

If you go into the graph editor and try to make sense of the keys, you're going to get completely lost very quickly.
If you try and use a script to reduce the keys, you might end up losing some fine details in the motion while still keeping some big errors.

Instead, I scrub through the timeline and try and pick out the Key Poses and mark them down on a sheet of paper. Then I'll go through again and try and find some Breakdown keys.
Now I can delete all other keys in the scene! If the animation has kept the same feel of my mocap, then I've done good. If not, I undo and try again, this time adding some more breakdown keys.

It usually helps if you create a copy of the mocap rig, this way you can playback your animation and see how the two differ. Now if you delete too many keys, you can quickly go back in and repose your character to match the mocap, only now you control the keys.

Have you used Maya's "Human IK" system? This automatically lets you create a duplicate rig and has some nice tools for dealing with mocap.

[cristis]

Thanks for your reply.
It's an interesting approach.I will try your method for certain.
I used a script to reduce keys but as you said I lose some fine details in the motion and errors are still there.And then delete other keys manually.Unfortunately without improving the results.
I never used Maya's HumanIK system but I've heard it's a very powerful tool working with mocap.
Thanks again.

[Korgon]

Hey so I saw your question and that way to approach it is a way that a lot of people do it but it really defeats the point of motion capture. The basic problem of deleting keys manually is that you mess with the ins and outs of your keys. It makes it look like bad mocap. I personally edit all of my motion capture inside of Motion Builder which is really the best way to do it. It has a function for baking the animation to bones called plot animation and it will ask you what frame rate you want to bake it at and you set it there. So i can have mocap animation at 120 fps which is way to high and I can bake it at 24 fps or 30 fps and the program will instantly do proper interpolation between keys and it will still look very good but have less keys. I know I am suggesting to learn a whole new program but it has the best tools for this hands down.

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