Explore the History of Motion Capture with Animatrik Film Design
Animatrik Film Design recently joined forces with creative agency Territory to showcase the finest moments in motion capture (or Mo-cap) history.
Mo-cap is the process of recording live-action movements of objects or people. Within the entertainment industry, it refers to recording actions of performers within a mocap volume and using that information to give life to digital character models or objects in 2D or 3D computer animation.
This co-created infographic dates back to 1774, when Johann Heinrich Lambert develops 'spatial resection', then launches head first through the performance capture history of today's efforts on projects such as Warcraft.
Highlights from the 1900's include 1915, when Max Fleischer develops rotoscoping technique and when Disney’s Snow White and her prince were animated in 1937 using rotoscoping.
1989 led the way for the first CG movie to be created using passive optical ‘Don’t Touch Me’ and in 1992 Motion Reality demonstrated single character real-time body capture.
Check out some other interesting facts and figures below, and don’t forget to pop over to Animatrik’s website to see the full infographic, covering more than 200 years of mo-cap history.
Facts & Figures
The weirdest animal capture so far is a tarantula
There are 38 to 85 markers on a typical mo-cap suit
The longest time spent capturing for a single video game is 140 days
The highest capture volume is 400km
People brought back from the dead using mo-cap include Marlene Dietrich and Orville Redenbacher
The longest continuous time spent capturing for a single live action movie is three years
The most dangerous capture to date is the Matrix II PMS flying rig (the ‘Please Make It Stop’ sentinel attack simulator)
Make sure you check out Animatrik’s infographic to see more big firsts and bizarre facts as well as a list of famous actors who have been motion captured.
