Wrestle alone: Creating tangled motions of multiple avatars from individually captured motions

Abstract

Animations of two avatars tangled with each other often appear in battle or fighting scenes in movies or games. However, creating such scenes is difficult due to the limitations of the tracking devices and the complex interactions of the avatars during such motions. In this paper, we propose a new method to generate animations of two persons tangled with each other based on individually captured motions. We use wrestling as an example. The inputs to the system are two individually captured motions and the topological relationship of the two avatars computed using Gauss Linking Integral (GLI). Then the system edits the captured motions so that they satisfy the given topological relationship. Using our method, it is possible to create / edit close-contact motions with minimum effort by the animators. The method can be used not only for wrestling, but also for any movement that requires the body to be tangled with others, such as holding a shoulder of an elderly to walk or a soldier piggy-backing another injured soldier. © 2007 IEEE.