Interactive authoring of bending and twisting motions of short plants using hand gestures

摘要

In this paper, we propose an approach to interactively author the bending and twisting motions of short plants using hand gestures, especially suitable for grass, flowers, and leaves. Our method is based on the observations that hand motions can represent the bending and twisting motions of short plants and using a hand to describe motions is natural and proficient for human. We therefore use a hand as a puppet to author the animation of one single short plant based on transferring the motions of a hand to the motions of a short plant. We first author the global motions of the short plant followed by the motions of its elements such as leaves and flowers. We also propose a framework to utilize the animation results to animate a field of short plants and further adjust the motion effects according to the properties of the short plants, such as rigidity. As a result, users can intuitively and rapidly author and generate their desired motions of short plants under the influence of external forces. Especially, our method is accessible to non-expert users and suitable for fast prototyping and authoring specific motions of short plants such as in cartoons.