Systems and Methods for Animating the Faces of 3D Characters Using Images of Human Faces

摘要

Techniques for animating a 3D facial model using images of a human face are described. An embodiment of the method of the invention involves matching an image of a human face to a point in a space of human faces and facial expressions based upon a description of a space of human faces and facial expressions obtained using a training data set containing multiple images of human faces registered to a template and multiple images of human facial expressions registered to the same template. The point in the space of human faces and facial expressions matching the human face can then be used in combination with a set of mappings from the space of human faces and facial expressions to a plurality of facial expressions for a 3D character model to deform a mesh of the 3D character model to achieve a corresponding facial expression.