So came the realization of Fuse.  Our answer has been to develop a custom character creator which gives users the ability to make their own characters that are instantly compatible with the rest of our pipeline as well as versatile in their use elsewhere.  Also we wanted to make sure that it would be able to grow along with the community and be open to advanced users so it’s versatility in the amount of possible creations can build to be nearly infinite.

Quality has been the highest priority when creating the base assets for the customizable characters.  We decided we needed to have artists be at the healm of the initial the asset creation but needed a way to make their work modifiable in order to provide end users the ability to change them in useful ways.

A well known actor and theorist, Sandy Meisner, once said that “acting is the ability to live truthfully in imaginary circumstances.” He was of course referring to theatre in it’s direct sense, but Meisner’s words are an unexpectedly appropriate definition for CG character “acting” as well.

3D character animation is about timing – it’s about poses, expressions, and body mechanics. It’s about exaggerated moments. It’s about conveying emotion in a completely constructed and rendered environment – with no real pain, love, excitement, or any other truthful fundamental emotional input or output. It’s about creating physics in a non-physical world. It’s acting.

In film, the implications of character animation are as obvious as they are crucial. In gaming, character animation encourages empathy from the player for the character – increasing engagement and interest.

The connection between the conveyance of meaning through your character’s motion and it’s ultimate perception by your audience, is a finely tuned dialogue. If your timing is too fast, the audience might miss the punch – too slow and you lose their interest. Whether your character be animal, fantasy, human-like, or some twisted combination of all three – it must relay action in a way that your audience can relate to. There are hundreds of articles and studies about the elements of anthropomorphism in character animation – a technique that ultimately maximizes the ability for an audience to perceive and understand an animated character by it’s relationship to human “reality.”

If all that is true, then what better technique for physical communication than to root your character animation in reality itself? The introduction of motion capture created an opportunity for animators to access real-life motion data for a head-start on what would otherwise be tedious keyframing. But, unless you have access to an in-house capture studio and clean up staff, mocap data often requires just as much work to use as it does to keyframe. There is cleaning, looping, and the always tedious task of retargeting.

While technology and artistic talent are at an all time high, production schedules are tightening across the board to increase profit. Gamers and film audiences expect to be “wow-ed” time and time again.

With these quality expectations and tight schedules, 3D animators are turning to Mixamo more and more to provide the base layer of 3D animation for hard-to-reproduce physics such as weight transfer, foot plant, and timing. Mixamo’s built-in retargeting makes pipeline import negligible and keyframe reduction leaves motion data palatable for even the most hardcore keyframe purists. Real-time physical and emotional customization means you can tweak your motion (and emotion) right off-the-bat, before merging back into your pipeline. Production companies and developers such as nDreams, GamersFirst, and JumpCore are all reporting production cycles at a fraction of their historical time by using Mixamo to “up the anty” on character animation – giving their characters the ability to live “truthfully” in their imaginary circumstances regardless of constraint or pressure.

Cramming high-quality artistic character animation into film and game budgets can often be a compromising task…as much as art and money are always at war. But the casualties can be reduced.

Give your walk cycles a running start – with Mixamo you can set the stage for your talent as an animator to give life to a character – to be a director, not just a “poser.”

At Mixamo, our mission is to democratize 3D character art. We are already providing the first and only professional automatic rigging service in the world, the Auto-Rigger, as well as unprecedented access to high-quality 3D animations and 3D character models. Today we’re thrilled to extend our offering with high-fidelity facial 3D animation, the holy grail of emotional engagement for game developers and film makers.

Back in the days of 3ds Max version 3 and version 4, there were so many plugins that would simplify the process of being a 3d artist that, at the time, I swore 3d-palace off plugins completely for our tutorials. The reason? I didn’t want my students to be able to take short cuts all of the time – what purpose is there to being a 3d artist if you are relying on the “Make It So” button all of the time. I continue to have this opinion even though the plugins are way less prolific than they used to be with very few exceptions.

Enough words – how about a video to explain things first?

Krister Karlsson – Art Director, Creative Director & Producer at Modesty

The dream of making a video game has been in me since my dad was convinced to by me and my brothers a Commodore 64 back in the days. A few years later me and some buddies had spent 1 or 2 years on our first Amiga title – Shenandoah, as we called it. It was going pretty well. We had a full demo of the first level, and a publisher from the UK. We were featured in Amiga Format and Commodore User, which were major mags at the time. Then one day one of the programmers came out about being in love with the other programmer who then left for Seattle and never came back… Of all the strange things that can get in the way of game production.

Now almost 20 years later an opportunity arose in my company to make a mobile game with a small team of four. Early last year I got an idea for a game in which you would play a ghost. I thought it would be interesting to play the monster instead of the monster hunter. This idea arose from Pac Man actually. As an avid retro gamer I like to play old titles to draw inspiration from.

During last summer we discussed the game concept further and all through production actually. So everyone was involved in the creative process which I believe was a great benefit to the game.

Obviously the game grew in terms of complexity, as most projects do. And as the only artist on the game, as well as being the creative director and producer I was in great need of help to get my part done and to keep the pace with the rest of the team. However I was in no way going to let the quality suffer and the budget was too tight to get an additional team member.

Then one day I was browsing for models on Turbosquid, for another project I was doing at the same time, and came upon some animations from Mixamo. Curious as ever I went to check it out and could’t quite grasp what I saw. It just seemed too good to be true. Could this actually work this well right there in the browser? It was 2012, not 2022, I thought to myself. After doing some more testing I had just freed myself from a ton of late night and weekend work. Animating somewhere around 12 characters for the game would’ve taken forever for someone who’s not focusing on character animation. Because of the gameplay and camera angle in the game I didn’t even have to tweak the Auto-Rigger results. What a relief it was when I realized that this solution would work.

What I did with the characters then was to render them all in one long sequence – all the characters with their different animations. Those separate png’s were then processed by an atlas creator, which is basically a small piece of software that copies the content of the png’s into a 1024×1024 image map. All the motions of two characters would fit into one image, so we created several images to hold all characters in the game. The graphics engine then uses these atlases to draw the graphics in the game.

We’re all extremely pleased with the result and critics has shown the same enthusiasm, especially for the looks of the game. Comments like: “Hauntingly beautiful” and “It simply looks brilliant” puts a great big smile on my face off course. And Mixamo was a part of making that happen!”

Sincerly, Krister Karlsson

1st Place: $1000 cash + 1 year subscription to Digital Tutors + 1 Mixamo All Access pass
2nd Place: $500 cash + 6 months subscription to Digital Tutors + 1500 Mixamo credits
3rd Place: $250 cash + 1 month subscription to Digital Tutors + 500 Mixamo credits
Community Favorite: $100 cash + 1 month subscription to Digital Tutors + 200 Mixamo credits

Note: Even if you don’t place, don’t worry Mixamo will offer to buy spectacular models of high quality even if they are not in the top four.

Now that we know the winnings, on to the contest! This time around we have a topic that will really get your creative juices flowing. Here is the story based on real events!

Voynich Manuscript

In the early 19th century a mysterious book, the Voynich Manuscript, made its world debut. Written in an unknown language the secrets within are still debated to this day. Every generation has had its adventurers take hints from the Manuscript’s broken ciphers and cryptic images. From the high mountains of the Himalayas, to the lost jungles of the Amazon, from cities of gold, to buried underworlds, those brave enough to call themselves adventurers must be ready for the challenges the book alludes to. Help us discover the great adventures of the past century and the world’s most mysterious book.

Your Task:
Starting from the beginning of the 19th century up to modern day, create an adventurer to seek out the treasure of the Voynich Manuscript. Will it be a 19th century scholar from England, or perhaps a German code breaker from World War One? A Chinese medicine man or a hired thug for the Railroad barons of the expanding United States? Will it be a modern day billionaire, searching for thrills, or the descendant of Voynich himself? Use the greatest adventure stories you can think of as your inspiration and create your ideal hero!

Here’s how the contest works:

1. Register at www.mixamo.com/c/adventure for the contest to get access to Mixamo’s tech for      your entry and create your WIP thread on Polycount’s forums.

2. Model an adventure character using any 3D package you want. (Your model must be under 20,000 triangles, including everything except background elements or pedestals.)

3. Auto-Rig and animate it using Mixamo’s Auto-Rigger and at least one animation of your choice.

4. Submit your entry by using the submission guidelines below.

Submission Guidelines:
Please submit all images as JPG files.
Dimensions of every image you submit can be up to 1000px x 1000px and no larger than 500k for file size.
Please include the following images and use this specific naming convention:

FirstName_LastName_BeautyShot.jpg
FirstName_LastName_PresentationShot.jpg
FirstName_LastName_ConstructionShot
FirstName_LastName_ExtraShot01…02…03…etc.

When you’re ready to submit your character please create a final thread on Polycount entitled, “Final Submission – [Your Character's Name or Description]” and include all of your final rendered .jpg images. When that is complete send an email to contests@mixamo.com with the link to your Polycount thread containing your submission. Please submit your character no later then Sunday July 7th, 11:59:59 pm PST.

Beauty Shot:
Use this image to showcase your character in the best way possible. Show your character from different angles or one full image, be creative. You can include Background elements, matte paintings, post effects and anything else.

Presentation Shot
This image must contain one full front pose and one full back pose of your character. Post effects from 3d softwares or 2d programs like Photoshop are NOT allowed in this image. No Lens Flares, Fog, Smudge Tool, Paintovers etc. The only adjustments allowed are: Brightness/Contrast, Levels, Sharpness, Color Balance, Curves, and Hue/Saturation.

Construction Shot
This image should depict how your character was made. The image must contain at least one wireframe shot. You may also include shots like: high res models, multiple angles or just one big wire frame shot.

Optional Extra Images
You are free to submit up to 10 extra images of your choosing. Can be whips, construction shots, area specific highlights, texture sheets, concepts, etc.

Contest Judges: For this contest our judges will be Stefano Corazza, CEO and Co-founder of Mixamo. Jason Patnode, Maya Coordinator at Academy of Art University, Joshua Kinney, Lead Game Development Tutor at Digital-Tutors. Mark Deloura, Game Technology Consultant and Ed Fries, Former Vice President of Microsoft Game Studios.

Rules
By submitting to the Mixamo Contest you agree that you did all the hard work and didn’t buy the character online or steal the images. Submitting stolen images or a copyrighted character is in direct violation of our rules and probably some laws. Doing so will get you disqualified, and totally shamed by your peers.

WINNINGS: The prize winning submissions will be awarded their respective prizes listed. Cash prizes are delivered via Pay Pal or Mailed Check on request.
ADDITIONAL PRIZES: Sweet new prizes can and may be added to the already present present price list, so please keep watch.
CONFIDENTIALITY: Your privacy and data is sacred to you and us and will never be violated. But if you want the full confidentiality legal stuff, visit http://www.mixamo.com/home/legal

Now that you know the rules and submission guidelines it’s time to start creating, best of luck to you and we are looking forward to seeing what you create!

Mixamo/Houdini/cmiVFX Costume Design Contest Entry from Dryulya on Vimeo.

SideFX/Mixamo/Polycount Costume Design Contest entry from Denis Kozlov on Vimeo.

SideFX/Mixamo/Polycount Costume Design Contest entry from Denis Kozlov on Vimeo.

Mixamo/Houdini/cmiVFX Costume Design Contest Entry from Dryulya on Vimeo.

Mixamo would like to thank our partners Houdini, Polycount and our talented communities for taking on this challenge. The amazing art created motivates us to continue hosting more contests like these. Check back on our site and on the Polycount forums to learn about our next contest that will be starting at the end of April!

The 2013 Global Game Jam in San Francisco was no different. The event took place in a co-working space in the heart of downtown SF. Upon arriving at the jam, I knew I was amongst my own people. The folks that had gathered were all craftsman in their own right, be that in code, art or design. After the usual pleasantries of meet and greets, we broke off into smaller groups, all ranging from single lone rangers to massive tribes of ten. Personally, I had found fellowship with a motley crew of three other characters. Maybe it was written in the stars, maybe it was just luck of the draw, but over the next three days we would come together as a tight-knit team. In the end, our collaboration produced a game that received a number of accolades from our fellow jammers.

Screen capture of PING game play

At the core of any game jam lies a theme meant to serve as the seed for a game’s creative start. This year’s GGJ theme was an audio clip of a beating heart. The key with any theme is not to take it literally, but to explore the fringes of what it could represent. After an hour or two of scheming, we had settled on a collection of ideas for the start of our entry. Taking the concept that a heart beat was a continuous signal; we chose to create a space horror survival game where the player is stranded in a pitch-black maze. The only guide for further progression is a constant “ping” or signal beckoning the player to proceed forward. It was decided upon early that there should be a feeling of helplessness as players move through the experience. To make our lives easier — and for effect — we designed our game mechanics so that the player would never be able to fight his enemies back but would only be able to run. We then came up with a quick concept art sketch to get the team’s mind on a single track; this also provided further inspiration as the jam progressed.

What Went Right
From early on, what drew our team together was that we were going to use Unity 3D as the basic building block for our game jam entry. Unlike most of our fellow game jammers, the team had their heart set on creating a fully interactive 3D game with characters and environments. This is also what set our entry apart from the rest. A fully walking, running and jumping 3D character is no small achievement, but, thanks to a fellow game jammer, we discovered Mixamo‘s character animation technology. After reviewing the basic setup required by this animation service, we had a fully rigged and working character in less than four hours. Once the basic setup was completed, the team was able to choose from a huge library of motion capture data. Using the pre-made scripts provided by Mixamo made the integration of the animation as simple as dragging and dropping items within the Unity interface. It was also a godsend that one of the key developers of Mixamo was on hand to answer any of our questions and help work through any issues that might come up. This in turn left our team to focus on the task of creating an experience instead of worrying about the minutiae of technical details.

The second major contributing factor of the overall success of the game was the visual and audio ambiance that was achieved. It has been said horror is more about what is what your eyes cannot see than what it can. By creating a contrast of light and darkness, the player was left with a sense of helplessness and fear. This was the basic core of emotion that the team wanted to convey in the overall experience. In addition, the team was able to provide a music and effects soundtrack that perfectly complemented the bleak settings portrayed in the game.

What Went Wrong
Like any game jam, time is both the principal strength and weakness. Although we were able to achieve a lot of the basic gameplay that was initially conceived, a majority was left out due to a sheer lack of time. Areas that we wished we could have explored more were a more substantial use of the light in the game as well as a better AI and Enemies. Maybe someday, we as a team will get together and try to flush out a more comprehensive experience. This could be very much be a Kickstarter in the making — a boy can dream…

In the end, we were proud of what we accomplished in such a short amount of time. It was due in part to the technology we used while the sheer skill of our fellow team members made up for the rest. What made everything truly worthwhile was seeing complete strangers become so engrossed in something you had put your heart and soul into. With that, I can only say for anyone that has ever thought about attending a hackathon or game jam, go do it. Go do it now! Once you have threaded that needle, you will come out a changed person and all for the better.

To play the game make sure you have the Unity web player installed and click here.