Avatar facial expression techniques
First Claim
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1. An apparatus comprising:
- a camera to capture a user'"'"'s facial expressions and head movements;
a face tracking module to track face feature point positions and to decompose the face feature point positions into a facial expression movement and a rigid head movement;
a database module to store a plurality of feature data sequences, each of the feature data sequences corresponding to one of a plurality of facial expression movements;
the face tracking module to retrieve one of the stored feature data sequences based on the captured facial expression movement; and
a mapping module to map the retrieved feature data sequence to an avatar face and to present a similar facial expression movement and a rigid head movement on the avatar face, the facial expression movement being mapped by determining motion vectors for each face feature point position, transforming the motion vectors to avatar face motion vectors on a model avatar face, and smoothing the avatar face motion vectors, the rigid head movement being manned by applying three-axis rotation to the avatar face.
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Abstract
A method and apparatus for capturing and representing 3D wireframe, color and shading of facial expressions are provided, wherein the method includes the following steps: storing a plurality of feature data sequences, each of the feature data sequences corresponding to one of the plurality of facial expressions; and retrieving one of the feature data sequences based on user facial feature data; and mapping the retrieved feature data sequence to an avatar face. The method may advantageously provide improvements in execution speed and communications bandwidth.
222 Citations
20 Claims
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1. An apparatus comprising:
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a camera to capture a user'"'"'s facial expressions and head movements; a face tracking module to track face feature point positions and to decompose the face feature point positions into a facial expression movement and a rigid head movement; a database module to store a plurality of feature data sequences, each of the feature data sequences corresponding to one of a plurality of facial expression movements; the face tracking module to retrieve one of the stored feature data sequences based on the captured facial expression movement; and a mapping module to map the retrieved feature data sequence to an avatar face and to present a similar facial expression movement and a rigid head movement on the avatar face, the facial expression movement being mapped by determining motion vectors for each face feature point position, transforming the motion vectors to avatar face motion vectors on a model avatar face, and smoothing the avatar face motion vectors, the rigid head movement being manned by applying three-axis rotation to the avatar face. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 17, 18)
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8. A method comprising:
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capturing a user'"'"'s facial expressions and head movements; tracking face feature point positions of the facial expressions and head movements; decomposing the face feature point positions into a facial expression movement and a rigid head movement; retrieving one of a plurality of stored feature data sequences using the facial expression movement, each of the feature data sequences corresponding to one of a plurality of facial expression movements; and mapping the retrieved feature data sequence to an avatar face and presenting a similar facial expression movement and a rigid head movement on the avatar face, the facial expression movement being mapped by determining motion vectors for each face feature point position, transforming the motion vectors to avatar face motion vectors on a model avatar face, and smoothing the avatar face motion vectors, the rigid head movement being mapped by applying three-axis rotation to the avatar face. - View Dependent Claims (9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 19, 20)
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15. An article comprising a non-transitory machine-accessible medium having stored thereon instructions that, when executed by a machine, cause the machine to perform operations comprising:
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capturing a user'"'"'s facial expressions and head movements; tracking face feature point positions of the facial expressions and head movements; decomposing the face feature point positions into a facial expression movement and a rigid head movement; retrieving one of a plurality of stored feature data sequences using the facial expression movement, each of the feature data sequences corresponding to one of a plurality of facial expression movements; and mapping the retrieved feature data sequence to an avatar face and presenting a similar facial expression movement and a rigid head movement on the avatar face, the facial expression movement being mapped by determining motion vectors for each face feature point position, transforming the motion vectors to avatar face motion vectors on a model avatar face, and smoothing the avatar face motion vectors, the rigid head movement being mapped by applying three-axis rotation to the avatar face. - View Dependent Claims (16)
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Specification