Artificial Intelligence Exploring Technical Challenges

What is it motion capture? The process of recording and digitizing movements of an object or a person. In some cases animals too. Infrared optical systems must be set up to record the mo-cap suits that the actor has to wear before performing. This works by pointing 23+ cameras flooding the surrounding area, the more cameras usually means that the movement is picked up smoother.

The motion capture suit is a morph suit with reflective balls that shine infrared back, feeding the coordinates into the cameras. The cameras then send the information through to the computer which uses a program to translate the coordinates into an animation.

What is it good for?● By mimicking the movement of a person, they can accurately capture the actors body in motion, this is then translated into

an animation project. This speeds up animating, saving time to perfect and add details that may not have been added due to time loss when animating from scratch.

● Help achieve realistic movements for animal animations that otherwise look fake when animated from scratch. ● They teach actors to work in an imaginary environment and improves physicality and understanding.

Two products that used motion capture >

Is motion capture AI?Motion tracking or motion capture started as a photogrammetric analysis tool in biomechanics research in the 1970s and 1980s, before expanding further into education, sports and now computer animation become a huge asset to CGI Blockbusters and video games.

Most argue that computer engineering spending millions on the entertainment industry is useless because it isn’t as focused on it’s primary roles. A lot of people get angry over the time spent is actually wasted. Motion capture is an intelligent design that aids the coding and helps developers create algorithms that set rules for characters in the game. it isn’t essential so I wouldn’t say it’s intelligent alone, but without it, the games animation would take ten times as long to create and it would be missing natural movement that can primarily be caught using motion capture.

The principles of AI in gamesWhat relevance does it have to the games industry? AI is used in games because games are designed to entertain you as a human being. They require your involvement so they challenge you and try to impress you each year with their graphics. The AI in games have become very competitive. Each game coming out now needs to have 60fps with top graphics, otherwise it falls behind.

AI in games is the way that characteristics in a 3d space move, react and make intellectual decisions. The better a game is at hiding its rules, the more natural it is i.e the less you notice a pattern whilst playing a game, the better the game design is. An example of finding a pattern: I could find the spawning area of bad guys in an open world game, I now understand that there is a rule in the game, telling the bad guys to always spawn from those coordinates, it is no longer a mystery and the magic is lost.

A decent game would hide things, and a great game would be extra safe by going the extra mile of making one hundred different reactions a character could make once they had been shot, this makes it more realistic and pleases the gamer if he tries to catch it out.

Problem With AI in Bioshock InfiniteIn the game BioShock Infinite, there was issues with a character names Elizabeth. I’m personally not familiar since I have only played the second Bioshock game. Apparently the character didn’t move very smoothly during combat and her body didn’t seem life-like. John Abercrombie (AI developer) for Bioshock Infinite explained that Elizabeth is the players companion and needed to be a character with depth and not an animatronic.

Elizabeth was created to guide the player, the whole world would end up looking like mechanical Museum, her whole solid purpose is to be a friend to the player that this can't be achieved if she appears empty.

Abercrombie explains that the way characters brought to life in a game is not through watching them move alongside them and interact with polygon walls. The player builds A relationship with this character by testing them and watching how they react to own movements, this is how you know that they are in the action with them. Elizabeth at the time left most of the skills, she appeared rigid and unaffected by her surroundings which didn't help the Bioshock experience at all.

They can solution an emotional side. They make Elizabeth unpredictable reactions for when the player decides to make a risky move, Elizabeth would react with hesitance whenever they would make life threatening choices. This helped Elizabeth be seen more as a person than an animation, showing emotion at any appropriate Time.

"Elizabeth's behaviour had become so complex character class was called WTFLIZ in the code". To add to the name, the team also the smarts terrain System, which basically meant that she would goal-side her gaze, basically ensuring that there is an object nearby that they can react with, there for notifying the user.

Elizabeth Bioshock InfiniteHere we see screen grabs of her using some of her Artificial emotions, they differ for every moment during gameplay.