Slashdot Mirror
Perfect Digital Skin
ILMfan writes "BBC Technology is describing a new graphics algorithm for creating perfect virtual skin. This technique by graphics wizard Henrik Jensen (the guy who invented photon mapping) is already being used in movies (it was used on Gollum in Lord of the Rings, and it will be used in the soon-to-be-released van Helsing movie). And perhaps more exciting is that several game companies are planning on using it for their next generation games. So John Carmack are you listening? Any chance this can be included in DOOM3? Of course there are endless other opportunities for virtual humans with perfect skin :-)"
Just in case anyone's wondering what that magical technique is: It's called subsurface scattering and simulates the light flow within materials, not just on the surface.
How is this any different than sub-surface scattering? I know there are a few lightwave plugins out there that can do this. Something I googled
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Right, when I saw this article I was thinking: "What, something beyond subsurface scattering?" This has been out for a couple of years. That doesn't make it any less cool, but I'd like to see more Slashdot stuff on newer graphics techniques, like General Purpose GPU stuff (www.gpgpu.org) or new illumination models. It doesn't have to be front page, but I'd like for the graphics topic to be a little less "lite".
Derek
Don't Panic...
Anyone care to join a project to model all positions and transitions between them ? Arbitrarily long movies could be made quickly as a lot of the action is repetitive.
Is this something we can expect to see in OSS anytime soon, or is there some kind of patent/copyright restriction? I would be thrilled if this feature showed up in Yafray or Blender...
People can't even stand watching porn when the guy wears a rubber, let alone computer completely artificial porn.
Of course, not wearing rubbers is one of the contributing factors of the current HIV scare in the industry at the moment.
True, when watching an adult movie, many look at it as a fantasy, to view it as living vicariously through others if you will. While viewing an adult movie set in like 1777 and then someone throws on a latex rubber kinda kills the mood. True, this isn't really why people are watching these movies, but still.
Perhaps, with this digital skin, the industry can make movies in the future (perhaps 10 years for truely believable ones) that doesn't put people in jepardy to STD's, AND it doesn't exploit young girls. But I'm sure there will be some people that object to even digital actors "exploiting themselves".
"Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it." - John Lennon.
It will raise some interesting questions.
;o). (british humour)
Unfortunately a lot of people get off on porn because they know that they are watching two people really doing it.
If two people simulate it and are then replaced by digital models (by using the technology they used to make gollum) that actually penetrate each other then this would have the benefit of looking good and being much safer - but would run into the above problem. I think it would stimulate an important debate about sex though.
The thought of being able to watch Gollum being penetrated by Dobby is appealling
Not all movies are dependent solely on CG for their baddies and their special effects. Physical models can still look goddamn remarkable.
There have been cases of AIDS in people who work in porn. If effective skin was developed for CG movies, this would make it a lot safer for people working in this billion-dollar business.
I'm in the hole of the broadband donut.
Thing is, as the graphics get better, so do our abilities to discern between them and real life. When I first saw the old man from the Final Fantasy movie I couldn't have told you it was fake; however, I could say the same thing about the first Tekken PS2 showcase. Now, both are easy for me to tell from real life.
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There are several different things all being lumped under the category of "lens flare": coronas around lights, artifacts from camera lenses, and the "bloom" effect that's just recently started to appear in games. Coronas and bloom can be seen through human eyes easily, the former in a foggy area and the latter on very bright lights. Also, I don't think the camera lens effect is just "cool", it's also used to mean "really bright", since monitors and TVs have a maximum brightness anyway and the effect is most often applied to the sun.
I suspect I'd get sick to my stomach if I played an FPS that realistic. I flinch when I see the arrow go through Will Scarlet's hand in Robin Hood.
On a more technical note, I'd expect it'd be best offloaded to the GPU. Dynamically rendering a texture offscreen wouldn't be a bad thing. However, how would you describe it in the data file?
If your model skin was PNG file with extension segments to include the Cg code, it could work.
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because, at some point, somebody is going to make a 1st-person-shooter with absolutely realistic looking victims.
How long until it goes from subdermal photon scattering to absolutely realistic effects (of gibs flying off a body in the process of becoming a corpse.)
We'll be able to make shots from a bullet's point of view as it pierces and rends.
Will this enure us to the real thing?
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