Module 5
Computer Animation
•Design of Animation Sequences
•Raster Animations
•Computer Animation Languages
•Key-frame systems
-Morphing
•Motion Specification
Computer Animation
•Any time sequence of visual changes in a scene.
•Change object positions with translations or rotations.
•Display time variations in object size, color, transparency or
surface texture.
•Transition of one object shape into another.
•Generated by changing camera parameters, such as
position, orientation and focal length.
•Change lighting effects or other parameters and
procedures associated with illumination and rendering.
Design of Animation Sequences
•Storyboard Layout
The storyboard is an outline of the action. It defines the motion
sequence as a set of basic events that are to take place.
Depending on the type of animation to be produced, the
storyboard could consist of a set of rough sketches or it could be a
list of the basic ideas for the motion.
•Object Definition
An object definition is given for each participant in the action.
Objects can be defined in terms of basic shapes, such as polygons.
In addition, the associated movements for each object are
specified along with the shape.
Design of Animation Sequences
•Key-frame Specifications
A key-frame is a detailed drawing of the scene at a certain
time in the animation sequence. Within each key frame, each
object is positioned according to the time for that frame.
•Generation of in-between frames
In-between are the intermediate frames between the key frames. The
number of in- betweens needed is determined by the media to be used
to display the animation. Film requires 24 frames per second, and
graphics terminals are refreshed at the rate of 30 to 60
frames per second.
Raster Animations
It can produce animation sequence on raster scan system
from one frame at a time so that each completed frame
could be saved in while for later viewing. The animation
can then be viewed by cycling thorugh the completed
frame sequence or the frames can be transaferred to
film.
Raster Animations
Double Buffering
One method for producing a real time animation with a
raster system is to employ two refresh buffers.
Initially, we create a frame for the animation in
one buffer. Then, while the screen is being refreshed
from the buffer, we construct the next frame in the
other buffer. When that frame is complete, we switch
the roles of the two buffers so that the refresh routines
use the second buffer during the process of creating
the next frame in the first buffer. This continues
throughout the animation
Raster Animations
Color table transformations
•we predefine the object at successive positions along the motion
path, and set the successive blocks of pixel values to color-table
entries
•We set the pixels at the first position of the object to "on" values,
and we set the pixels at the other object positions to the
background color
•The animation is then accomplished by changing the color-table
values so that the object is "on" at successively positions along the
animation path as the preceding position is set to the background
intensity
Computer Animation Languages
•C, Lisp, Pascal, Fortran -Animation Routines
•Animation Function
•Graphic editor
•Design and modify object shapes
•Key-frame generator
•In-between generator
•Standard graphic routines
Computer Animation Languages
Scene description
•Positioning of objects and light sources
•Defining the light source intensities and surface illumination
properties
•Setting the camera position, orientation and lens
characteristics
Action specification
•Layout of motion paths for the objects and camera
Computer Animation Languages
•Viewing and perspective transformation.
•Geometric transformations to generate object movements.
•Visible surface identification.
•Surface rendering operations.
Computer Animation Languages
Key-frame systems
Generate in-betweens from the user specified key frames.
Parameterized systems
Allow object motions to be specified as part of the object
definition.
Parameters
•Degrees of freedom
•Motion limitations
•Allowable shape changes
Computer Animation Languages
Scripting systems
•Allow object specifications and animation sequences to be
defined with a user input script
•A library of various objects and motions can be constructed
Computer Animation Languages
•In-betweens are generated from key frames
•Motion paths are given by set of spline curves
•Complex scenes - we can separate the frames into individual
components or objects called cells.
Transformation of object shapes from one form to another
Given two key frames - adjust the number of vertices(no. of
edges) in one frame so that it is same for the two frames.
Key-frame systems
Morphing
•Preprocessing rules for equalizing key frames-edge count
Lmax= max(Lk , Lk+1)
Lmin= min(Lk , Lk+1)
Ne= Lmaxmod Lmin
Ns= int(Lmax/ Lmin)
•Dividing Ne edges of key framemin into Ns+1 sections
•Dividing the remaining lines of key framemin into Ns sections
Morphing
Preprocessing rules for equalizing keyframes-vertex count
Vmax= max(Vk,Vk+1)
Vmin= min(Vk,Vk+1)
Nls= (Vmax-1) mod (Vmin-1)
Np= int((Vmax-1) / (Vmin-1))
Morphing
•Adding Np points to Nls line sections of key frame min
•Adding Np -1 points to the remaining edges of key frame min
Eg. Triangle-to-quadrilateral
Vk= 3 and Vk+1= 4
Nls= 1, Np= 1
•Add 1 point to one edge of key framek
•No points would be added to the remaining lines of key
framek+1
Motion Specification
Direct motion specification : -
The most straightforward method for defining a motion sequence
is direct specification of the motion paremeters. Here, We
explicitly give the rotation angles and translation vectors. Then the
geometric transformation matrices are applied to transform co-
ordinate positions. Alternatively, We could use an approximating
equation to specify certain kinds of motions. These methods can
be used for simple user programmed animation sequencs.
Motion Specification
Goal-directed systems : -
At the opposite extreme, We can specify the motions that are to
take place in general terms that abstractly describe the actions.
these systems are referred to as goal directed because they
determine specific motion parameters given the goals of the
animation. For example, We could specify that we want an object
to "walk " or to "run" to a particular destination. Or We could
state that we want an object to "pick up " some other specified
object. The inpute directive are then interpreted in term of
component motions that will accomplish the selected task.
Human motion, for instance, can be defined as a heirarchical
structure of sub motion for the toros , limbs , and so forth.
Motion Specification
Kinematics and dynemics : -
We can also construct animation sequences using kinematic
or dynemic descriptions. With a kinematic description, we
specify the animation by giving motion parameters position,
velocity, and acceleration) without reference to the forces
that cause the motion. for constant velocity (zero
acceleration), we designate the motions of rigid bodies in a
scene by giving an initial position and velocity vector for each
objects.
Motion Specification
An alternate apporach is to use inverse kinematics. Here, we
specify the initial and final positions of objects at specified times
and the motion parameters are computed by the system . For
example, assuming zero acceleration , we can determine the
constant velocity that will accomplish the movement of an object
from the initial position to the final position.
Dynamic descriptions on the other hand, require the specification
of the forces that produce the velocities and acceleration.
Descriptions of object behavior under the are generally referred to
as a physically based modeling.
Motion Specification
Object motion are obtained from the forces equations describing
physical laws, such as newton's law of motion for gravitational ang
friction processes, euler or navier-stokes equations describing fluid
flow, and maxwell 's equations for electromagnetic forces. For Eg:- the
general form os newton's second law for a particle of mass m is
F = d(mv)/dt
with F as the force vector, and v as the velocity vector. If mass is
constant, we solve the equation F=ma, where a is the acceleration
vector. otherwise, mass is a function of time, as in relativistic motions
of space vehicles that consume measurable amounts of fuel per unit
time.