Mocap

Mocap - Mocap (or motion capture) refers to the recording of human / object movements for applications such as animation, movies and games. The recorded movement data is then used to animate human and object models in 3D animation. Tea Vui Huang's Mocap Phone is a mobile application that enables a suitable mobile phone to be a limited 2-axis / 3-axis motion capture device.

New generation of mobile phones appearing in the shops are starting to feature motion sensors as standard features of the phone. These Wii-mote-like motion sensors are generally utilising a MEMS (Micro-electro mechanical systems) Accelerometer. It is this built-in Accelerometer (e.g. Analog Devices ADXL340KCPZ) that Mocap Phone uses to detect movements of the phone. A red LED strobe-ring decal is totally optional.

The Accelerometer's pitch, roll & direction is used for 3-axis motion capture. However, some phones do not have sensors for direction and hence only 2-axis motion capture of pitch & roll is available. These information are subsequently converted into (rx, ry, rz) animation data and / or (tx, ty, tz) position data in the phone. They are then exported to the phone's removable storage (microSD card) in widely-used industry-standard mocap formats such as Vicon C3D, Autodesk FBX and Acclaim AMC & ASF, as well as a direct Maya MEL format.

If a built-in Accelerometer is available for motion capture, you can point, roll & pitch the phone to generate motion data. However, if an Accelerometer is NOT available for motion capture on the phone, you can still use keys 1/3, 4/6, 7/9 to simulate azimuth, roll & pitch.