MoCap for Artists

9 Hand Motion Capture

Hand capture is very difficult and at the same time very valuable. Emotions can be conveyed with subtle movements of hands and fingers. When dealing with motion capture, however, fingers give you very small areas to place markers on, which create some interesting issues and challenges.

9.1   Anatomy of a Hand

As with any study of motion capture, anatomy is the best place to start. You need to understand how the hand is structured, how it moves, which type of hand motion you want to capture, and what kind of motion you are willing to sacrifice for efficiency.

Let’s start with the forearm, which is the arm between the elbow and the wrist. It supplies the “twisting” of the hand. This rotation around the longitudinal axis of ...