Stop Staring: Facial Modeling and Animation Done Right

Stop Staring: Facial Modeling and Animation Done Right

Released May 2007
Publisher(s): Sybex
ISBN: 9780471789208

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Book description

Breathe life into your creations

With detailed examples, high-quality professional images, and a touch of humor, this is the fully revised and updated second edition of Jason Osipa's best-selling book on facial animation. You'll learn the basics of design, modeling, rigging, and animation-while mastering exciting new techniques for stretch-and-squash deformation, advanced blend extraction, and the latest software tools. Walk through the author's detailed analysis of sample animations and discover how to add nuance and sophistication to your designs.

Full of insights drawn from years of professional experience, this book provides the focused and practical information you need to create believable facial animations.

  • Learn visimes and lip sync techniques

  • Construct a mouth and mouth keys

  • Explore the process of facial landmarking

  • Master the cartoon techniques of squash and stretch

  • Harness the latest advanced blend extraction tools

  • Create interfaces for your faces

  • Understand skeletal setup, weighting, and rigging

Control faces with the book's powerful rig and learn how skin moves to make various shapes and expressions

Master powerful stretch-and-squash (and squoosh!) techniques

Featured on the CD

Fine-tune your facial animations with the techniques demonstrated on the companion CD. Content includes tutorial files, lip sync samples, models, textures, and more.

Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.

Examples link provided by the publisher.Errata link provided by the publisher.

Table of contents

  1. Copyright
  2. Dear Reader
  3. Acknowledgments
  4. About the Author
  5. Introduction
    1. Why This Book
    2. Who Should Read This Book
      1. Maya and Other 3D Apps
    3. How Stop Staring Is Organized
      1. The Companion CD
        1. Installing the Shelf and Tools Is Easy!
      2. What's on the CD
        1. Chapter Files
        2. Resources
        3. Extras
  6. I. Getting to Know the Face
    1. 1. Learning the Basics of Lip Sync
      1. 1.1. The Essentials of Lip Sync
        1. 1.1.1. Analyzing the Right Things
      2. 1.2. Speech Cycles
      3. 1.3. Starting with What's Most Important: Visimes
        1. 1.3.1. Why Phonemes Aren't Best for CGI
          1. 1.3.1.1. Open Mouth Sounds
        2. 1.3.2. Visimes Aren't Tied to Individual Sounds
        3. 1.3.3. Representative Shapes
        4. 1.3.4. Relative Shapes
          1. 1.3.4.1. "Who are you and what are you doing?": Wide/Narrow
          2. 1.3.4.2. "Who are you and what are you doing?": Open/Closed
      4. 1.4. The Simplest Lip Sync
        1. 1.4.1. Creating a Sync Tool 1: Shapes
        2. 1.4.2. Creating a Sync Tool 2: Setup
        3. 1.4.3. Using the Sync Tool
    2. 2. What the Eyes and Brows Tell Us
      1. 2.1. The Two Major Brow Movements
        1. 2.1.1. Brows Up and Down
        2. 2.1.2. Brows Squeeze
        3. 2.1.3. The Brow Squeeze Is Every Expression
      2. 2.2. The Upper Lids' Effect on Expression
        1. 2.2.1. The Upper Lids Show Us Alertness
          1. 2.2.1.1. The Upper Lids Usually Stay Relative to the Pupil and Iris
      3. 2.3. The Lower Lids' Effect on Expression
        1. 2.3.1. The Value of a Good Squint
          1. 2.3.1.1. Squint Is Not Emotion Specific
          2. 2.3.1.2. Squeeze Across Different Styles
      4. 2.4. Eyelines: Perception vs. Reality
        1. 2.4.1. Headline vs. Eyelines
          1. 2.4.1.1. Implied Eyelines
      5. 2.5. Distraction Is the Enemy of Performance
    3. 3. Facial Landmarking
      1. 3.1. Introduction to Landmarking
        1. 3.1.1. Landmarking by Example
          1. 3.1.1.1. Fixing a Shape by Fixing Its Surroundings
        2. 3.1.2. The Landmarking Process
        3. 3.1.3. Landmarks Are Obvious When They're Alone
      2. 3.2. Landmarking Mouth Creases
        1. 3.2.1. Landmarking to Plan a Point Layout
          1. 3.2.1.1. The Main Crease of the Mouth Area
          2. 3.2.1.2. The Same Crease Does Different Things
        2. 3.2.2. Where Is the Crease Most Intense?
          1. 3.2.2.1. Even the Big Boys Sometimes Get It Wrong
        3. 3.2.3. Creasing Applied to Each Shape
      3. 3.3. Landmarking Brow Creases
        1. 3.3.1. Brows Up/Raise
          1. 3.3.1.1. The Shape of Brow Creases
        2. 3.3.2. Brows Down/Squeeze
      4. 3.4. Landmarking the Tilt of the Head
        1. 3.4.1. Every Expression Has a Tilt
        2. 3.4.2. The Significance of Tilts
          1. 3.4.2.1. The Benefits of More Animation on the Head
          2. 3.4.2.2. Musical Head Tilts
  7. II. Animating and Modeling the Mouth
    1. 4. Visimes and Lip Sync Technique
      1. 4.1. Sync: Wide/Narrow Grows Up
        1. 4.1.1. Visimes vs. Sounds
          1. 4.1.1.1. The Visimes
          2. 4.1.1.2. The Non-Visime Sounds
        2. 4.1.2. Breaking Sounds Down
          1. 4.1.2.1. Spelling, Respelling, and S-P-EH-L-IH-NG
          2. 4.1.2.2. Funneling
      2. 4.2. The Best Order of Sync Operations
        1. 4.2.1. Learn-While-Doing Sync: "Hey, buddy, I don't like your face"
        2. 4.2.2. Finessing Sync
          1. 4.2.2.1. Weighting the Rules
          2. 4.2.2.2. Relatives between Absolutes
          3. 4.2.2.3. Opposites
          4. 4.2.2.4. Stepping
        3. 4.2.3. Sync Subtleties
          1. 4.2.3.1. Cap the Ends
          2. 4.2.3.2. Earlier Is Better
          3. 4.2.3.3. Percussive Sounds
          4. 4.2.3.4. Oh Yeah, Almost Forgot the Tongue!
      3. 4.3. Sync Example 1: "What am I sayin' in here?"
        1. 4.3.1. Identifying Visimes
        2. 4.3.2. Identifying Open/Closed
        3. 4.3.3. Finessing
          1. 4.3.3.1. Inserting Opposites or Stepping
          2. 4.3.3.2. The Tongue
          3. 4.3.3.3. What Bothers Me
      4. 4.4. Sync Example 2: "Was it boys?"
        1. 4.4.1. Identifying Visimes
        2. 4.4.2. Identifying Open/Closed
        3. 4.4.3. Finessing
          1. 4.4.3.1. Inserting Opposites or Stepping
          2. 4.4.3.2. The Tongue
          3. 4.4.3.3. What Bothers Me
    2. 5. Constructing a Mouth and Nose
      1. 5.1. The Best Edge Flow
        1. 5.1.1. Modeling in Circles
        2. 5.1.2. Modeling for Movement
      2. 5.2. The Big Picture
      3. 5.3. Building the Lips
      4. 5.4. Building the Surrounding Mouth Area
      5. 5.5. Building the Nose
      6. 5.6. Connecting the Nose and Mouth
        1. 5.6.1. Mouth Conclusion
      7. 5.7. Building Teeth
        1. 5.7.1. A Real-Life Lesson in Gums
          1. 5.7.1.1. Placement
        2. 5.7.2. The Types of Teeth
        3. 5.7.3. Creating Teeth
          1. 5.7.3.1. Shaping the Interior Tooth Surface
          2. 5.7.3.2. The Underside of the Teeth
          3. 5.7.3.3. Sculpting the Gums
        4. 5.7.4. Making the Lower Teeth from the Upper Teeth
      8. 5.8. Building the Tongue
        1. 5.8.1. Shaping a Basic Tongue
        2. 5.8.2. A More Refined Tongue
      9. 5.9. The Mouth Wall
    3. 6. Mouth Keys
      1. 6.1. Order of Operations
      2. 6.2. Preparing to Build a Key Set
        1. 6.2.1. Key Set Construction
      3. 6.3. Default Shapes, Additive Shapes, and ss2_blend_taper.mel
        1. 6.3.1. Additive Shapes Explained
          1. 6.3.1.1. There Are No Shapes, Only Differences
        2. 6.3.2. ss2_blend_taper.mel: Subtraction of Shapes
          1. 6.3.2.1. Subtraction
          2. 6.3.2.2. Ss2_blend_taper and ss2_blend_inverse
          3. 6.3.2.3. Forks (Tapering the Tapers)
          4. 6.3.2.4. Scrunch = Lots
        3. 6.3.3. The Default Shape Is Bored. Period.
        4. 6.3.4. Deciding What to Include
        5. 6.3.5. What to Build?
        6. 6.3.6. Binding Sufficiently for Building
      4. 6.4. Building the Shapes
        1. 6.4.1. Open
        2. 6.4.2. Smile / Wide
          1. 6.4.2.1. Basic Ingredients
          2. 6.4.2.2. Advanced Ingredients
          3. 6.4.2.3. Style
        3. 6.4.3. Narrow / OO
          1. 6.4.3.1. Basic Ingredients
          2. 6.4.3.2. Advanced Ingredients
          3. 6.4.3.3. Cartoon Style
        4. 6.4.4. Upper Lip Up
          1. 6.4.4.1. Basic Ingredients
          2. 6.4.4.2. Advanced Ingredient: Path
          3. 6.4.4.3. Cartoon Style
        5. 6.4.5. Upper Lip Down
          1. 6.4.5.1. Basic Ingredients
          2. 6.4.5.2. Advanced Ingredients
          3. 6.4.5.3. Cartoon Style
        6. 6.4.6. Lower Lip Down
          1. 6.4.6.1. Basic Ingredients
          2. 6.4.6.2. Advanced Ingredients and Style
        7. 6.4.7. Lower Lip Up
        8. 6.4.8. Frown
          1. 6.4.8.1. Basic Ingredients
          2. 6.4.8.2. Advanced Ingredients
          3. 6.4.8.3. Cartoon Style
        9. 6.4.9. Sneer
          1. 6.4.9.1. Basic Ingredients
          2. 6.4.9.2. Advanced Ingredient: Path
          3. 6.4.9.3. Cartoon Style
        10. 6.4.10. Joint-Built or Soft-Mod Shapes
          1. 6.4.10.1. Mouth Move Left/Right
          2. 6.4.10.2. Jaw Left/Right Forward/Back
        11. 6.4.11. The Tongue
  8. III. Animating and Modeling the Eyes and Brows
    1. 7. Building Emotion: The Basics of the Eyes
      1. 7.1. Building an Upper Face for Practice
        1. 7.1.1. Modeling the Pieces
          1. 7.1.1.1. The Face
          2. 7.1.1.2. The Brows
          3. 7.1.1.3. The Upper Lids
          4. 7.1.1.4. The Lower Lids
          5. 7.1.1.5. The Eyeballs
        2. 7.1.2. Parenting Our Face Together
        3. 7.1.3. Rigging Our Face
          1. 7.1.3.1. Creating Our Control
          2. 7.1.3.2. Rigging the Face Control
          3. 7.1.3.3. Rigging the Eye Control
          4. 7.1.3.4. Rigging the Upper Lids
          5. 7.1.3.5. Rigging the Lower Lids
          6. 7.1.3.6. Rigging the Brows
          7. 7.1.3.7. Re-Rigging the Mouth
      2. 7.2. Using "Box Head"
      3. 7.3. Rules of the Game
        1. 7.3.1. Eye Rules: Focus and Distraction
          1. 7.3.1.1. Focus and Motion
          2. 7.3.1.2. Timing
          3. 7.3.1.3. Involuntary Distraction Is the Enemy of Performance
        2. 7.3.2. Brow Rules
          1. 7.3.2.1. Limit Your Range
          2. 7.3.2.2. Darting Motion
          3. 7.3.2.3. Sometimes the Best Shape Is No Shape
        3. 7.3.3. Order of Operations
          1. 7.3.3.1. Sync
          2. 7.3.3.2. Head Tilt
          3. 7.3.3.3. Eyes
          4. 7.3.3.4. Eyelids
          5. 7.3.3.5. Brows
          6. 7.3.3.6. Finesse
      4. 7.4. Example Animations
        1. 7.4.1. "What Am I Sayin' in Here?"
          1. 7.4.1.1. Head Tilt
          2. 7.4.1.2. Eyes
          3. 7.4.1.3. Eyelids
          4. 7.4.1.4. Brows
          5. 7.4.1.5. Finesse
        2. 7.4.2. Beautiful Perfect
          1. 7.4.2.1. Head Tilt
          2. 7.4.2.2. Eyes
          3. 7.4.2.3. Eyelids
          4. 7.4.2.4. Brows
          5. 7.4.2.5. Finesse
        3. 7.4.3. Default Grey
          1. 7.4.3.1. Head Tilt
          2. 7.4.3.2. Eyes
          3. 7.4.3.3. Eyelids
          4. 7.4.3.4. Brows
          5. 7.4.3.5. Finesse
      5. 7.5. Continuing and Practicing
    2. 8. Constructing Eyes and Brows
      1. 8.1. Building Eyeballs
        1. 8.1.1. Two Ways to Model the Pupil
          1. 8.1.1.1. Sculpt the Pupil from the Eyeball
          2. 8.1.1.2. Cut a Hole
        2. 8.1.2. Building the Cornea
      2. 8.2. Building the Eye Sockets
        1. 8.2.1. Creating the Tear Duct
      3. 8.3. Building the Forehead
        1. 8.3.1. Brow Hair
          1. 8.3.1.1. For Fur or PaintFX Eyebrows
          2. 8.3.1.2. Separate Brows: Technical Extras
      4. 8.4. Detailing the Inside of the Lid
    3. 9. Eye and Brow Keys
      1. 9.1. Brow Shapes and Texture Maps
        1. 9.1.1. UV Mapping Information
          1. 9.1.1.1. Cylindrical Mapping
        2. 9.1.2. Multiple Bump Maps
          1. 9.1.2.1. Connecting a Color Map to Start From
          2. 9.1.2.2. Connecting a Bump Map
          3. 9.1.2.3. Connecting a Second Bump Map
          4. 9.1.2.4. Bump Depth and Alpha Gain
      2. 9.2. Building Realistic Brow Shapes
        1. 9.2.1. BrowsOutUp
        2. 9.2.2. browsOutDn
        3. 9.2.3. browsMidUp
        4. 9.2.4. browsMidDn
        5. 9.2.5. browsSqueeze
        6. 9.2.6. squint
      3. 9.3. Building Stylized Brow Shapes
        1. 9.3.1. browsOutUp
        2. 9.3.2. browsOutDn
        3. 9.3.3. browsMidUp (Sad)
        4. 9.3.4. browsMidDn (Mad)
        5. 9.3.5. browsSqueeze
        6. 9.3.6. Squint (Happy Eyes)
      4. 9.4. Tying Up Loose Ends
        1. 9.4.1. Asymmetry (Tapering)
        2. 9.4.2. Pupil Dilation Keys
        3. 9.4.3. The Stop Staring Expressions
  9. IV. Bringing It Together
    1. 10. Connecting the Features
      1. 10.1. Building the Ear
        1. 10.1.1. Bottom of the Ear
        2. 10.1.2. Preparing the Ear to Join with the Head
      2. 10.2. Assembling the Head Pieces
        1. 10.2.1. Mirroring: Working on Half of the Head
        2. 10.2.2. Silhouetting the Chin
    2. 11. Skeletal Setup, Weighting, and Rigging
      1. 11.1. Weighting the Head
        1. 11.1.1. Placing the Joints
          1. 11.1.1.1. Placing the Head and Neck Joints
          2. 11.1.1.2. Placing the Eye Joints
            1. 11.1.1.2.1. MAKING THE RIGHT-SIDE EYE JOINTS
          3. 11.1.1.3. Placing the Jaw
            1. 11.1.1.3.1. CONNECTING THE EYEBALL GEOMETRY TO THE SKELETON
        2. 11.1.2. Binding the Head
          1. 11.1.2.1. Weighting Order
          2. 11.1.2.2. Checking Poses
          3. 11.1.2.3. Weighting the Eyelids
          4. 11.1.2.4. Mirroring the Weights
      2. 11.2. The SS2 Eye Rig
        1. 11.2.1. Outputs
        2. 11.2.2. Multipliers and Variables
          1. 11.2.2.1. Spread
          2. 11.2.2.2. Cornea Push Radius
          3. 11.2.2.3. Cornea Push Weight
          4. 11.2.2.4. Upper Lid Limit
          5. 11.2.2.5. Lower Lid Limit
          6. 11.2.2.6. Upper Lid Up/Down % Follow
          7. 11.2.2.7. Upper Lid Left/Right % Follow
          8. 11.2.2.8. Lower Lid Up/Down % Follow
          9. 11.2.2.9. Lower Lid Left/Right % Follow
          10. 11.2.2.10. Blink Line
        3. 11.2.3. Setting Up Your Skeleton
        4. 11.2.4. Notes on the Ss2 Eye Rig : For TDs
          1. 11.2.4.1. Attribute Labeling on the Network Node
          2. 11.2.4.2. Offsets and the Diverge Setup
          3. 11.2.4.3. Up/Down/Left/Right
          4. 11.2.4.4. Integrating the Aims
      3. 11.3. Zipper Lips
        1. 11.3.1. SS2_Zip
    3. 12. Interfaces for Your Faces
      1. 12.1. Using Expressions to Animate
        1. 12.1.1. What Is an Expression?
          1. 12.1.1.1. What Else Can Expressions Do?
        2. 12.1.2. Corralling Our Values: clamp
          1. 12.1.2.1. You Can Do Math Anywhere in an Expression
        3. 12.1.3. Building an Example Expression and Control
          1. 12.1.3.1. Creating a Simple Expression to Start
          2. 12.1.3.2. Adding More to the Slider
          3. 12.1.3.3. Expressions Wrap-Up
      2. 12.2. Interface Concepts
        1. 12.2.1. Multidirectional Controls
        2. 12.2.2. Shape Collisions
        3. 12.2.3. Limits
        4. 12.2.4. Fix Shapes
        5. 12.2.5. XYZ Shapes and Half Shapes
        6. 12.2.6. Control Schemes: Shapes
      3. 12.3. Prep Work for Your Own Setup
        1. 12.3.1. Naming Conventions
        2. 12.3.2. Work Flow for Fixes, Halves, and XYZs
          1. 12.3.2.1. Fix Shapes
          2. 12.3.2.2. Half Shapes
          3. 12.3.2.3. XYZ Shapes
        3. 12.3.3. Prepping Your Blends
          1. 12.3.3.1. Prepping Fixes
          2. 12.3.3.2. Prepping Halves
          3. 12.3.3.3. Prepping XYZs
          4. 12.3.3.4. Generating a Control Network
            1. 12.3.3.4.1. LIMITED
            2. 12.3.3.4.2. UNLIMITED
            3. 12.3.3.4.3. DIRECT
            4. 12.3.3.4.4. BUFFER
        4. 12.3.4. Controlling Your Blends
        5. 12.3.5. Making Controls
          1. 12.3.5.1. Control Types
            1. 12.3.5.1.1. TYPE A
            2. 12.3.5.1.2. TYPE B
            3. 12.3.5.1.3. TYPE C
            4. 12.3.5.1.4. Type D
            5. 12.3.5.1.5. Type E
            6. 12.3.5.1.6. Type F
        6. 12.3.6. Connecting Sliders
          1. 12.3.6.1. Connecting to Shapes That Are Already Connected
          2. 12.3.6.2. Limiting Shapes
      4. 12.4. Sharing Control Schemes
      5. 12.5. The "Just Do This" Part
        1. 12.5.1. Shapes
          1. 12.5.1.1. Simple Face Shapes
          2. 12.5.1.2. Complex Face Shapes
          3. 12.5.1.3. Simple Teeth Shapes
          4. 12.5.1.4. Complex Teeth Shapes
        2. 12.5.2. Control Schemes: Eyes and Lids
    4. 13. Squash and Stretch and Squoosh
      1. 13.1. Local Rigs
        1. 13.1.1. Joints
          1. 13.1.1.1. Eye and Eyelid Joints
        2. 13.1.2. Separate the Big Blends
      2. 13.2. Global Rigs
        1. 13.2.1. Separating out the "Special" Objects
          1. 13.2.1.1. Lattices
          2. 13.2.1.2. Wraps
        2. 13.2.2. Plugging B, C, D... into A
          1. 13.2.2.1. The Elastigirl Parachute
      3. 13.3. The "Real" Character Has No Rig!
        1. 13.3.1. Anytime You Rig Something, It's Just a Plug
      4. 13.4. Not Using Wraps Changes a Few Things
        1. 13.4.1. Point-Level Rigging
        2. 13.4.2. No Parenting to Joints
      5. 13.5. Tutorial: Rigging Squoosh
        1. 13.5.1.
          1. 13.5.1.1. Taper Big Shapes
          2. 13.5.1.2. Make a Skeleton
          3. 13.5.1.3. Identify "Specials"
          4. 13.5.1.4. Create Lattices
          5. 13.5.1.5. Make Wraps
          6. 13.5.1.6. Hierarchies
          7. 13.5.1.7. Making the Teeth Behave
          8. 13.5.1.8. Adding More Rigs: The Real Fun
      6. 13.6. Gotchas
        1. 13.6.1.
          1. 13.6.1.1. Pivot Location
          2. 13.6.1.2. Tooth Line and Tooth Scale
          3. 13.6.1.3. Limiting
          4. 13.6.1.4. Deformation Order
    5. 14. A Shot in Production
      1. 14.1. Scene 1: Bartender
        1. 14.1.1. Sync Special Cases
        2. 14.1.2. Head Tilts
        3. 14.1.3. Eyes
        4. 14.1.4. Lids
        5. 14.1.5. Brows
        6. 14.1.6. Mouth Emotion
        7. 14.1.7. Other Tilts and Finesse
      2. 14.2. Scene 2: Lack of Dialogue
        1. 14.2.1. Sync Special Cases
          1. 14.2.1.1. "That's the way it is sometimes..."
          2. 14.2.1.2. The Cough
          3. 14.2.1.3. Neighborhood
          4. 14.2.1.4. Character Two
        2. 14.2.2. Head Tilts
        3. 14.2.3. Eyes
          1. 14.2.3.1. Character Two
        4. 14.2.4. Lids
        5. 14.2.5. Brows
        6. 14.2.6. Mouth Emotion
        7. 14.2.7. Other Tilts and Finesse
      3. 14.3. Scene 3: Dunce Cap
        1. 14.3.1. What Order to Do Things?
        2. 14.3.2. Your Process with This Scene
      4. 14.4. Scene 4: Salty Old Sea Captain
        1. 14.4.1. Sync Special Cases
        2. 14.4.2. Head Tilts
        3. 14.4.3. Eyes
        4. 14.4.4. Lids
        5. 14.4.5. Brows
        6. 14.4.6. Mouth Emotion
        7. 14.4.7. Other Tilts and Finesse
      5. 14.5. Scene 5: Pink or Blue?
        1. 14.5.1. Sync Special Cases
          1. 14.5.1.1. Toon Sync Differences
          2. 14.5.1.2. Hitting the "Clicks"
          3. 14.5.1.3. Use Smiles and Frowns in Your Sync When You've Got the Time
          4. 14.5.1.4. Exaggerated Closeds
        2. 14.5.2. Tilts
        3. 14.5.3. Eyes
        4. 14.5.4. Lids
        5. 14.5.5. Brows
        6. 14.5.6. Mouth Emotion
        7. 14.5.7. Other Tilts
      6. 14.6. That's All, Folks!
    6. Stop Staring in Color

Product information

  • Title: Stop Staring: Facial Modeling and Animation Done Right
  • Author(s):
  • Release date: May 2007
  • Publisher(s): Sybex
  • ISBN: 9780471789208