Motion capture has become very popular in the video game and film industries to help artists realistically animate 3d models of humans. This project explores the possibility of using fabrics who's conductivity changes based on how much the fabric is stretched in place of a video capture system or mechanical system to achieve motion capture at a lower cost.
To be able to optimally capture the movement of an actor using stretch fabrics, a morph suit would be used as the base in which the stretch fabrics are sewed on to. The skin-tight morph suit would allow the fabrics to stretch at the slightest movement, making for a more accurate measurement of movement.
Stretch fabrics would be located at major joints such as the elbow, shoulder, hips, knees, and along the back. Because these fabrics change conductivity only based on how stretched they are, there can only be two strip of each fabric for each axis of movement a joint can make. Joints such as the knee or elbow can only bend in 1 axis and thus would need 2 fabric strips to accurately measure the movement. Shoulders and hips on the other hand have more degrees of freedom and thus may need 4 or more fabric strips.
The stretch fabrics would be connected via conductive thread to a battery and a micro controller. The voltage that the micro controller is reading from the fabrics would determine how stretched the fabric is and through a lot of experimentation, an accurate motion capture system would hopefully emerge.
It was interesting to learn about how there exists certain fabrics that can change conductivity based on how stretched they are and how with conductive thread, an entire circuit could literally be sewed on to a morph suit to create a relatively inexpensive motion capture system. An interesting iteration of this proposal would to make a consumer version of this motion capture system that is more comfortable and easier to put on than a morph suit. This would allow consumers to track their movements, whether its at the gym or when they are playing virtual reality games in a comfortable and cheap manner.
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