Human 3D Animation in a Virtual Environment for Gait Rehabilitation

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Human 3D Animation in a Virtual Environment for
Gait Rehabilitation

• CS698 Masters Project
• Semester Spring 2007
• Advisor Dr. Jessica Crouch
• Student Rodencio Catahan (Dennis)

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Outline

• Problem and Requirements
• Gait rehabilitation
• VR Gait Rehab project
• Masters project contribution
• 3D Model Animation Software Development
• Open Scene Graph development environment
• Cal3d and ReplicantBody integration
• Creation and use of new animator classes
• 3D Model Data
• Acquisition of 3D model data
• Model format modification via 3ds Max
• Export Process
• Demonstration

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Masters Project Motivation and Requirements
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Gait Rehabilitation

• Definition
• Physical therapy that improves a patients
  walking ability
• Patients
• Surviving stroke victims
• Amputees and leg injury patients, especially
  military personnel
• Need for Virtual Environment
• Traditionally, rehab is repetitive and labor
  intensive.
• Theres a need for a virtual environment that can
  provide automated assistance to the medical
  staff, fine tune the practice sessions, and
  improve the study of gait rehabilitation.

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Virtual Reality in Gait Rehabilitation Project

• Multi-disciplinary team effort with several ODU
  faculty and PhD/graduate students participating.
• Dr. Crouch is a Co-PI in charge of the virtual
  reality environment.

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Masters Project Contribution

• Fulfill the 3D human animation requirements
• Data
• Create, modify, and configure 3D avatars (human
  models) that will be displayed and animated in
  the VR (virtual reality) environment.
• Processing
• Design, implement, and integrate software
  applications to render the avatars in the VR
  environment.

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3D Animation Software Development
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Open Scene Graph

• Provides the development and display environment
  for the virtual reality simulation.
• Is an open source high-performance 3D graphics
  toolkit written in C and built on top of
  OpenGL.
• Reference http//www.openscenegraph.com/index.php
  

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3D Animation Software

• Problem
• How to implement human animation within the OSG
  simulation?
• Solution
• Download, Build, (Re)Use and Integrate
  ReplicantBody.
• Download, Build, (Re)Use and Integrate Cal3D.
• Cal3D provides the foundation for ReplicantBody.

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ReplicantBody

• Provides the animation tools used to animate the
  3D Models in the OSG simulation.
• Is a character animation toolkit
• Written in C
• Built upon Cal3D, ConfigScript, and OSG
• Distributed under GNU LGPL (Lesser General Public
  License)
• Reference http//www.vrlab.umu.se/research/replic
  antbody/

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Cal3D

• Provides the underlying human animation library,
  data exporters, and utilities.
• Is a skeletal based 3D character animation
• Written in C
• Distributed under GNU LGPL
• Reference https//gna.org/projects/cal3d/

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New Animation Classes

• Problem
• How to populate the OSG simulation with 3D human
  models?
• Solution
• Design and implement new animator classes that
  will work in OSG with ReplicantBody and Cal3d.

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New Animation Classes
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New Animation Classes

• CAnimator
• Main class, interface to simulation
• rbodyMgr
• Responsible for replicants
• CSceneEventMgr
• Responsible for scene events
• Staging area for scene event containment and
  launching
• CSceneEvent
• Data structure for scene activities

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3D Model Data
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3D Model Acquisition

• Problem
• Where to get 3D human model data?
• Solution
• Purchase through 3rd party vendor
  (turbosquid.com)
• Reuse existing ODU data.
• VMASC owns business human models.
• Shown later in demonstration.

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Engineer Data into Usable Form

• Problem
• How to get the 3D models into a format that can
  be used in the OSG simulation?
• Solution
• Work with modeling experts like Hector Garcia
  (VMASC).
• Modify data via 3ds Max into exportable
  components for Cal3D.
• Export skeleton, meshes, materials, and
  animations.
• Specify the Cal3D components for ReplicantBody.

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3ds Max Studio
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Cal3D Components
.csf .xsf
skeleton
meshes
materials
animations
.crf .xrf
.cmf .xmf
.caf .xaf

• Export via 3ds cal3d plugin.
• Export skeleton first.
• Other components depend on skeleton.
• Export to binary format (i.e. .csf, .crf, .cmf,
  .caf) or xml format (i.e. .xsf, .xrf, .xmf, .xaf)

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ReplicantBody Components
rbody specification
configuration
.cfg
.rbody
static character listing
.char

• Requires properly formatted cal3d exported
  components.
• Must associate cal3d components and scalar values
  in replicant body files.
• Configuration file (i.e. .cfg) is used for cal3d
  mini-viewers.
• .rbody character files describe the models for
  replicant body runtime.

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Screen Capture
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Demonstration and Questions