首先的亚当和末后的亚当

I am Krasimir Nechevski, and I am the animation director in Unity’s demo team. Even though I have a degree as a software engineer, I have been working as a character animator for more than 15 years. Before joining Unity’s demo team a year ago I was lead animator in Crytek for 7 years.

我是Krasimir Nechevski，并且是Unity 演示团队的动画总监。 尽管我拥有软件工程师的学位，但作为角色动画师，我已经工作了15年以上。 在一年前加入Unity演示团队之前，我曾在Crytek担任首席动画师7年。

Working on the short film “Adam” was both a privilege and an exciting opportunity to take part in a production involving a great original idea, cutting edge technologies, and an awesome team. I knew it would not be easy, because at times we had to sail in uncharted waters, but nevertheless the team carried out the task with confidence and enthusiasm.

参与短片“ 亚当 ”的 拍摄 既是一种荣幸，也是一次激动人心的机会，参与了一个伟大的原创构想，尖端技术和一支敬畏的团队。 我知道这并不容易，因为有时我们不得不在未知的水域中航行，但是尽管如此，团队还是充满信心和热情地完成了任务。

You can read more about my teammates’ experience during the production of the Adam demo in their blog posts:

您可以在他们的博客文章中了解有关我的队友在制作Adam演示期间的经验的更多信息：

• Georgi Simeonov: Adam – Production design for the real time short film

  Georgi Simeonov： Adam –实时短片的制作设计

• Plamen Tamnev: Adam – Assets creation for the real time short film

  Plamen Tamnev： Adam –实时短片的资产创造

In this blogpost, I will cover all areas of animation-related work. Most of it I did myself, and in some areas we were assisted by contractors whom I managed. These are the things I was directly responsible for: the previs, Adam’s rig, most of Adam’s animations, environment animations, camera animations and management of the mocap sessions. I also worked closely with our junior coder Dominykas Kiauleikis on designing and developing the crowd system. Last but not least, I did the assembly of the movie inside Unity’s in-development sequencing tool.

在这篇博文中，我将介绍与动画相关的所有领域。 其中大部分是我自己做的，在某些领域，我得到了我管理的承包商的协助。 这些是我直接负责的事情：预览，Adam的装备，Adam的大多数动画，环境动画，相机动画以及mocap会话的管理。 我还与我们的初级编码员Dominykas Kiauleikis紧密合作，设计和开发了人群系统。 最后但并非最不重要的一点是，我在Unity的开发定 序工具中 进行了电影的汇编 。

预视 ( Previs)

The plan was to keep everything flexible at all times. We wanted to be able to switch assets and iterate where necessary. As a result, the project was in a semi-previs stage for a lot of the time. We started by building a placeholder model for Adam.

该计划是要始终保持所有内容灵活。 我们希望能够交换资产并在必要时进行迭代。 结果，该项目大部分时间处于半预览阶段。 我们首先为亚当建立一个占位符模型。

演示地址

The first version of Adam

亚当的第一个版本

The aim was to get the basic proportions right and also iterate on the mechanics of the shoulder rig, because even though Adam’s shoulder looked humanoid it was not a balljoint with many degrees of freedom but a combination of single axis rotational joints.

目的是要获得正确的基本比例，并且还要迭代肩钻的力学原理，因为即使亚当的肩膀看起来像人形机器人，它也不是具有许多自由度的球形接头，而是单轴旋转接头的组合。

演示地址

An early version of Adam’s shoulder rig test

亚当肩部装备测试的早期版本

Another thing that was very important to us was to be able to work with the actor as early as possible. Our actor, Ovanes Torosian, had experience in both film and theatre, but hadn’t done motion capture before. We decided to use the Perception Neuron system, a very affordable markerless mocap solution, in the early previs stage. By doing so, we were able to give the actor some time to adjust to the technology while we tested different approaches and iterated on Adam’s pose, body language, and performance. We were also able to try out camera movements with a handheld DSLR rig.

对我们来说非常重要的另一件事是能够尽早与演员合作。 我们的演员Ovanes Torosian具有电影和戏剧方面的经验，但之前从未进行过动作捕捉。 我们决定在早期预览阶段使用Perception Neuron系统，这是一种非常实惠的无标记Mocap解决方案。 通过这样做，我们可以给演员一些时间来适应技术，同时我们测试了不同的方法并迭代了亚当的姿势，肢体语言和表演。 我们还能够使用手持式DSLR装备尝试相机的运动。

We started making the previs in Motionbuilder with tests of one of our signature scenes, where we tried a couple of camera cuts, ranging from a single seamless camera to fast paced cuts.

我们开始通过对其中一个标志性场景的测试来在Motionbuilder中制作previs，在其中我们尝试了几次摄像机剪切，从单个无缝摄像机到快节奏的剪切。

Soon after we decided to move the previs into Unity. There, Vess, the Director, was able to add lights and materials, and to bring the previs closer to final quality while taking full advantage of working with a real-time engine. This iterative approach, and the very early assembly of the whole movie in Unity, proved to be very efficient in giving us a fast turnaround between different shot tests.

在我们决定将previs移入Unity之后不久。 在那里，主管Vess能够添加灯光和材料，并使previs更接近最终质量，同时充分利用实时引擎的优势。 事实证明，这种迭代方法以及整部电影在Unity中的早期组装非常有效，可以使我们在不同的镜头测试之间快速进行周转。

亚当–钻机 (Adam – Rig)

Vess wanted to achieve a realistic, documentary look for the film and we needed Adam’s mechanics to look convincing. I did not want to be forced to cover or fake anything like bend hard surfaces or hide them from the camera. Moreover, when we started, a lot of the functionality was not clear, so throughout the initial stage of production Adam had only his basic skeleton and some parts of his arms functioning. This structure and proportions remained until the end but many more parts were added later while some were altered to fit the required range of motion. The changes which needed to be made in order to achieve the desired freedom of motion influenced the character’s concept, and there was a lot of back and forth between me, our production designer, Georgi, and our modeller, Paco, until we reached the final result.

维斯想让这部电影看起来像真实的纪录片一样，我们需要亚当的机制来令人信服。 我不想被迫掩盖或伪造诸如弯曲坚硬表面或将它们从相机隐藏起来的东西。 此外，当我们开始时，许多功能尚不清楚，因此在生产的最初阶段，Adam仅具有基本骨架，并且手臂的某些部分仍在运转。 这种结构和比例一直保持到最后，但是后来又添加了更多的零件，同时对某些零件进行了更改以适应所需的运动范围。 为了实现所需的动作自由而需要进行的更改影响了角色的概念，在我，产品设计师Georgi和建模人员Paco之间进行了很多往返，直到最终结果。

The rig which was exported to Unity was done in 3D Studio Max with the help of Character Studio as the main skeleton. On top of that, I added procedurally animated bones, e.g. the scapulae, clavicles, upper arm, and forearm. For the rubber parts around the belly and neck, I decided not to use blend shapes and baked simulated deformations onto a set of helper joints.

导出到Unity的装备是在3D Studio Max中借助Character Studio作为主要骨架完成的。 最重要的是，我添加了程序动画骨骼，例如肩cap骨，锁骨，上臂和前臂。 对于腹部和颈部周围的橡胶部件，我决定不使用混合形状并将烘焙的模拟变形烘焙到一组辅助关节上。

Another part of the rig I put a lot of attention into was the eyes. For them, I made a functioning rig resembling the blend of a photocamera with separate rotating blades for the iris. The eyelids were segmented and each piece was individually pushed by the cornea.

我非常关注的钻机的另一部分是眼睛。 我为他们制作了一个功能齐全的装置，类似于光相机和用于虹膜的单独旋转刀片的混合体。 分割眼睑，并由角膜分别推动每一片。

演示地址

The rig of the eyes

眼神的装备

The rig was then imported into Motionbuilder. There, the Character Studio skeleton was characterized as a Human IK Biped. All of the motion captured data was retargeted, cleaned, and altered inside of Motionbuilder. Most of the hand-keyed animation work was also done inside Motionbuilder the exception being the eyes.

然后将该装备导入到Motionbuilder中。 在那里，Character Studio骨架的特征是人类IK Biped。 在Motionbuilder内部重新定位，清理和更改了所有捕获的运动数据。 除了眼睛之外，大多数手动动画工作都是在Motionbuilder中完成的。

After a shot was ready, it was exported back to 3DS Max where all of the procedural animations were added, along with the hand-keyed animation for the eyes. The result was then baked and exported as a FBX to Unity, where it was imported as a generic rig.

准备好镜头后，将其导出回3DS Max，在其中添加了所有程序动画以及用于眼睛的手动动画。 然后将结果烘焙并作为FBX导出到Unity，并在其中将其作为通用装备导入。

亚当– Mocap和动画 (Adam – Mocap and Animation)

During the production, a lot of shots proved to be challenging – especially in the first part where Adam was falling from a stretcher and crawling on his knees trying to remove his mask. The challenge lay mostly in finding the perfect sync between the character and the camera’s movements. During our previs mocap sessions, the actor managed to iterate on the performance and also had the chance to understand the role in depth. At the same time, the director used the opportunity to give feedback about the performance and really fine-tune the movements, as well as iterate with the cameras to make sure all the elements fitted together.

在制作过程中，许多镜头被证明是具有挑战性的-特别是在第一部分中，亚当从担架上摔下来，跪在膝盖上，试图取下面具。 挑战主要在于找到角色与相机动作之间的完美同步。 在我们的演出现场会议中，演员设法反复进行表演，并有机会深入了解角色。 同时，导演利用这次机会提供有关表演的反馈意见，并真正地微调了机芯，并反复进行了摄影机检查，以确保将所有元素组合在一起。

Eventually, when we got to shoot the final performance in a proper mocap volume, we knew exactly what we wanted, so we were able to shoot all the initial takes we had in mind in a single day. The facility at studio Cinemotion in Sofia, Bulgaria, provided everything we needed in order to simultaneously capture Adam and the camera by using a virtual camera setup. Moreover, since the price levels were very reasonable, we could comfortably apply our iterative production approach, and return for reshoots, additional shot exploration and sudden last-minute creative ideas as necessary.

最终，当我们以适当的拍拍量拍摄最终的表演时，我们确切地知道了我们想要什么，因此我们能够在一天之内拍摄出所有初衷。 位于 保加利亚索非亚的 Cinemotion 工作室的设施 提供了我们所需的一切，以便通过使用虚拟摄像机设置同时捕获Adam和摄像机。 此外，由于价格水平非常合理，我们可以轻松地采用迭代式制作方法，并根据需要返回进行重新拍摄，更多的镜头探索和突然的最后创意。

After we shot the final performance, I used data from different takes and managed to stitch together the parts of the actor’s performance and camera capture that Vess liked the most. This wouldn’t have been possible without spending that extra time in the volume trying to nail all the parts.

在拍摄完最后的表演之后，我使用了来自不同镜头的数据，并设法将维斯最喜欢的演员表演和摄像机捕捉部分拼接在一起。 如果不花大量时间试图钉牢所有零件，这是不可能的。

演示地址

Early version of one of the interior shots

内景拍摄之一的早期版本

After I retargeted and cleaned the data, it was time to add the finishing touches. Next, I hand-keyed the gaps where it was not possible to capture the proper motion or pose, such as Adam hanging on the stretcher machine, and proper hand movements. After that, I hand-keyed the fingers inside Motionbuilder and exported the shots to Max.

在我重新定位并清除了数据之后，是时候添加点睛之笔了。 接下来，我手动输入无法捕捉正确运动或姿势的间隙，例如，亚当挂在担架机上以及正确的手部运动。 在那之后，我在Motionbuilder中手动用手指将镜头导出到Max。

演示地址

Eye performance study

眼力研究

During our mocap sessions, I separately captured some footage of our actor’s eyes with a head-mounted camera. Finally, in Max, and by using the footage as a reference, I added the eye movements. Adam was ready for export!

在进行拍拍动作时，我用头戴式摄像头分别拍摄了演员眼睛的一些镜头。 最后，在Max中，以素材作为参考，我添加了眼睛的动作。 亚当准备出口了！

相机– Mocap和动画 (Camera – Mocap and Animation)

To achieve the desired documentary look, we needed the recognizable motion of a handheld camera. For that, we used a virtual camera setup operated by our cameraman, Mihail Moskov. Even though we captured the camera in the mocap volume, we knew that we would continue to iterate on the edit and that some shots might need to be added later in the process. To keep our options open for as long as possible, we conveniently captured some cameras with generic movement: i.e different pans and rotations. We then used Motionbuilder or Unity’s sequencer to blend those together to create a new camera which we hadn’t anticipated needing when we performed the mocap. This allowed our Director Vess lots of flexibility – he wasn’t bound to the captured material.

为了获得理想的纪录片外观，我们需要手持摄像机可识别的运动。 为此，我们使用了由摄影师Mihail Moskov操作的虚拟相机设置。 即使我们将相机捕获到Mocap量中，我们也知道我们将继续迭代编辑，并且在此过程的后期可能需要添加一些镜头。 为了使选件尽可能长时间保持打开状态，我们方便地捕获了一些具有通用运动的摄像机：即不同的摇摄和旋转。 然后，我们使用Motionbuilder或Unity的音序器将它们融合在一起，以创建一个新的相机，当我们执行Mocap时，我们并没有预料到它。 这使我们的总监Vess具有很大的灵活性-他不受所捕获材料的束缚。

塞巴斯蒂安和卢 (Sebastian and Lu)

Sebastian and Lu are the two strangers that appear in the second part of the movie. Capturing their performance was yet another challenge, because they walked on retractable stilts. Stanimir ‘Stunny’ Stamatov, a stuntman who had prior experience with stilts, did the performance for both characters.

塞巴斯蒂安和卢是出现在电影第二部分的两个陌生人。 捕捉他们的表现是另一个挑战，因为他们踩着可伸缩的高跷行走。 特技演员Stanimir'Stunny'Stamatov曾经有过踩高跷的经验，并为这两个角色表演。

By the time we shot the mocap session for these characters, Vess had several different ideas about their performance, and hadn’t made a decision. We needed to adjust our method so he would be able to experiment with building and playing out various versions of their actions. So we used more of a game-like approach – we captured different animation loops and transitions which we could later assemble. We did a number of versions of some of animations so we could pick the one we liked best at a later date. The animations utilized a set of loops: walk, idle, stop, descend etc. and some transitions. It proved flexible, but it did have drawbacks as there were issues with the flow between some of the animations.

当我们为这些角色拍摄捕捉影片时，Vess对他们的表现有几种不同的想法，还没有做出决定。 我们需要调整我们的方法，以便他能够尝试构建并播放他们动作的各种版本。 因此，我们更多地使用了类似于游戏的方法–我们捕获了不同的动画循环和过渡，可以在以后进行组装。 我们制作了一些动画的多个版本，以便以后可以选择我们最喜欢的动画。 动画使用了一组循环：行走，闲置，停止，下降等以及一些过渡。 它被证明是灵活的，但是它确实有缺点，因为某些动画之间的流程存在问题。

Sebastian walk cycle

塞巴斯蒂安步行周期

For the rigging and animation work on Sebastian and Lu, we contracted Bläck Studios and Pixelgrinder – two companies with whom we already had previous experience from our demo The Blacksmith (2015). They did the rigs in Maya and Motionbuilder with the help of HIK and a custom extension of the rig for the stilts. Adam’s functionality was not used for Sebastian and Lu because they had garments covering most of their bodies.

对于塞巴斯蒂安和卢的索具和动画制作工作，我们与 BläckStudios 和 Pixelgrinder签约 -这 两家公司已经与我们的演示 《铁匠》 ( The Blacksmith ，2015年)合作过。 他们借助HIK和高跷的自定义扩展在Maya和Motionbuilder中进行了搭建。 Sebastian和Lu并未使用Adam的功能，因为他们的衣服覆盖了大部分身体。

The cloth and rope simulations were done by our VFX artist Zdravko Pavlov with the help of CaronteFX – a Unity plugin developed by Next Limit Technologies and available on the Asset Store. We’ll publish a blogpost focused on Zdravko’s work on the production where you can learn more about his work with CaronteFX and the other effects in the movie soon.

布料和绳索的模拟是由我们的VFX艺术家Zdravko Pavlov在 CaronteFX 的帮助下完成的 。CaronteFX 是Next Limit Technologies开发的Unity插件，可在Asset Store上购买。 我们将发布一个博客，重点介绍Zdravko在制作中的工作，您很快就可以了解有关他与CaronteFX的合作以及电影中其他效果的更多信息。

卫队 (The Guards)

The guard rig was done in a manner very similar to Adam’s rig. It had a base Character Studio skeleton and additional procedural parts on top of that. The additional rigs took care of armor sliding and bending. The cloth below the waist and the pouches were done by Zdravko with CaronteFX.

防护装置的安装方式与亚当的装置非常相似。 它具有一个基本的Character Studio骨架以及最上面的其他程序部分。 额外的钻机负责装甲的滑动和弯曲。 腰部下方的布和小袋由Zdravko与CaronteFX共同完成。

For the guards’ motion capture session, we captured both Ovanes and Stanimir. The scene where one of the guards starts shooting at the crowd was a bit more complex than the rest, so I captured the performance in segments which I later stitched together. For the retargeting and cleaning work on the guards, we used Cinemotion’s animation services.

在警卫的动作捕捉会议中，我们同时捕捉了Ovanes和Stanimir。 一名警卫开始向人群开枪的场景比其他警卫要复杂一些，因此我将表演分成几段，然后将它们缝合在一起。 对于警卫的重新定位和清理工作，我们使用了Cinemotion的动画服务。

The Crowd

人群

The main challenge with making a crowd is the sheer amount of content that needs to be produced in order to achieve enough variety. On top of that, these mechanical, stumbling, confused characters needed to look sentient and as conscious as possible. Our approach was to make crowd variants which had unique behavior (i.e. sad, energetic, curious). For every variant of the crowd we had a very simple state machine which would drive each agent.

吸引人群的主要挑战是，为了实现足够的多样性，需要生产大量的内容。 最重要的是，这些机械的，绊脚的，混乱的角色需要看起来有感觉且尽可能有意识。 我们的方法是制作具有独特行为(即悲伤，精力充沛，好奇)的人群变异。 对于人群的每个变体，我们都有一个非常简单的状态机来驱动每个代理。

Ideally, we were aiming to have around 8 variants, all of them with the full set of the required animations. However, as the movie evolved and the edit gradually solidified, it became clear that each crowd variant would need to have around 90 seconds of animation. This proved to be more than we could handle and we ended up with only 4.

理想情况下，我们的目标是拥有大约8个变体，所有变体都带有所需的动画的全套。 但是，随着电影的发展和剪辑工作的逐步巩固，很明显，每个人群的变体都需要大约90秒的动画。 事实证明，这远远超出了我们的处理能力，最终只剩下4个。

We built three LOD versions of Adam, with 41, 28, and 13 bones, respectively. We ended up using only the two higher LODs since the GPU skinning tech, developed by our tech lead Torbjorn Laedre, proved to be able to handle the character count we needed. As previously, Ovanes and Stanimir provided theThe mocap performance, was done again by Ovanes and Stanimir and after that the mocap retargeting and cleaning was carried out with the help of Cinemotion’s animators.

我们构建了三个LOD版本的Adam，分别具有41、28和13个骨骼。 由于我们的技术负责人Torbjorn Laedre开发的GPU外观技术能够处理我们所需的字符数，因此我们最终只使用了两个更高的LOD。 和以前一样，Ovanes和Stanimir提供了Mocap的性能，然后由Ovanes和Stanimir再次完成，然后在Cinemotion的动画师的帮助下进行了Mocap的重新定位和清理。

人群系统 (The Crowd System)

The crowd system was developed by our tech lead Torbjorn Laedre, our junior programmer Dominykas Kiauleikis, and me. Torbjorn wrote all of the actual ‘playback code’, keyframe interpolation, gpu skinning, crowd instancing, and material variation. Dominykas wrote all of the vector field code and tools.

人群系统是由我们的技术负责人Torbjorn Laedre，初级程序员Dominykas Kiauleikis和我共同开发的。 Torbjorn编写了所有实际的“播放代码”，关键帧插值，gpu外观，人群实例化和材质变化。 Dominykas编写了所有矢量域代码和工具。

Foremost, we needed to identify the tasks our crowd system would need to solve:

首先，我们需要确定人群系统需要解决的任务：

-The crowd simulation needed to be 100% deterministic

-人群模拟必须是100％确定性的

-The system had to work with Unity’s sequencing tool allowing for fast scrubbing

-系统必须与Unity的排序工具配合使用，才能进行快速清理

-We needed a robust way of controlling the flow of the crowd as a whole

-我们需要一种强大的方式来控制整个人群的流动

-We also needed a way to tune in custom values for separate crowd agents.

-我们还需要一种方法来调整单独人群代理的自定义值。

To control the crowd’s flow, we decided that the system should use a vector field implementation, which would affect the crowd agents’ orientation in space as they walked through it. Dominykas made some simple yet robust vector field authoring tools in the form of splines. Each spline could either align the field to its direction, attract or repel it. Each had an area of effect and strength parameters.

为了控制人群的流动，我们决定系统应使用矢量场实现，这会影响人群在他们走过时在空间中的朝向。 Dominykas以样条线的形式制作了一些简单而强大的矢量场创作工具。 每个样条线都可以将磁场与其方向对齐，吸引或排斥它。 每个区域都有一个作用区域和强度参数。

We added a feature for initial random distribution of the agents in an area. Each agent in this resulting distribution could later be altered by picking a starting point’s position and rotation, initial state in the state machine, and a delayed trigger. We also added a feature that captures a snapshot of a crowd’s state at any point on the timeline, and which could then be used as starting point for another shot.

我们增加了区域内代理商的初始随机分布的功能。 随后，可以通过选择起点的位置和旋转，状态机中的初始状态以及延迟的触发来更改此结果分布中的每个代理。 我们还添加了一项功能，可以在时间轴上的任何时刻捕获人群状态的快照，然后可以将其用作下一个镜头的起点。

测序工具 (The Sequencing tool)

One of the roles of the Demo team within Unity is to give a user’s perspective to the engine developers. For Adam, we worked very closely with the team developing the new sequencing tool in Unity. We used early prototypes and pre-alpha versions of the tool, constantly providing feedback. In that way, we were able to influence its design and development. Working with the sequencer on our film felt very comfortable and familiar as it resembled other sequencing tools widely used in the film industry.

Unity内部演示团队的职责之一是向引擎开发人员提供用户的见解。 对于Adam，我们与团队紧密合作， 在Unity中 开发了 新的排序工具 。 我们使用了该工具的早期原型和pre-alpha版本，不断提供反馈。 这样，我们就能影响其设计和开发。 在影片上使用音序器感到非常舒适和熟悉，因为它类似于电影行业中广泛使用的其他音序工具。

For the character and camera animations, we used standard animation tracks, which we could trim, blend, and offset in world space.

对于角色和相机动画，我们使用了标准的动画轨迹，可以在世界空间中对其进行修剪，融合和偏移。

For the more advanced features driven by the sequencer, we used another type of track which enabled us to run custom scripts: Playables. Examples include the Crowd system Scene Manager- used to enable/disable objects – change lighting, and cameras etc.

对于音序器驱动的更高级的功能，我们使用了另一种类型的轨道，该轨道使我们能够运行自定义脚本：Playables。 例如，Crowd系统的场景管理器-用于启用/禁用对象-更改照明以及相机等。

Another really useful feature of the sequencing tool is the ability to record a change in any parameter. Using that in combination with the inline curve editor allowed me to easily animate camera movement, properties, fades etc.

排序工具的另一个真正有用的功能是能够记录任何参数的变化。 将其与内联曲线编辑器结合使用，使我可以轻松地为相机移动，属性，淡入淡出设置动画。

For the final outcome of the project, our first deliverable was a stage demo. We built the executable directly out of Unity and delivered it for presentation.

对于项目的最终结果，我们的第一个可交付成果是阶段演示。 我们直接从Unity中构建可执行文件，并将其交付以供演示。

In order to provide a preview of the film for online audiences, we also made a video intended for YouTube. It was captured with the help of a small script that we have, which we call BeautyShot. Unity’s R&D is currently looking into the possiblity to implement a video capturing solution directly in-engine.

为了向在线观众提供电影的预览，我们还为YouTube制作了一个视频。 它是在我们拥有的一个小脚本(称为BeautyShot)的帮助下捕获的。 Unity的研发部门目前正在研究是否可能直接在引擎中实施视频捕获解决方案。

Thanks for reading! Right now, we’re working on preparing a standalone for release, and there are more blog posts about how we made Adam in the pipeline, so stay tuned…

谢谢阅读！ 目前，我们正在准备一个独立的发行版，并且还有更多关于如何制作Adam的博客文章，请继续关注…

翻译自: https://blogs.unity3d.com/2016/08/31/adam-animation-for-the-real-time-short-film/

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