Virtual metamorphosis systems

ATR Media Integration and Communications Research Laboratories (ATR MIC) are aiming at realizing communication environments in which remotely located people can communicate with each other via a virtual scene. Virtual metamorphosis systems are possible applications of such virtual communication environments. In the virtual metamorphosis system, people can change their forms into any other form in a virtual scene. To realize a virtual metamorphosis system, the facial expressions and body postures of the user who will be “morphed” need to be estimated in a real time manner and reproduced in the form, which is normally a computer graphics human model (avatar). We emphasize that facial expressions and body postures should be estimated in a non-contact fashion, more specifically, by computer vision based technologies. The paper introduces two versions of the virtual metamorphosis systems: the Virtual Kabuki system and “Shall We Dance?” system