Avatar - a reality

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Lets talk about a movie - Avatar. Originated from Sanskrit and taken to the world, the word Avatar represents a second form of oneself. The story behind the movie Avatar, represents a lilteral definition of the word. It takes its root from Hindu mythology - where Lord Vishnu takes reincarnation or Avatar of a human form to kill evil on the earth. The movie 'Avatar' is not the first one, though to use Hindu mythological stories. 'The Matrix' takes its root from there too.

OK! What is special about this movie, now? All know it is a big budget James Cameroon movie in 3D with super real graphics and effects. But, that is not the best part. The facts behind the making of this movie is amazing and surprises me.

We were all awed by the computer generated dinosaurs in the Jurassic Park. That was a break through in animation and CG. We got so use to the CG creatures, we dont find it special any more, up until Avatar where we have humanoids in the movie; CG humans! So, what? Generating humans is the least thing James could have worried about. But, giving human expressions to those graphical humans is a challenging one.

Motion capture technology had been in use for quite a long time. Actors wear a weird suite with motion sensors and perform the act. The motion sequences are fed to a computer where the graphical creature followed the motion sequences and represented on the film. Now, for Avatar, James used Performance Capture. He used small cameras in front of the actors and recorded the expressions. In addition to motion, their expression sequences are also fed to a computer. Using special alogorithms, humanoids in Avatar took their shape and looked near real like humans. Actually, one would not even realize the graphics while watching the movie.

That is one part. The other part is how to make this virtual humanoids interact with the environment? James had a solution through Augmented Reality. Avatar is by far the best implementation of this tehnology. Avatar was James idea from the past 10 years. He had to wait this long until 3D and virtual reality industry could evolve.

James would be shooting at a virtual forest environment while the humanoids generated graphically, would be superimposed in the real time over his environment. On top of this, James also added virutality to the environment. He invented a new camera to shoot using Augmented reality. Yes he invented! He invented a new world of virtual reality.

Hats off to James Cameroon.

If you have n't watched the movie, close this computer screen. Head out for the big screen.