Machine learning scientists at Disney Research have developed a new innovative model that uncovers how the meanings of words change over time. Dr. Robert Bamler and Dr. Stephan Mandt developed the dynamic word embeddings model by integrating neural networks and statistics used in rocket control systems. The result is a complex machine learning algorithm that […]
Design Method Helps Animated Characters Gain Physical Form
Disney Research has developed a method for designing cable-driven mechanisms that help artists and hobbyists give physical form and motion to animated characters. Assemblies of cables and joints make it possible to achieve desired motions and poses in a character, even when artistic preferences dictate limb sizes that make it infeasible to place motors at […]
Disney Research Makes Augmented Reality A Group Experience
Sit on Disney Research’s Magic Bench and you may have an elephant hand you a glowing orb. Or you might get rained on. Or a tiny donkey might saunter by and kick the bench. It’s a combined augmented and mixed reality experience, but not the type that involves wearing a head-mounted display or using a […]
Computers Using Linguistic Clues to Deduce Photo Content
Scientists at Disney Research and the University of California, Davis have found that the way a person describes the content of a photo can provide important clues for computer vision programs to determine where various things appear in the image. According to Leonid Sigal, a senior research scientist at Disney Research, it’s not just the […]
When Kids Talk To Robots: Enhancing Engagement And Learning
Conversational robots and virtual characters can enhance learning and expand entertainment options for children, a trio of studies by Disney Research shows, though exactly how these autonomous agents interact with children sometimes depends on a child’s age. Pre-school children responding to an on-screen character, for instance, may be happiest if the character simply waits for […]
Disney Research Transforms Movie-Quality Animations For Interactive Viewing
Cinema-quality animations and virtual reality graphics that need to be rendered in real-time are often mutually exclusive categories, but Disney Research has developed a new process that transforms high-resolution animated content into a novel video format to enable immersive viewing. The end-to-end solution the researchers devised will make it easier to repurpose animated film assets […]
More Than Animation: Software Supports Animated Storytelling
Disney Research has developed new tools to help people use animation to tell stories by eliminating distracting details that hamper creativity, suggesting ways to fill holes in plots and assisting in the creation of virtual worlds where stories can play out. “We are empowering anyone to create their own animated stories,” said Mubbasir Kapadia, a […]
Green-Screen Keying Method Cuts Time, Boosts Quality In Film Compositing
Filming an actor in front of a green screen and then superimposing the actor over another background is commonplace in feature film production, but getting rid of all traces of the green screen remains a chore. A new “keying” method devised by Disney Research and ETH Zurich, however, improves the results substantially. What’s more, these […]
New Method Reduces Amount Of Training Data Needed For Facial Performance Capture System
Disney Research has found a way to tailor a facial capture system to the characteristics of a specific actor’s expressions while dramatically reducing the time and effort it would normally require. Instead of exhaustively recording the actor displaying a variety of facial expressions under numerous combinations of lighting conditions and camera viewpoints, the researchers found […]
Disney Researchers Build First Tetherless Hopping Robot
One-legged hopping robots have long been used to study balance issues, but their dependence on off-board power has kept them tethered, literally, to the lab. Now, Disney Research has figured out how to build a hopper that runs on battery power. The researchers believe theirs is the first one-legged hopper that does not require a […]