Leap Motion Path is a Second Story lab experiment exploring the use cases for the Leap Motion controller in the digital animation field. Our objective was to create a tool to capture 3D motion that could be used within an animation platform to control digital content.
One of our goals was to record an animation without the assistance of a keyboard or mouse. To achieve this, we needed a way for the animator to know where their hand was in relation to a recording canvas. We accomplished this by creating an inset frame that gives the animator space to interact with Leap Motion and gain spatial reference to where they are inside the computer screen. Once they’re ready, they can enter the frame and start recording. Later, in the animation software, they can remove the entry and exit points from the frame by cropping the animation recording.
During this experiment, we encountered another interesting use case. Leap Motion provides a lot of data about the geometry of the hand. If you capture the position of the animator’s wrist and the tip of the index finger and draw a line between those points, you end up with a vector that indicates the direction of the hand. If you capture this vector over time, you see that it produces a beautiful ribbon. The animator can record this ribbon and use it in other animations.
As we developed Leap Motion Path, several stand-alone libraries came to be. We’ve hosted one called Path.js here on Github. To provide some additional context: we wanted to capture a 3D position over time and then animate along the path we recorded. If we were to animate along the finite points Leap gives us, the animation would be choppy because the resolution of these points wouldn’t resemble the actual path we drew with our hand. To combat this, we needed to interpolate a line or a curve between these points to give a finer resolution so we could animate at any speed. Path.js takes a collection of timestamped points and creates a linear interpolation between them. This allows Leap Motion Path to export an animation in vector format, allowing the animator to scale and stretch the animation as desired.
With more development, Leap Motion Path could be integrated into a standard digital animation workflow giving animators one more tool to create beautiful & lifelike work. Moving forward, to improve the motion-capture experience, we would need to re-write the recording mechanism as a plugin to an animation platform, enabling the animator to record and review all in one application. We look forward to integrating Leap Motion Path into our own animation workflow at Second Story.
— Dimitrii Pokrovskii, Interactive Developer
