Environment-Aware Postural Control of Virtual Humans for Real-time Applications

Interactive control of a virtual character through full body movement has a wide range of applications. However, there is a need for systems that accurately reproduce the motion of a performer while accounting for surrounding obstacles. We propose an approach based on an efficient Prioritized Inverse Kinematics constraint solver. The inputs to the system are the acquired positions of relevant body parts. These positions are tracked by the virtual character thanks to a set of kinematic constraints. At the same time a special constraint, which we call “observer”, is attached to body parts that must be checked for collisions. An observer acts by smoothly damping the motion of its controlled body part towards nearby obstacles, thus preventing future collisions from taking place.