Faceware And Vicon Pair Up Motion Capture Products In New Partnership

Faceware and Vicon, two makers of motion capture technologies, has announced a new partnership that will bring their respective offerings together. For now, the partnership is bringing a simple merging of Faceware's software with Vicon's hardware to expand so-called mocap options in the industry, but additional options may be made available in the future.

Under the new partnership, Faceware will make its Analyzer and Retargeter software available to Vicon's Cara head rig when it is being used in a single-camera setup. Cara allows professionals to capture facial movement information, which can now be shuttled to characters via Faceware's products.

This technology is often used by those in the movie and gaming industry, allowing actors' facial movements to be recorded and them imparted to a 3D character. With Faceware's Analyzer, the data gathered by Cara is converted into motion tracking files, then Retargeter — a plugin for Autodesk software — makes it easier to add those facial movements to characters.

Said Faceware's VP of Business Development Peter Busch: "[Vicon's] systems complement ours, and in many cases, are used alongside our software and hardware products. The main goal of this global partnership is to simplify the mocap process by making sure that studios and really anyone using both Vicon systems and our software products are not hindered in any way."