kander – mocap
I spent a lot of time thinking about what I wanted to do with this project. My initial idea was to create little monsters (see sketchbook), but the level of detail I wanted was hard to do with the 3D environment in Processing. I then investigated Perlin noise, which had some interesting results (I wanted to have multiple characters, and have the noise of each affect the other), but I wasn’t super into that project either.
the sketching for the monster
Some of my experiments with Perlin noise to generate forms
Some of my experiments with Perlin noise to generate forms
Then, while looking at some of my preliminary code for the monsters idea, I came up with the idea of making “corn people” (perhaps this idea subconsciously stemmed from me missing the Midwest?). I then adapted the Bvh data to make a corn person class, shown below, and my final product is a pair of corn people dancing in sync to techno music (the original data comes from my dancing). An earlier version had different bvh files, and the flailing corn people remind me of awkward dances of my high school days.
sketches of my ideas
the OG ear of corn
While dancing, I had to be cognizant about the leaf-like way in which the arms should move, and I was careful not to hop about, because corn people would be unlikely to move their feet in such a way. Overall, I am quite happy with how this assignment turned out, especially considering the late start I got due to investigation of other topics. I really thought it was crucial to have the leaf-like limbs, and I’m glad I was about to accomplish that. I also think it’s pretty funny.