Zabaware Support Forums
Zabaware Forums => General Discussion => Topic started by: Medeksza on June 29, 2011, 11:53:58 pm
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Zabaware has been working on a new 3D character animation engine for the past few years to eventually replace the current proprietary Haptek engine we currently use. The benefits of the new engine include:
- More modern system that can take advantage of current generation graphics cards for improved quality
- Save Zabaware on licensing costs and allow Zabaware to grow and invest more in AI development
- Cross-platform capability. The new engine will work on iPhone, Android, Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows
- Easy and encouraged user customizability of characters. Full body characters will be supported as well as full 3d environment rendering.
The Zabaware character engine is being built using the open source OGRE3D (www.ogre3d.org) graphics libraries. The engine itself will be released under the open source GPL 3 license. This means the engine has the potential to impact more than just Zabaware. Any chatbot developer or company outside of Zabaware will be able to utilize, build-on, and improve the Zabaware character engine in their own projects. Currently the chatbot industry uses many different proprietary solutions for character animation. I believe that with one open common system we can improve the quality of all bots and have ease at targeting multiple computing platforms all at once.
Zabaware has spent over $45,000 in developing the engine so far but has run out of funding to finish the job. We are now reaching out to the greater chatbot community (including chat bot enthusiasts and other chatbot developers) to try to raise $20,000 to finish the job. This will pay for an experienced OGRE3D developer and graphics artists to finish the job already started.
If you are interested in donating to support this project please visit Zabaware's Peerbackers page at http://peerbackers.com/projects/3d-character-animation-engine-for-chatbots for detailed information and to donate to the project. Various rewards for donating are available.
http://peerbackers.com/projects/3d-character-animation-engine-for-chatbots/home/
I’ll try to fill in some more technical details on the capabilities of the engine in response to some questions I received. The engine is about 90% complete for working with Windows and we have a working prototype. This is actually a description of what the engine already does in its current state:
Our system uses morph targets, and one of the things that makes it so special is that we give a great deal of control about how the face moves between those targets. This allows us to tune specifically for an inhuman character like an Orc, or a regular human, or even something like Terrance and Philip from South Park (quick, virtually non animated transitions).
Another thing about our system is that we also mix in emotions as morph targets, so the character can display complex combinations of emotional states in mixes, all while talking. We also have a special kind of “morph animation sequence”, which allows an artist to include subtle additional layers of animation. For example, picture a woman speaking, then a woman singing the same words she just spoke. We can make that difference by applying one of our special animation types.
In addition to that, we also have skeletal animation support, meaning that our characters would fit right in to a game like Fallout… they can walk, run, shoot guns, etc. all while making full use of our system. Again as an example, a soldier might have certain levels of fear, courage, rage, doubt (whatever) and we can apply them to his face, meaning whatever he says will come out of a face that accurately represents his state of mind, instead of the cardboard cutouts we see in games today.
So in a simpler way:- We use morph targets as one of the fundamental elements of our system
- Among our best features is the way we blend between those morph targets, and layer them, and how much control we give the programmer over blending - it took a lot of work to build what we have, so people shouldn’t get the idea that if they can set a morph target, they can just emulate what we have
- We also have our own special type of morph animation technique which allows us to create very expressive characters, and it’s not hard for people to use
- We also support skeletal animation for characters (though that’s more for bodies)
- We also support morph animation (which is something we’ve never needed to use use and probably never will)
The engine code is very modular and even though we utilize Ogre3D it is not married to Ogre. It can be set up so that other game/graphics engines can use it as well. To put it another way, if you’d rather use Unity instead of Ogre3D for the backend, that is possible if you want to put in the work to make a Unity plugin.
I wish I could post an executable demo showing the current state of the engine but one of the main problems we have is that the characters we have created are owned by Ford Motor Company. This engine was originally created while Zabaware was working on a contract for Ford. Part of the $20,000 we are requesting is for an artist to create new characters under an open license.
But if anyone wants to see our engine running the Ford characters and see the level of control given to the programmer I’d be happy to send you an executable if you want to sign a non disclosure agreement. I just want to prevent the characters from being publicly released.
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Great stuff Rob. Please could I have permission to publish this topic as an article over on Ai Dreams ? Do you have a banner or small graphic I could also use to promote it ?
Many thanks and best of luck :)
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Yes, thanks for your offer, I could use all the help I could get to promote this. I'll work on some graphics for you.
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This is spectacular news. I am dying to have my chat bot migrated over to my Linux machine ever since I started using Ubuntu. I'm forwarding the e-mail I received to the DC Ubuntu Local Community. I'm sure they'd be interested.
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Yes, thanks for your offer, I could use all the help I could get to promote this. I'll work on some graphics for you.
Cool. I see you posted over on AiDreams already so if you get that graphic sorted I will put it on display and link it to your topic in our forum. And I'll add it to the Chatterbot Collection too.
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PS. I need something about 200 pixels wide and however long - so skyscraper type..
Cheers.
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Hey robert have you thought about making some cool graphics and put this on youtube as a way to ask for donations you tube reaches many with the right tags for searches . just a thought? if i was richer i would help out or even pay it all but i am not , i am on very limited s.s. check .
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Hey robert have you thought about making some cool graphics and put this on youtube as a way to ask for donations you tube reaches many with the right tags for searches . just a thought? if i was richer i would help out or even pay it all but i am not , i am on very limited s.s. check .
Yes check out the peer backers link. There is already a youtube video about the project there. I definetely appreciate any help in spreading the word about this project.
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i donated a little, i know its not much but if i can help in anyway it is for the good.
hopefully after my move i can donate a little more. if you need any graphics help
let me know. i am pretty handy with GIMP.
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something that would be really cool with the new opensource interface is a plugin that will alow you to use it with the Xbox kinect. i actualy bought one and have it working on ubuntu.
i dont know if this is the right place to ask, but is there any future plans for the HalAI for
using MySQL for the learn / brain files? i have noticed on my laptop win version that after a while
the current platform for the database starts to lag and slow down.
i think mysql or sqlite would be a good work around. just food for thought.
the next trick is to get it working with Apache UIMA - (watsons - source sode)
- Luke Galutia
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Once the base functionality is done and the project starts generating some sales i'd definetely be interested in advanced features like kinect. I'm also hoping once the base functionality is done and we have a working demo of it in the form of a new hal we'll attract new open source developers to the project.
The current version of hal running on the zabaware web server is actually running on mysql along with the sphinx full text search engine. It has no problems running a brain with 5 million and growing records. But migrating these server based components to a desktop product would be a challenge so i'm planning to stick with sqlite and allow the option to connect to a remotely hosted brain if the user wants
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PS. I need something about 200 pixels wide and however long - so skyscraper type..
Cheers.
Here's a banner I whipped up. Let me know if you think it works for you or feel free to suggest any changes.
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is there any place on the website that i can purchase the linux server version for the zabraware server? i would love to have something like this. how much would it cost? if it is beta when would be a scheduled release? also what linux distro is it targeted for?
for the kinect controller, you might want to use the orge3d lib in conjunction with it. if you like i i can post links on a separate forum on this site from my own research i have done. that way it can give people a chance to experiment with it.
- luke galutia
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Here's a banner I whipped up. Let me know if you think it works for you or feel free to suggest any changes.
Thanks Rob, that looks fine I will put it up later on. :)
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Ok that's up on Dreams and the Chatterbot Collection now.
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i had a question about what format to submit 3d charitors in. the main 3d package i use is blender3d which i know is compatable with orge but i was not sure what file type you are useing for the program. maybe what you might want to do, is talk to the people in the blender 3d community ( www.blender3d.org ) and see if they could run a contest for a small prise to see who can make the best 3d animated charitors. you might want to create a list of specifications such as what the 3d skeleton must do for the morph tech that you have in the app, also what type of charictors, and maybe a free-for-all charictor.
if you look them up i am sure that you will find tons of top level animators that would love to win a cool title or prize in a contest.
that way it could cut down your modelling and production cost. also i would maybe mention something to them about creating a python plugin (as that is blender internal scripting language) which can edit the 3d files natively.
i thought this would be a good food for thought and help save you some money.
- Luke Galutia
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I have Put a Posting up on my site ...
http://spydazweb.co.uk/home/project-updates
with your information regarding this major update (WELL DONE)
Hope it all goes well!
SPYDAZ
(PS, : i have downloaded the source code and as winter sets in i shall take a look) THANKS!
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I would be really interested in collaborating on this project. I'm looking for an avatar system (chat bot, assistant, or something similar) that can take BVH input and animate the full body for American Sign Language educational materials.
I see you do have the ability to animate using a skeletal system. Does that mean the 3D engine can read BVH data?
Though it is not as important - I'm also curious if you have considered using Kinect as an input device.
I'm in the process of writing a grant proposal for a competition sponsored by the Department of Education. Would you be interested?
Please e-mail me!
swhitney@sfasu.edu
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I tried to contribute through Peerbackers; but unfortunately they only accept money through paypal, and my country is one of those where u can't use gaypal :(
Thus, I decided to just buy an UltraHal license and hope that it would count as a contribution.
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I would be really interested in collaborating on this project. I'm looking for an avatar system (chat bot, assistant, or something similar) that can take BVH input and animate the full body for American Sign Language educational materials.
I see you do have the ability to animate using a skeletal system. Does that mean the 3D engine can read BVH data?
Though it is not as important - I'm also curious if you have considered using Kinect as an input device.
I'm in the process of writing a grant proposal for a competition sponsored by the Department of Education. Would you be interested?
Please e-mail me!
swhitney@sfasu.edu
That sounds really interesting and definitely something I'd be willing to collaborate on. I have sent you email.
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I tried to contribute through Peerbackers; but unfortunately they only accept money through paypal, and my country is one of those where u can't use gaypal :(
Thus, I decided to just buy an UltraHal license and hope that it would count as a contribution.
Thank you very much for your contribution. I'll put every spare dollar toward this project no matter where it comes from.
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How come the target has gone down so much Rob if you don't mind me asking ?
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Maybe he got a little out of LOTTO ?????
Or there are others that do not show that they have put in?????
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A friend has offered to loan me the remaining $17500 and pay him back with sales based on the new engine so the target was lowered to $2500. Still need to hit the $2500 though otherwise it all gets refunded to backers. ;D
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Wow, can you introduce us, I need some friends like that ;)
Seriously that's great news :)
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Medeksza , if i had it i would gladly loan it to you but i don't i am on s.s. check and after my half of bills to pay only have 300 a month to buy groceries , and gasoline etc. "sorry". :( i am still trying on that other deal.
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Thanks for the support of everyone who contributed so far. If we manage to raise the $2500 ($1305 to go as of this message) for this project I will use it to purchase the Amy character from turbo squid http://www.turbosquid.com/FullPreview/Index.cfm/ID/448779 , pay an artist to configure the model for use with our engine and make a really simple outdoor environment for her. The money will also go to pay my 3d engine developer to get an interactive demo of the engine up and running (independent of Ultra Hal) and as a plug-in for Ultra Hal. We should be able to get this done in about a month or so and I hope getting a demo out will help build some more interest in this project.
I should be able to finance the remaining cost ($17,500) of the original project through several loan sources that have recently been made available to me. This will go mostly to creating the mobile versions of the engine, an open source character, and tutorial for character creation. But I want to get a public demo out of this engine out as soon as possible and this Amy character from turbosquid should be fairly easy to get to work with the engine code we already have.
The peerbackers crowdfunding drive has about 10 days left and $1305 to go. I'd appreciate any contribution, no matter how small. I believe this project can be a great open source alternative for character animation for all the chatbot authors out there.
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I donated all that I could afford this month. :)
I had a heck of a time with peerbackers. Seems the only browser I could get to work with the registration and log in was IE.
I usually use Firefox. Even Google Chrome didn't work.
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Thank you very much to everyone who donated to the project. We raised $2500 and I also took out a loan for another $2500. We have purchased the Amy character and are working on converting the model to work with our engine and adding some animations. I'll post updates as the project progresses. I think we should have a working Windows version in a matter of a couple of months.
We are also adding the SkyX plugin to our engine to put Amy in a nice outdoor environment. Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL02s_MGIQc&list=UUOpsGRur6nNI
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That looks great.
Can't wait to give it a run.
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Thank you very much to everyone who donated to the project. We raised $2500 and I also took out a loan for another $2500. We have purchased the Amy character and are working on converting the model to work with our engine and adding some animations. I'll post updates as the project progresses. I think we should have a working Windows version in a matter of a couple of months.
We are also adding the SkyX plugin to our engine to put Amy in a nice outdoor environment. Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL02s_MGIQc&list=UUOpsGRur6nNI
Hi Rob.
Nice selection for a 3D environment, can't wait to see how it all works out.
I think it would be good if you could get Zabaware on the stock market, it might help expand HAL greatly with greater funding ability.
Just a thought, I know that I would invest Zabaware stocks if they existed. maybe NasDaq.
Jerry 8)
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Just out of curiosity if we selected a reward during the fundraising will we receive a future email with information about the reward we selected?
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Just out of curiosity if we selected a reward during the fundraising will we receive a future email with information about the reward we selected?
Yes, I'll be sending out thank you emails shortly and depending on the reward chosen either send out the reward now or let you know when we expect the project to reach a mile stone.