Motion retargeting algorithm based on model simplification

A new motion retargeting algorithm is presented, which adapts the motion capture data to a new character. To make the resulting motion realistic, the physically-based optimization method is adopted. However, the optimization process is difficult to converge to the optimal value because of high complexity of the physical human model. In order to address this problem, an appropriate simplified model automatically determined by a motion analysis technique is utilized, and then motion retargeting with this simplified model as an intermediate agent is implemented. The entire motion retargeting algorithm involves three steps of nonlinearly constrained optimization: forward retargeting, motion scaling and inverse retargeting. Experimental results show the validity of this algorithm.