Athletic Performance:
Intelligent Believable Characters
Tuesday, February 27, 2007 — 7:30 PM

Believable character motion is a very challenging and complex problem to solve in any medium. Achieving it interactively not only engages the player emotionally by maintaining suspension of disbelief but can also change the nature of gameplay. The solution starts with better understanding the problem through critical analysis and breakdowns. Current-gen techniques such as motion capture cycle blending only go so far. AI, human biomechanics, inverse kinematics, procedural awareness and other related aspects of the solution will be discussed and demonstrated with live proprietary software. Benefits are more than just visual, the impact to game play through responsiveness and communicating intent with body language will also be discussed.

BIOS

Henry LaBounta
Chief Visual Officer, Electronic Arts Canada

As Chief Visual Officer for EA SPORTS, Academy Award nominee Henry LaBounta uses his 20+ years in computer animation and applies them in overseeing the visuals of EA’s next-generation SPORTS titles. LaBounta came to EA via PDI/DreamWorks where he supervised visual effects for the Steven Spielberg film, Minority Report. Other recent film credits include A.I., Mission Impossible 2 and Forces of Nature. He originally joined DreamWorks in 1996 to supervise the climactic Red Sea sequence in The Prince of Egypt. Prior to joining DreamWorks he worked at Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) on many feature films including: Twister, Casper and Star Trek VII Generations.

Eric Armstrong
Sr. Animation Director, Electronic Arts Canada

Eric began his nearly 20 year career working on several animated TV series before moving to film. Honing his skills with companies such as Industrial Light and Magic, Sony Pictures Imageworks and Dream Works Feature Animation, Eric has contributed to over 10 feature films. His credits include Stuart Little 1 & 2, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Hollow Man, Jurassic Park and The Flintstones. In 2002 Eric received an Academy Award for his animated short film, The Chubb Chubbs. Eric then joined Electronic Arts Canada where he was tasked with helping to raise the level of motion and performance in EA’s award winning sports titles.

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