MOVIN: Real-time Motion Capture using a Single LiDAR

Recent advancements in technology have brought forth new forms of interactive applications, such as the social metaverse, where end users interact with each other through their virtual avatars. In such applications, precise full-body tracking is essential for an immersive experience and a sense of embodiment with the virtual avatar. However, current motion capture systems are not easily accessible to end users due to their high cost, the requirement for special skills to operate them, or the discomfort associated with wearable devices. In this paper, we present MOVIN, the data-driven generative method for real-time motion capture with global tracking, using a single LiDAR sensor. Our autoregressive conditional variational autoencoder (CVAE) model learns the distribution of pose variations conditioned on the given 3D point cloud from LiDAR.As a central factor for high-accuracy motion capture, we propose a novel feature encoder to learn the correlation between the historical 3D point cloud data and global, local pose features, resulting in effective learning of the pose prior. Global pose features include root translation, rotation, and foot contacts, while local features comprise joint positions and rotations. Subsequently, a pose generator takes into account the sampled latent variable along with the features from the previous frame to generate a plausible current pose. Our framework accurately predicts the performer's 3D global information and local joint details while effectively considering temporally coherent movements across frames. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our architecture through quantitative and qualitative evaluations, comparing it against state-of-the-art methods. Additionally, we implement a real-time application to showcase our method in real-world scenarios. MOVIN dataset is available at \url{https://movin3d.github.io/movin_pg2023/}

Determining the Construction Costs for Basic Type to Estimate the Sale Prices of New Multi-Family Housing Projects

Over the past two decades, the South Korean government has been regulating the supply and prices of multi-family housing (MFH) projects to stabilize the national population. Recently, active research has been conducted on the construction costs for basic type (CCBT) calculation to formulate appropriate policies. However, related previous studies have focused on improving the predictability of the construction cost in early stages based on existing house sale prices. In contrast, the CCBT calculation approach mainly requires policy implementation in practical fields, without considering the requirements of academics. Therefore, it is necessary to academically discuss a different approach for the estimation of sale prices of new MFH in the construction stage. This study aimed to calculate the CCBT to determine the appropriate sale price for new MFH. We selected four sample projects to calculate the CCBT, and a weighted average method was applied to correct regional deviations. Case application, which is a comparison between the CCBT-based sale price and actual case-based sale price, produced cost values in the range of 98–104%, and they included additional expenses. The results of this study demonstrate an extremely high level of cost estimation accuracy according to the Association for the Advancement of Cost Engineering study. Furthermore, this study can facilitate the stabilization of national housing by determining an appropriate sale price and can contribute to cost management research conducted during the construction phase

High performance 3D printed electronics using electroless plated copper

This paper presents design and performance validation of 3D printed electronic components, 3D toroidal air-core inductors, fabricated by multi-material based Fused Deposition Modelling (FDM) 3D printing technology and electroless copper plating. Designs of toroidal inductor is investigated with different core shapes and winding numbers; circular and half-circular cores with 10 and 13 turns of windings. Electroless plated copper thin film ensures 3D printed toroidal plastic structures to possess inductive behaviors. The inductance is demonstrated reliably with an applied source frequency from 100 kHz to 2 MHz as designs vary. An RL circuit is utilized to test the fabricated inductors’ phase-leading characteristics with corresponding phase angle changes

Contact Preserving Shape Transfer For Rigging-Free Motion Retargeting

International audienceRetargeting a motion from a source to a target character is an important problem in computer animation, as it allows to reuse existing rigged databases or transfer motion capture to virtual characters. Surface based pose transfer is a promising approach to avoid the trial-and-error process when controlling the joint angles. The main contribution of this paper is to investigate whether shape transfer instead of pose transfer would better preserve the original contextual meaning of the source pose. To this end, we propose an optimization-based method to deform the source shape+pose usingthree main energy functions: similarity to the target shape, body part volume preservation, and collision management (preserve existing contacts and prevent penetrations). The results show that our method is able to retarget complex poses, including several contacts, to very different morphologies. In particular, we introduce new contacts that are linked to the change in morphology, and which would be difficult to obtain with previous works basedon pose transfer that aim at distance preservation between body parts. These preliminary results are encouraging and open several perspectives, such as decreasing computation time, and better understanding how to model pose and shape constraints

Surface based motion retargeting by preserving spatial relationship

International audienceRetargeting motion from one character to another is a key process in computer animation. It enables to reuse animations designed for a character to animate another one, or to make performance-driven be faithful to what has been performed by the user. Previous work mainly focused on retargeting skeleton animations whereas the contextual meaning of the motion is mainly linked to the relationship between body surfaces, such as the contact of the palm with the belly. In this paper we propose a new context-aware motion retargeting framework, based on deforming a target character to mimic a source character poses using harmonic mapping. We also introduce the idea of Context Graph: modeling local interactions between surfaces of the source character, to be preserved in the target character, in order to ensure fidelity of the pose. In this approach, no rigging is required as we directly manipulate the surfaces, which makes the process totally automatic. Our results demonstrate the relevance of this automatic rigging-less approach on motions with complex contacts and interactions between the character's surface

Dynamic Hydrogen Production from Methanol/Water Photo-Splitting Using Core@Shell-Structured CuS@TiO2 Catalyst Wrapped by High Concentrated TiO2 Particles

This study focused on the dynamic hydrogen production ability of a core@shell-structured CuS@TiO2 photocatalyst coated with a high concentration of TiO2 particles. The rectangular-shaped CuS particles, 100 nm in length and 60 nm in width, were surrounded by a high concentration of anatase TiO2 particles (>4~5 mol). The synthesized core@shell-structured CuS@TiO2 particles absorbed a long wavelength (a short band gap) above 700 nm compared to that pure TiO2, which at approximately 300 nm, leading to easier electronic transitions, even at low energy. Hydrogen evolution from methanol/water photo-splitting over the core@shell-structured CuS@TiO2 photocatalyst increased approximately 10-fold compared to that over pure CuS. In particular, 1.9 mmol of hydrogen gas was produced after 10 hours when 0.5 g of 1CuS@4TiO2 was used at pH = 7. This level of production was increased to more than 4-fold at higher pH. Cyclic voltammetry and UV-visible absorption spectroscopy confirmed that the CuS in CuS@TiO2 strongly withdraws the excited electrons from the valence band in TiO2 because of the higher reduction potential than TiO2, resulting in a slower recombination rate between the electrons and holes and higher photoactivity

European validation of the Yonsei Gastric Cancer Prognosis Prediction Model after gastrectomy : Validation with the Netherlands Cancer Registry

Background: Recently, a novel model predicting 5-year survival after gastrectomy was developed, the Yonsei Gastric Cancer Prognosis Prediction Model, to overcome limitations of the tumor-node-metastases (TNM)staging system. This study aimed to validate this model in a European cohort. Methods: All patients who underwent gastrectomy for gastric cancer were selected from the Netherlands Cancer Registry (2005–2015). Patients with 30-day mortality, co-existing cancer, neoadjuvant therapy, or missing data were excluded. The prediction model included gender, age, resection type, pT-stage, pM-stage, number of retrieved lymph nodes, number of metastatic lymph nodes, and tumor histology. The model was validated and compared to the 7th TNM staging system using calibration plots and the concordance index (c-statistic with 95% confidence interval (CI)). Results: From the 5748 patients who underwent gastrectomy, 2253 were included in this study. Mean age was 72.1 years, most patients had advanced gastric cancer (88%), and in 1102 patients (49%)no proper TNM staging could be performed since <16 lymph nodes were retrieved. Median overall survival was 24.6 months, and the 5-year overall survival was 30%, respectively. Model calibration was accurate in predicting 5-year overall survival, and the degree of discrimination was high (c-statistic = 0.807, 95% CI (0.787–0.826)). The model was superior to the TNM staging system in patients who could be properly staged: c-statistic = 0.861, 95% CI (0.838–0.885)vs. 0.711, 95% CI (0.692–0.729), p < 0.0001. Conclusion: The Yonsei Gastric Cancer Prognosis Prediction Model was superior over the TNM staging system in predicting prognosis after gastrectomy in a European cohort, although it is not applicable to patients treated by neoadjuvant therapy