ARray - An augmented reality and pre-visualisation tool for the costume industry

ARray - 服装行业的增强现实和预可视化工具

• 批准号: AH/Y005813/1
• 负责人: Andrew Lavender
• 金额: $ 5.22万
• 依托单位: Guildhall School of Music and Drama
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2023 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=AH%2FY005813%2F1
• 关键词: ARray; augmented; reality; pre; visualisation

In 2022, the Production Arts Department at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama successfully applied to the AHRC's Creative Capabilities & Research Fund (CResCa), securing over £900,000 to purchase cutting-edge digital equipment, namely SmartStage Pro XR Stage, Holosys Volumetric Capture Suite, and BlackTrax Realtime tracking. This equipment has enabled the Department to develop a credible XR (Extended Reality) studio that includes a high-quality volumetric capture system with fully integrated hardware and software necessary to allow for motion capture of people and objects in 'six degrees of freedom' (6DoF) ready for use in augmented and virtual reality (AR and VR) and virtual production. As a result, the Department has become increasingly active in technology-driven and collaborative practice-based work across the commercial and research sectors. Ongoing work facilitated by CResCa includes 'A Mid-journey Night's Dream', a project that investigates the potential for AI scenography in the Shakespearian canon, using existing mainstream platforms and bespoke machine learning systems to design stages and costumes that are built in both physical and digital processes to create an immersive XR production. Whilst the benefits of digital technologies that allow broad and rapid ideation, sharing of ideas and the ability to prepare and visualise work for those of us working at the mise en scène end of production arts is clear, the use of digital tools for costume design is, at present, limited. During our work on 'A Mid-journey Night's Dream', for example, the School's costume lecturers have struggled to adapt to digital workflows due to a paucity of digital tools that can adequately reflect the physical demands of costume design e.g. the tactile nature of fabric, the importance of working with human bodies, the influence of lighting, and so on. Where online cataloguing of stage costumes or traditional physical costume archives exist, they tend to be basic and photographic, not capturing the 3D nature of the originals or their dynamic quality when they move. Moreover, whilst there are some similar tools on the market that provide digital solutions for costume design, such as 'Virtual Wardrobe' by Weta Digital (a software tool used to create digital costumes for films) and 'ClosetSpace' by Stylitics (a digital wardrobe organiser for personal use), there is it seems no tool that specifically addresses the needs of costume houses in streamlining the costume selection process and providing a digital platform for collaboration and experimentation. There is, therefore, a commercial need for a digital tool that can successfully integrate established working practices of costume designers with the digital workflows increasingly found elsewhere in the performing arts sector, not to mention other digital spectacle-based entertainments. This project has been conceived to support activities enhancing self-sustaining commercial impact on the UK's costume design industry arising from work funded by the Guildhall School of Music & Drama's successful application to the AHRC's Creative Research Capabilities Strand 1 (CResCa). Using cutting-edge technologies that enable motion capture of people and objects in 6DoF ready for use in AR and VR, Guildhall School researchers will collaborate with Angels Costumes (a leading UK-based costume design house that boasts the largest collection of theatre, television and film costumes in the world) to develop a prototype subscription-based digital costume library, initially of 100 items. This digital library will enable costume designers to view manipulate costumes virtually , without the need for the physical prototypes on which the costume design industry currently relies. The development of this digital library will address a significant gap in the commercial market - no equivalent resource currently exists - and will enhance the competitiveness of the UK's costume design industry.

2022年，市政厅音乐与戏剧学院的制作艺术系成功申请了AHRC的创意能力与研究基金（CResCa），获得了超过90万英镑的资金，用于购买尖端的数字设备，即SmartStage Pro XR Stage，Holosys体积捕获套件和BlackTrax实时跟踪。该设备使该部门能够开发一个可靠的XR（延展实境）工作室，其中包括一个高质量的体积捕捉系统，该系统具有完全集成的硬件和软件，可以在“六自由度”（6DoF）中捕捉人和物体的运动，可用于增强现实和虚拟现实（AR和VR）以及虚拟制作。因此，该部门在商业和研究部门的技术驱动和协作实践工作中变得越来越活跃。CResCa正在进行的工作包括“中途之夜的梦想”，这是一个研究人工智能场景设计在罗马正典中的潜力的项目，使用现有的主流平台和定制的机器学习系统来设计在物理和数字过程中构建的舞台和服装，以创建沉浸式XR制作。虽然数字技术的好处，允许广泛和快速的构思，分享的想法和能力，准备和可视化的工作，为我们这些工作在生产艺术的场景结束是显而易见的，使用数字化工具的服装设计，目前，有限的。例如，在我们的“A Mid-journey Night's Dream”工作中，由于缺乏能够充分反映服装设计物理要求的数字化工具，学院的服装讲师一直在努力适应数字工作流程，例如面料的触觉性质，与人体一起工作的重要性，灯光的影响，在舞台服装或传统服装档案的在线编目中，它们往往是基本的和照片式的，而不是捕捉原件的3D性质或它们移动时的动态质量。此外，虽然市场上有一些类似的工具，为服装设计提供数字解决方案，例如Weta Digital的“虚拟衣柜”（一种用于为电影制作数字服装的软件工具）和Stylitics的“ClosetSpace”（一个个人使用的数字衣柜组织者），似乎没有一种工具可以专门解决服装店在简化服装选择过程和提供数字化服装设计方面的需求。合作和实验的平台。因此，商业上需要一种数字工具，它可以成功地将服装设计师的既定工作实践与表演艺术领域其他地方越来越多的数字工作流程相结合，更不用说其他基于数字游戏的娱乐了。该项目旨在支持活动，增强对英国服装设计行业的自我维持商业影响，这些影响来自市政厅音乐与戏剧学院成功申请AHRC创意研究能力链1（CResCa）资助的工作。使用先进的技术，使运动捕捉的人和物体在6DoF准备在AR和VR中使用，Guildhall学校的研究人员将与天使服装（一家领先的英国服装设计公司，拥有最大的收集剧院，电视和电影服装在世界上）开发一个原型订阅为基础的数字服装库，最初的100个项目。这个数字图书馆将使服装设计师能够虚拟地查看和操纵服装，而不需要服装设计行业目前所依赖的物理原型。这个数字图书馆的发展将解决商业市场上的一个重大差距-目前还没有相应的资源存在-并将提高英国服装设计行业的竞争力。