NSF Avatar Grant Expected to Revolutionize Virtual Representations

I noted earlier this year the ties director James Cameron made with academia while making the movie “Avatar.” Notably, he hired Jodie Holt, director of the botany and plant sciences department over at UC Riverside to consult with Sigourney Weaver (helping her act like a scientist), and to develop a nomenclature for the fictitious plant life on Pandora. Now another of those academic ties has led to an NSF grant for a prof at Texas A&M.

It’s an interesting Hollywood tidbit … many of the folks behind the onscreen animations in top grossing films graduated from TAMU’s Dept. of Visualization. Texas is a hotbed of movie animation and video game development, with some 55 related companies headquartered here. Many students at A&M’s Dept. of Visualization are snatched up by Hollywood companies and go right to work on future blockbusters.

Tim McLaughlin heads the department, and was hired by Cameron to work on the alien Na’vi race. This in turn led to a grant by the NSF for half a million dollars. Here’s the relevant quote:

The investigation will study motion of virtual animals to better convey traits that express what the creatures are, such as heavy or light, predator or prey, old or young. For instance, the movement of young animals typically is fairly balanced but chaotic, whereas old animals are slower. The goal is to capture those traits and allow users to attach them to the animal.

The study could have implications for online social systems and video games…

On a deeper level, McLaughlin said, it’s a shift away from animation based on robotics principles such as points in space and rotation and toward how animation is perceived by the viewer.

Complete story here.

"Cute Scientist" by TAMU student Megan Bednarz

Naming the Plants of Pandora

O to be a professor in California who movie companies might tap for consulting purposes. Such was the delightful situation Dr. Jodie Holt, chair of the botany and plant sciences department over at UC Riverside found herself in when James Cameron’s people came calling for advice on plant life in the world’s most successful movie.

Dr. Holt advised Sigourney Weaver how a botanist would act in such situations as portrayed in the film. Also, she named the digital creations seen in the rich onscreen scenery, using standard taxonomies. She made up reasonable-sounding Latin names for the plant life, which is included in the official Avatar Pandorapedia and video game. A treatise she wrote, “The Avatar Survival Guide,” also was included in the Pandorapedia. It proffered an explanation for plant development based on environmental details provided to her by Cameron.

Alas, she has not spent much time with the video game. Here’s the relevant statement:

This project was very challenging but also a lot of fun. What botanist would not want to “discover” new plants and name them herself?

I understand that some of these Pandorapedia entries are also contained in the games that were released. However, my husband and I have not yet achieved much proficiency at the video game, so we have not been able to explore Pandora and learn about the plants that way. Hopefully, we can get my young nephew to help us.

Read the full interview here.

References:
Kozlowski, L. (2010, January 2). Inventing the plants of ‘Avatar.’ [Online.] Retrieved January 30, 2010 from http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-avatar-q-and-a2-2010jan02,0,5033714.story