Machinima for Dummies: Second Life has Lipsynch! For real!

Second Life has Lipsynch! For real!

Hugh "Nomad" Hancock — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 14:52:00 +0000

OK, you know how we’ve been going on for ages about how SL doesn’t have any lipsynch, and that’s a major problem?

It does, apparently. According to Phil Rice, it’s been in there for ages - since July.

How? Well, it’s built into the viewer. Press CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+D, choose Character from the Advanced menu which appears, and choose “Enable Lipsynch”.

And it looks pretty good! Now all we need is facial animation…

(Side note - how the hell did I not hear about this? Was I being totally ignorant, or did they, erm, not publicise it much?)

"Second Life has Lipsynch! For real! " by Johnnie Ingram

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 14:49:41 +0000

@Kate - I think you’re right. The whole publicity strategy seems to be “if you build it they will come”. Lip-sync and facial animation in SL is a huge deal for us. Perhaps we’re the only community who view it as news-worthy?

Either way, this is a very exciting development. Or at least it was, in July, when everyone but Hugh and me found out about it ;-)

"Second Life has Lipsynch! For real! " by Trace

Sat, 10 Jan 2009 18:28:01 +0000

The expressions are only really good for comedy, they look over-the-top for anything serious.

"Second Life has Lipsynch! For real! " by Trace

Sat, 10 Jan 2009 18:26:20 +0000

They look like poses because the expressions have been chopped up from the inworld gestures which you can find in the library/inventory, and yes you can blend them. Don’t pay for a Hud either there are plenty for free.

"Second Life has Lipsynch! For real! " by Phil Rice

Sat, 10 Jan 2009 16:17:13 +0000

Yeah, the facial expressions are there, not as a function of the viewer, but one can concoct a puppet-like interface to invoke different face animations on command. Go to xstreetsl.com, to Marketplace, and do a search for “face animation” and you’ll see many HUDs available for controlling face. I don’t think there’s any blending at this time, they are more like poses, but they work.

"Second Life has Lipsynch! For real! " by Kate

Sat, 10 Jan 2009 16:03:17 +0000

Facial animation is there too Hugh, though the choices of expression are somewhat basic. I think the SL publicity department depends on people finding things out by accident :)