Lights! Camera! Interaction!

How the video capture process is changing the face of computer gaming for the better.

By Lorelei Shannon SIERRA'S VIDEO STUDIO IS located up the hill from Sierra, hidden in a little warren of offices. You'd never guess the people inside are making game magic. From the shocking realism of Police Quest 3 to the warped humor of Space Quest IV, Sierra is using the very latest technology in video-captured imaging to make the best games possible. Where the technology doesn't exist, they create it. HOW IT WORKS First, the art director, producer, and designer decide what the character should look like. Then it's a matter of casting. With almost 400 employees to choose from, it's usually not hard. The level of detail needed in the actor's costume depends on the type of game. For Laura Bow II, which will have a very realistic look, the actors wear authentic period costumes. Police Quest >' has very little artistic enhance ment, so careful costuming is required. For Quest for Glory III, the characters will he artistically enhanced to a higher degree, so an approximation ot the costume is all that's needed. The lighting must be carefully set, just like in a movie. Frequently the taping takes place against a background of Ultranet blue, which doesn't show up on videotape and will make the actor appear isolated in space. The director and art director of the game being taped are frequently present to guide the actor's movements. When everything is ready the actor is videotaped, and at the That means we could animate twice as fast, allowing us to produce more complex and realistic animation. Our technology is always improving. Once the taping is done, the digitized images are turned over to the artists. The eels created by Movie 256 are used as a template to enhance, colorize, or alter the image in whatever way is neces Where the technology doesn't exist... ...We create it! same time, digitized into the computer. The tape is kept as a backup and a piece of proprietary software created by Sierra called Movie 256 turns the video feed into individual animation eels. Movie 15h is capable of cap turing 16 eels at a time, or five seconds of film time. That means many, main separate loops oi action must be captured. Then the loops are strung together in the computer using a view editor. It's a lot of work, but it you've seen the games, you know it's worth it. Fhe video people hinted that Movie 25h will soon be capable of capturing M frames at a time. sary for it to fit the overall look of the game. Sometimes the characters look very much like the actors who played them, but sometimes their own mothers wouldn't rec ognize them. If you tour Sierra, look around. You just might see .i Familiar face. When the video captured actor has been turned into a walking, talking, fully developed Sierra character, he or she is placed against a background, and game graphics are born. I In- video-capture process pro vides the highest quality character animation in computer adventure game interaction. It's also the most exciting.. .lor you. Technical Terms Cel - A single frame of animation, either hand-painted or digitized. Digitization - The internal process that takes place in the computer, turn ing a video or scanned image into a computer image. 'Rough' - is a term that means every movement, prop and background is stripped out and the characters' movements are evaluated for usage in the game. Pixelization - Round features of video captured images need to be pixelized. The artists manipu late each pixel to achieve realism. Video Capture - The process in which a live actor is videotaped, and the video information is digitized into the computer. SPECIAL FUN! Check out the animation inside this magazine. Flip the pages from back to front and watch the characters come to life in the bottom left hand corner.