Influence of Dynamic Wrinkles on the Perceived Realism of Real-Time Character Animation

Abstract

When creating a real-time character animation (e.g. for video games), fine grain details such as cloth wrinkles are very often omitted due to the limitation of available resources. However, we believe that they are crucial to increase realism, hence user immersion. In this paper, we present a perceptual study of dynamic wrinkles on clothes to show that they indeed have an important impact on realism. The models, animations and textures we used are game realistic and the wrinkling algorithm is fast enough to be used in a game. We have found that parameters influencing the perception of dynamic wrinkles include movement type and speed, viewing angle, and texture colors. Our results should be useful for animators or game designers to help them add wrinkles only where they are necessary, and activate them only when they have an impact on realism.