3D-rendered faces are a big part of any major movie or game now, but the task of capturing and animating them in a natural way can be a tough one. Disney Research is working on ways to smooth out this
A new paper published by Disney Research in partnership with ETH Zurich describes a fully automated, neural network-based method for swapping faces in photos and videos — the first such method t
Robotic arms can move fast enough to snatch thrown objects right out of the air… but should they? Not unless you want them to unnerve the humans they’re interacting with, according to work
Whenever I see an overpass or billboard that's been tagged, I worry about the tagger and the danger they exposed themselves to in order to get that cherry spot. Perhaps this spray paint-toting drone d
Disney is unequivocally the world’s leader in 3D simulations of hair — something of a niche talent in a way, but useful if you make movies like Tangled, where hair is basically the main charac
The team at Disney Research never fails to deliver fascinating (if not always particularly useful) experiments. Take Stickman. The robot is essentially one long limb, capable of some cool acrobatic ma
The charming robot at the heart of Disney's Big Hero 6, Baymax, isn't exactly realistic, but its puffy bod is an (admittedly aspirational) example of the growing field of soft robotics. And now Disney
It seems obvious that the way a robot moves would affect how people interact with it, and whether they consider it easy or safe to be near. But what poses and movement types specifically are reassurin
In our perambulations through the halls of museums, who hasn't wanted to give paintings we pass by a little touch-up in a spontaneous act of yellowism? Disney has created an augmented reality app to a
As moviemaking becomes as much a science as an art, the moviemakers need ever-better ways to gauge audience reactions. Did they enjoy it? How much... exactly? At minute 42? A system from Caltech and D
Sooner or later, our children will be raised by robots, so it's natural that Disney, purveyor of both robots and child-related goods, would want to get ahead of that trend. A trio of studies from its
The Eurographics conference is underway in Lyon and among the more technical offerings from computer graphics specialists are a few cool enough for just about anyone to appreciate. Unless you're afrai
Roboticists at Disney Research are investigating how to improve the quality of human-robot interactions by studying how speech patterns affect engagement with a creepy anthropomorphic bot that imitate
Serious motion capture setups often involve dozens of optical markers, inertial sensors or both, making them a pain to set up and tear down, and producing a ton of data. This Disney Research project p
The team at Disney Research is up to its fun old tricks, this time finding some new uses for off-the-shelf RFID tags. Along with researchers from Carnegie Mellon, Disney’s laboratory wing has disco
Disney Research and the research group at ETH Zurich have created a car that can drive, fly, jump, and ride up walls. By using propellers and wheels, the robot can fly over obstacles and then smack ag
Disney’s Research Hub is one of my favorite things on the Internet. Just about every time they release a new video, it’s something immediately understandable (in terms of its use cases) an
Who’s the leader of the club that’s made for you and me? M-I-C- See? See the visible light carrying data quickly and easily from light bulbs to gadgets! -K-E-Y Why? Because light is ubiqui