A 3D printer 鈥� a machine that 鈥減rints鈥� small objects rather than pages 鈥� has been used for the first time to give the characters in an animated movie a far greater range of facial expressions than has been possible before.
When fed with a design from a computer, a 3D printer gradually builds up objects by depositing layer upon layer of material. The materials can be plastic, nylon or metal powders, and each layer is set hard by a blast from a laser before the next one is laid down.
These devices, which are mainly used for prototyping products, offer major advantages over the traditional techniques for making the models used in stop-motion films like Wallace & Gromit. Rather than painstakingly hand sculpting every facial expression, animators can instead 3D print many slightly different heads, says Martin Meunier, the 鈥渃reature supervisor鈥� at Laika Entertainment in Portland, Oregon. The company made the animated movie Coraline, which opened in the US this month. By laying down layers just 16 micrometres thick 鈥� far finer than a human animator could sculpt 鈥� the printer offers greatly increased subtlety. This allows animators to capture almost a quarter of a million fine-grained facial expressions.
Advertisement
鈥�3D printers allow animators to capture almost a quarter of a million facial expressions鈥�
鈥淲hen you look at a lot of the models鈥� faces side by side you often can鈥檛 tell them apart,鈥� Meunier says. 鈥淏ut when they are projected onto a cinema screen their subtle expressions really come alive.鈥�
