Computer facial animation: A survey

Abstract

Since the pioneering work of Frederic I. Parke [1] in 1972, significant research efforts have been attempted to generate realistic facial modeling and animation. The most ambitious attempts perform the face modeling and rendering in real time. Because of the complexity of human facial anatomy and our inherent sensitivity to facial appearance, there is no real-time system that generates subtle facial expressions and emotions realistically on an avatar. Although some recent work has produced realistic results with a relatively fast performance, the process for generating facial animation entails extensive human intervention or tedious tuning. The ultimate goal for research in facial modeling and animation is a system that (1) creates realistic animation, (2) operates in real time, (3) is automated as much as possible, and (4) adapts easily to individual faces. © Springer-Verlag London Limited 2008.