GZ Exclusive: Animation Experts “LifeMode Interactive” Talk to GameZone Online

by Louis Bedigian

From Final Fantasy Tactics to Nival Interactive’s Silent Storm, LifeMode has helped developers increase the realism of their games.

First came the wireframe.  It was simple and very basic, but held promise for the future.  Then came the ability to take those wireframes, render them into various shapes (a ball, for example) and cover them with colors and textures.  That was only the beginning.

Today, a little more than a decade after computer animation saw its first technological breakthrough, computer graphics are revolutionizing the two top forms of entertainment: games and movies.  Toy Story would not have been the same without computer graphics.  Neither would have Final Fantasy VII.

One of the top studios helping to push the technology forward is LifeMode Interactive.  Responsible for creating the animated sequences in Final Fantasy Tactics, LifeMode’s producers and artists have since went on to create a unique facial animation tool called LifeStudio: Head.  Involved with numerous upcoming games, including Silent Storm, LifeMode continues to revolutionize computer animation.

In this exclusive interview, GameZone Online talks with Rodion Cherednichenko, CEO and Founder of LifeMode Interactive, about his company, its creations, and all of the accomplishments they have made.

Please tell our readers what you guys do and what your company, LifeMode, is all about.

Rodion Cherednichenko: Actually we are experts in the facial animation. Our product today is LifeStudio:HEAD SDK. It’s mighty solution for head modeling, real-time facial animation and automated lip-synch. Thanks to original Macro-Muscles technology you can easily create cinematic characters and use them in your game.  For example soldiers could lively react on actions – personages can say the same phrase with panic or calm expression depending on the battlefront situation.

What advantages does LifeStudio:HEAD and BODY give developers over other powerful engines?

RC: To our best knowledge LifeStudio:HEAD is the only powerful quality engine dedicated to real-time facial animation. It allows 3D artists to store only one head mesh per character, to swap animations between characters, and animate any heads in a flash. Moreover our technology allows non-linear mixing lip-synch and expressions in real time following the in-game situation generated by AI. On average, it takes the LSHead real-time engine less than one milli-second per frame on a 1GHz system to animate an 800-polygons head during game run-time.

Pictured here: Rodion Cherednichenko, CEO and Founder of LifeMode Interactive

Has LifeMode produced any gameplay-related tools or been involved with that aspect of a game's development?

RC: I think the perfect facial animation has deep impact on a gamer’s experience and his involvement into gameplay. Up till now this potential [was] not fully understood.

How much work went into creating LifeStudio:HEAD, BODY and other versions?

RC: LifeStudio:HEAD was in development over two years and LifeStudio:BODY is an unfinished project.

Are these tools being constantly updated, or does LifeMode opt to create all-new tools whenever one has been completed?

RC: Yes, we’re going to improve LifeStudio:HEAD constantly.  At the end of this year we’ll issue LifeStudio:HEAD Web technology using ActiveX control. In the next version of LifeStudio:HEAD we’ll implement support of PS2 and Xbox, extend support of external 3D editors by integrating the  Muscles Setup with  our software, as well we’ll work on integration with other game engines.

How far does LifeMode's technology reach?  Is it primarily used in games, or has it been used in movies, other computer programs, or any other medium?

RC: Our SDK is mainly used in games but the professional package for artists has enough potential to be used in movies and other fields, and we expect to be in these markets very shortly.

Square usually does their computer graphics in-house.  How did LifeMode come to be involved with Final Fantasy Tactics?  How long did the intro and finale movies take to complete?

RC: Actually it was our creative producer Violetta Kolesnikova with some of our artists had worked on the Final Fantasy Tactics project 7 years ago.  Her movies received Platinum Disk Award from Sony and she said the work had been done in 3-4 months.

Here’s an example of what LifeStudio:HEAD can do.

Amazing, isn’t it?

Has the time that it takes to render CG movies increased or decreased over the years?

RC: Yeah, you bet it sure has increased!...

How are mouth movements/facial expressions applied to a game that features voice-overs?  Are the voices recorded, and then the characters are animated to match the words, or...?

RC: First you have to record voices, then you load speech files into LSHead and the personages are automatically lip-synched. After that you apply different expressions over lip-synch to get the final animation. Or you can load the automatic lip-synch results and our animation library at the game start and then mix the expressions with lip-synch in real time under control of the game AI. The lip-synch generation as well could be applied in real-time in Voice Chats in MMORPG but the threshold for real-time speech analysis lies over 2 GHz CPU.

It was recently announced that Nival Interactive's Silent Storm is utilizing the LS:HEAD facial animation technology.  How has this affected the quality of the game, and what does this mean to those who will play it?

RC: This game is really much anticipated RPG and it’s already gained “The Best Game Design” award [at the] Russian Game Developer Conference in March. The Nival Interactive guys have incorporated a very cool character editor based on our SDK into the game. So you can create your own hero (like Keanu Reeves [for] example) and then the customized personage will talk and play the same animations as the preset ones.

What are some of the other titles utilizing LifeMode's technology, and what can you tell us about them?

RC: During the last two months we exclusively signed 4 major deals but unfortunately we cannot reveal all details of these projects because they’re on the first stage of development and we will announce them later.  Our technology is the base solution in four new games of very different genres: from first person shooter to quest and RPG. It would be used for creating high poly models with portrait resemblance and for interactive psychological reactions during game run-time.

Silent Storm features a character editor that was created using LifeStudio:HEAD.

Where would you like LifeMode to be in ten years?  What plans do you have for the future?

RC: The changes would be great. Actually we want to establish our brand as a main leader on high-end middleware market and we see us working in the new entertainment world where video games and movies will be blended together.

Where do you think computer animation will be in ten years?  Do you think it will be possible to create video game characters that look just like the real thing?

RC: I think in ten years computer animation will be around us everywhere – as The Minority Report has shown earnestly. And virtual actors will be exploited in ads, movies and games simultaneously – so you couldn’t even distinguish movies from games. And we [are] involved in this process absolutely.

Thank you for your time.