Georgia Tech unveils new way to control CG characters without skeletons

A team of researchers at Georgia Tech have developed an innovative new way to control CG characters and objects without a skeletal structure like worms, Jello-like blobs of goo and even the human tongue. The system eschews the typical bones-based skeleton control approach that is commonly used in computer animation in favour of a new approach that involves simulating soft bodies.

The researchers claim that the result is non-skeletal characters that can be easily animated using simple point-and-click mouse movements and/or touchscreen gestures, which opens up all kinds of exciting possibilities for accessible animation including possible applications for real-time animation. You can find more information and a detailed technical explanation here.

Via Cartoon Brew Biz.