Disney Clone A Human Face, Create More Realistic Animatronics

Who even knew Disney had a research department? It’s called Disney Research and they’ve been looking at face cloning technology. As well as being a potential way to create the next tween stars, it’s hoped they can use it to create animatronic models at their theme parks so they look more human, less uncanny valley.

The process of Physical Face Cloning starts by capturing 3D facial expressions from a human subject, gathering data about the characteristics of the skin and how it moves. They then figure out how this will effect the silicon material they use for the synthetic skin and use physics-simulation software to predict the behavior of the robotic face. Thus a human face becomes an animatronic clone, greeting visitors at Disney’s theme parks.

It makes you wonder what Ray Bradbury would’ve thought of these new “miracles of rare device”.

[via DVICE]

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