Vicon awarded Innovate UK funding for next-gen motion capture research
Two-year funding award is part of Innovate UK’s Digital Funding competition
LONDON, U.K. – January 08, 2015 – Vicon, the motion capture technology specialist, today announced that it has received research & development funding in partnership with a world-renowned visual effects company as part of Innovate UK’s Digital Funding competition. The two-year research funding covers the development of innovative motion capture (mocap) technologies for the digital media industry. Mocap pioneer Vicon, who are behind many of the key technology innovations over the last 30 years, will use the funding award for extensive technology research above and beyond its existing development programme.
The Digital Funding competition from the UK’s innovation agency, Innovate UK (formerly known as the Technology Strategy Board) aims to support projects addressing convergence in digital technologies. It covers film and television, online video, animation and video games - including pre-production, production and post-production processes, particularly in visual effects technologies. The competition funds feasibility studies as well as collaborative R&D projects.
“Innovation and meeting tomorrow’s customer needs is vital to ensure the UK remains a centre of excellence for motion capture. This funding means we can focus on ’blue-sky’ innovations that can really help take the UK mocap sector to even greater heights,” said Imogen Moorhouse, Vicon CEO. “Vicon’s ability to exploit new product development across a variety of our markets means the resulting products and ideas developed as part of this research will ultimately benefit not only the VFX space, but the entire mocap community.”
Motion capture is the process of recording the movement of objects or people. It is used in military, entertainment, sports, medical applications, and for validation of computer vision and robotics. Since 1984 Oxford-based Vicon has been developing technology to capture, track and analyse movement. This includes enabling true-to-life character creation in games and films to improving the performance of world-class athletes to designing ergonomic spacesuits for NASA. Vicon developments include the first commercial motion capture systems in the early 1980s, to launching accurate real-time entertainment software in 2012 and a head mounted tracking system in 2013.
Media contacts
For more information, images, or to arrange an interview, please contact:
Red Lorry Yellow Lorry - www.rlyl.com
UK enquiries: Joanna Clark, +44 (0) 20 7403 8878, vicon@rlyl.com
USA enquiries: Kim Willsher, (+1) 310 870 9822, vicon@rlyl.com
About Vicon
Academy Award®-winning Vicon is the world’s largest supplier of precision motion tracking systems and match-moving software. It serves customers in CG animation, engineering and life sciences industries. As well as those in film, visual effects, video games and broadcast television sectors.
Vicon is a subsidiary of OMG (Oxford Metrics Group - LSE: OMG), plc., a group of technology companies that produces image understanding solutions for the entertainment, defense, life sciences and engineering markets. Other holdings include: 2d3, a manufacturer of specialized image understanding software for defense applications; OMG Life, our IP licensing business; and Yotta, a provider of software and services for infrastructure asset management.
Among many others, Vicon global clients include:
Entertainment: Audiomotion, The Imaginarium, Quantic Dream, SEGA, Konami, Activision, Sony, Dreamworks, ILM and USC Engineering: European Space Agency, BMW, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research – South Africa, ETH Zurich, Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology, NRL, UPENN GRASP, MIT, Ford and General Motors Life Sciences: Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre - Oxford, Headley Court, University of Western Australia, Adidas, Digital Human Research Centre - Japan, Gillette Children’s Specialty Healthcare, Shriners, Marquette, UMich and Red Bull
For more information about OMG and its subsidiaries, visit: www.omgplc.com, www.vicon.com, www.vicon.com/boujou, www.2d3sensing.com or www.yotta.co.uk.
About Innovate UK
Innovate UK is the new name for the Technology Strategy Board – the UK’s innovation agency. Taking a new idea to market is a challenge. Innovate UK funds, supports and connects innovative businesses through a unique mix of people and programmes to accelerate sustainable economic growth. For further information visit https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/innovate-uk
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