December 20, 2016
Magical creatures were brought to life in the 2016 winter box office hit Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, thanks to software developed by Dr. Dinesh Pai and his lab.
Dr. Pai and former students from the Sensorimotor Systems Lab founded the UBC spin-off company Vital Mechanics to translate research into innovative and practical software, for application ranging from health care to computer animation.
Vital Skin, Vital Mechanics’ first product, utilizes a patent-pending simulation algorithm published in SIGGRAPH 2013 to simulate physically realistic skin.
Using Vital Skin, visual effects studio Image Engine Design created realistic skin movement in various creatures, such as Graphorns, in the blockbuster film.