Autonomous Virtual Humans: From Biomechanics to Cognition

Demetri Terzopoulos
University of California, Los Angeles

A computer-simulated world that approaches the complexity and realism of the
real world, inhabited by virtual humans that look, move, and behave like real
humans could be used in revolutionary ways with profound impact across multiple
scientific disciplines. To this end, I review an artificial life framework that
addresses the challenging problem of emulating the rich complexity of
pedestrians in urban settings. Our approach integrates motor, perceptual,
behavioral, and cognitive components within a comprehensive model of
pedestrians as highly capable autonomous agents that can perform a variety of
natural activities. Featuring innovations in each of these components, as well
as in their combination, our agent model yields results of unprecedented
fidelity and sophistication for autonomous human simulation in an extensive
urban environment; specifically, a richly populated virtual train station. This
visually and behaviorally realistic "reality emulator" has motivated a
provocative Virtual Vision paradigm for computer vision research, supporting
our work on next-generation smart video human surveillance systems.

BIO:

Demetri Terzopoulos is the Chancellor's Professor of Computer Science at the
University of California, Los Angeles. He graduated from McGill University and
obtained his PhD degree from MIT ('84). He is a Fellow of the ACM, a Fellow of
the IEEE, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and a member of the European
Academy of Sciences. His many awards and honors include an Academy Award for
Technical Achievement from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for
his pioneering work on physics-based computer animation, and the inaugural
Computer Vision Significant Researcher Award from the IEEE for his pioneering
and sustained research on deformable models and their applications. He is
listed by ISI and other indexes as one of the most highly-cited authors in
engineering and computer science, with more than 300 published research papers
and several volumes, primarily in computer graphics, computer vision, medical
imaging, computer-aided design, and artificial intelligence/life. Professor
Terzopoulos joined UCLA in 2005 from New York University, where he held the
Lucy and Henry Moses Professorship in Science and was Professor of Computer
Science and Mathematics at NYU's Courant Institute. Previously he was Professor
of Computer Science and Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the
University of Toronto, where he currently retains status-only faculty
appointments. www.cs.ucla.edu/~dt