Multimodal sensing, interpretation and copying of movements by a virtual agent

We present a scenario whereby an agent senses, interprets and copies a range of facial and gesture expression from a person in the real-world. Input is obtained via a video camera and processed initially using computer vision techniques. It is then processed further in a framework for agent perception, planning and behaviour generation in order to perceive, interpret and copy a number of gestures and facial expressions corresponding to those made by the human. By perceive, we mean that the copied behaviour may not be an exact duplicate of the behaviour made by the human and sensed by the agent, but may rather be based on some level of interpretation of the behaviour. Thus, the copied behaviour may be altered and need not share all of the characteristics of the original made by the human. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2006.