3D Models of the Lips for Realistic Speech Animation

Thierry Guiard-Marigny (1) , Nicolas Tsingos (2) , Ali Adjoudani (1) , Christian Benoit (1) , Marie-Paule Cani (2)

1 ICP - Institut de la communication parlée
2 iMAGIS - Models, Algorithms and Geometry for Computer Generated Image Graphics

3D models of the lips have been developed in the framework of an audiovisual articulatory speech synthetizer. Unlike most of the regions of the human face, the lips are essentially characterized by their border contours. The internal and external contours of the vermilion zone can be fitted by means of algebraic equations. The coefficients of these equations must be controlled so that the lip shape can be adapted to various speakers conformations and to any speech gesture. To reach this goal, a 3D model of the lips has been worked out from geometrical analysis of the natural lips of a French speaker. Our lip model was developed to adjust a set of continuous functions best fitting the contours of 22 reference lip shapes. Only five parameters are necessary to predict all the equations of the contours of the lip model. From this model, a volumic model based on implicit surfaces was also developped to take in account lip contact.

Mots clés: speech synthesis; natural languages; audio-visual systems; computer animation; realistic images; 3D models; lip modelling; realistic speech animation; audio visual articulatory speech synthesizer; human face; border contours; vermilion zone; algebraic equations; lip shape; speaker dependent conformations; geometrical analysis; natural lips; French speaker; continuous functions; reference lip shapes; volumetric model; implicit surfaces; lip contact

Domaines: Synthèse d'image et réalité virtuelle [cs.GR]

Thierry Guiard-Marigny, Nicolas Tsingos, Ali Adjoudani, Christian Benoit, Marie-Paule Cani. 3D Models of the Lips for Realistic Speech Animation. Computer Animation, Jun 1996, Geneva, Switzerland. pp.80-89, ⟨10.1109/CA.1996.540490⟩. ⟨inria-00537531⟩