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It's flexible and purposeful, telling the whole story from a virtual newsroom occupied by our virtual characters, Digital Dan and VirtuaLibby, who can interact with each other and the audience in real time. Whether they are appearing on a big projection screen or on a web clip, this pair of journalists is ready to go, literally at a moment's notice.
It's the first newsroom without the staff of director, cameramen, wardrobe and makeup personnel, lighting and stage crew and we are able to get it up and recording in a matter of a minute or two, literally. Because there is no need to assemble the right people, put them in their places, give them their scripts and all that, this is probably the most efficient newsroom as well.
 Mede creates video email pieces to promote their tradeshow appearance at HFMA-ANI
This picture links to a page with two videos on it, webisodes which were prepared from Mede's scripts and then delivered to their customers shortly before the tradeshow.
 Mede uses "Flo" and "Chester" Live at HFMA- ANI Conference
Our two characters interact with show attendees from their TV set, while the performers work somewhere hidden in the booth. Maybe you can tell where - the attendees we talked to couldn't! It is a new experience for everyone.
 Digital Dan interviews Cissi on the "In the Know" set
Digital Dan chats up the ever-charming Cissi, and learns she is a spokesmodel for the website USADOJO.com, where she attracts attention and introduces visitors to the various parts of the site.
CYBER HUMANS MAKE GOOD TALENT
The anchorpersons or "talent" are digital. Digital Dan has a full range of facial expressions, as well as some upper body movement, which means he can be just as lifelike as a real newscaster. His non-verbal skills, or body language, are finely  tuned and puppeteered from the control booth, and he can interact with either live or online guests in real time.
VirtuaLibby is known for keeping cool under pressure, but you can see she has a heart of gold. Ok - she doesn't really have a heart, but she does have emotions. You can see those in her face. And you will never see a look of contempt or disappointment - those kind of judgments just aren't welcome in the newsroom.
It's easy to integrate other looks and sets into the KNOW newsroom. Our 3D designers simply construct another one and it is ready in a few days. We can also add field work and other production to the storytelling process, by using the ToonMX software to play back video clips on demand. And we can add lower-third titles and animated video foregrounds, with our overlay channel.
The KNOW Studio is useful for infomercials , and presenting other types of content in an editorial or newsroom format. Our talent can handle tough interviews, natural disasters and feel-good stories with the best of them, and never have to worry about a hair being out of place. They are consistently good-looking and they can be owned by a station, so there are no contract negotiations to worry about. It is worry-free professional journalistic talent at its best.
3D artwork is done in 3D Studio Max by Tom Knight , who builds the mesh for the models and then creates all the expressions, animations and functional elements of the characters, which are animated in the real-time animation software called "ToonMX." ToonMX is our newest software for doing live animation of characters. It is simple to learn, effective and does nice lip sync by making the lips move via phonetics, the sounds of the actors' voices.
All artwork and titles are copyright 2008 - CHOPS & Assoc. Live Animation. All rights reserved.
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