Flexible expressions could lift 3D-generated faces out of the uncanny valley – TechCrunch

Disney Research is working on ways to smooth out this process, among them a machine learning tool that makes it much easier to generate and manipulate 3D faces without dipping into the uncanny valley. Of course this technology has come a long way from the wooden expressions and limited details of earlier days. High-resolution, convincing 3D faces can be animated quickly and well, but the subtleties of human expression are not just limitless in variety, they're very easy to get wrong. Think of how someone's entire face changes when they smile -- it's different for everyone, but there are enough similarities that we fancy we can tell when someone is "really" smiling or just faking it. How can you achieve that level of detail in an artificial face?