"Our Dog Moves on the Screen" 3D Pet Avatar Technology Developed

[Financial News] It is now possible to meet an avatar that looks just like our home dog in virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and the metaverse.
Ulsan Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST) Graduate School of Artificial Intelligence, led by Professor Joo Kyung-don, announced on the 24th that they have developed an AI model called 'DogRecon' that can generate a 3D avatar (3D Avatar) that can move with just one photo of a dog.
Dogs are difficult animals to restore in 3D because their body shapes vary by breed, and their joints are often obscured due to their characteristic of walking on four legs. In particular, when restoring a three-dimensional shape from a single 2D photo, some parts are often inaccurately generated or distorted due to lack of information.
DogRecon applies a dog-specific statistical model to capture differences in body shape or posture by breed, and uses generative AI to automatically generate images from various angles, allowing even obscured parts to be restored realistically. It also accurately reproduces the dog's curved body shape and fur texture based on the Gaussian splatting model.
In performance tests using datasets, DogRecon created a natural and accurate 3D avatar of a dog with just one photo, similar to existing video-based technologies. Existing models often reproduced the dog's body stretched even when the dog was in a bent-leg posture, or awkwardly bent joints, and ears, tails, and fur clumped together, deviating from the actual appearance.
Additionally, DogRecon showed excellent scalability in applications such as 'text-based animation generation' that generates avatar movements with text input, VR, and AR.
This research was led by UNIST researcher Jo Kyung-soo as the first author, with co-authors including researcher Kang Chang-woo (UNIST) and researcher Soon Dong-hyun (DGIST).
Professor Joo Kyung-don said, "This research is a meaningful achievement that combines generative AI and 3D restoration technology to implement a pet model similar to reality," and "We look forward to expanding to various animals or personalized avatars in the future."
This research was published on June 2 in the 'International Journal of Computer Vision', the world's most prestigious journal in the field of computer vision, and was supported by the Ministry of Science and ICT and the Institute for Information & Communications Technology Planning & Evaluation (IITP) through the 'AI technology development project that infers and understands new facts based on common sense needed in daily life' and the 'UNIST Graduate School of Artificial Intelligence Support Project'.

jiany@fnnews.com Yeon Ji-an Reporter