Vicon Expands Its Portfolio with Acquisition of Captive Devices

Vicon, the motion capture division of Oxford Metrics, has announced its acquisition of Captive Devices Ltd, a company based in Manchester, U.K., known for its innovative head-mounted camera systems that enable markerless facial performance capture. This strategic move will enhance Vicon's capabilities, allowing it to offer a more integrated solution for both facial and body capture.

Effective immediately, the founding team of Captive Devices joins Vicon, bringing along their technology that is already trusted by studios such as Ninja Theory and Deep Silver Dambuster Studios. Vicon emphasizes that this acquisition will not disrupt its existing marker-based optical motion capture systems, but rather complement them, enabling customers to seamlessly layer facial capture onto their current setups.

Imogen O’Connor, chief executive of Oxford Metrics, expressed enthusiasm about the cultural and technological alignment between the two companies, highlighting the potential for greater efficiency in capturing and animating human performance. Meanwhile, David “Ed” Edwards from Vicon noted that this merger effectively bridges the gap that has historically separated facial and body capture vendors, streamlining the process for studios.

Fred Isaac, co-founder of Captive Devices, believes that joining forces with Vicon will expand their reach significantly, providing the necessary resources to enhance the visibility of their CoreHMC system, which integrates with Unreal Engine for real-time performance capture.

Source: variety.com