Study on Design and Production of Augmented Reality Work Integrated with Shadow Art Element
Year: 2016

This paper analyzes and studies the digital media design work produced based on the augmented reality technology. The work applies the shadow play to show the design of role, scene and action. The production process includes both the image production with computer software and the design and production of the interactive exhibition part of the work for the purpose of applying the representative element of the traditional Chinese shadow art to the augmented reality work in a reasonable and effective manner. Keywords shadow art; augmented reality; shadow element I. ANALYSIS ON DESIGN CONTENT AND APPLIED TECHNOLOGY The traditional Chinese shadow play, with a long history, is an art form characterized by folk and regional culture. As a traditional folk art, shadow art reflected in many paper cutting, New Year pictures and carving builds vivid and humorous roles and scene modeling. All figures generated by the shadow have allegoric shape, geometric symbol, simple color combination and proper separation of light and shadow. Shadow art integrates several design languages like visual communication, apparel modeling, real time interaction and performance. Digital technology brings convenience for people in the field of life whereas many traditional art forms die out. Today digital production technology changes people's living and entertainment manners and redesigns all aspects in daily study, entertainment and life. These increase the design works of traditional culture, folk custom and art element, presenting a new understanding and interpretation of the traditional art element to some degree while enriching the content and strengthening the fun of interaction. Augmented reality is a technology via which humans feel the superposition of analog simulation made with digital media technology in real life so as to create the sense experience transcending the reality for the audience. Augmented reality technology is increasingly applied in many areas including business, entertainment and education. Different from general digital technology which demonstrates digital effect with the help of computer software production, it superposes and composites the virtual and reality in the display screen to crease a brand new visual experience for the audience. "Concerto Timer" is a work made with augmented reality launched by Haagen Dazs. After users download such software and scan the ice cream cover, a figure playing violin will shown on the screen of the mobile phone. This design not only presents beautiful pictures and combines a two minute sound effect background. The entire work is designed to remind the customers of tasting the ice cream in the first two minutes after being taken out of the refrigerator. By this means, Haagen Dazs reminds the customers by making the boring waiting time elegant and interesting. II.  PROCESS Shadow art is an intangible cultural heritage of China and many animation works apply such element. This paper analyzes and explains how to reflect the e book made with 3D augmented reality with traditional art element. The e book is designed based on historical events of China, the story of which is visually reflected by shadow element. It presents the plane and monotonous story vividly with 3D animation through the carrier of multi media for the audience. The viewers may appreciate the artistic charm of traditional shadow play while learning cultural knowledge. The e book titled Fantastic Double Sword Story is compiled based on the story that Chen Sheng and Wu Guang staged an uprising at the end of the Qin Dynasty (BC 209).The work is highlighted by the visual effect design, especially the design and production reflecting traditional shadow art element in such aspects as role, scene and animation. The design and production of plane figures like role and scene are made with 2D plan figure design software based on which the 3D role, scene model, animation and 3D special effect will be produced. In the process, 3D plug ins including RealFlow, Pf Particle Flow, Ray Fire and Vray need to be used. By means of the AR technology in Unity3D software, lively story images can be generated with the pictures produced by the story line, linked International Conference on Arts, Design and Contemporary Education (ICADCE 2016) (c) 2016. The authors Published by Atlantis Press 638 as the developmental sequence of the story and finally presented by playing picture scroll. The self made equipment used in displaying the work is designed as the style of scroll. Viewers may rotate the scroll to identify each picture and form a rich and complete story to interactively demonstrate the work. III. PRIMARY LINKS OF PRODUCTION A. Role Design and Production In accordance with the story setting, all characters in the play are male, most generals and soldiers. To be light, thin, transparent and bright, traditional shadow figures are primarily made with animal leather and hollow carving technique. The purpose of applying computer software in designing and producing role images is to restore the features of the models made with primal process. In order to embody the hollow carving process, the roles are particularly rendered to show the process effect of intaglio. In addition, for the sake of highlighting the difference between the two generals in the story, their faces are colored in black and white, respectively. In the process of design, considering that the e book made with augmented reality will be principally read by children, in order to better stimulate the interest of children in reading, the role images need to be cartoonish. As a result, a body height three to four times of the head height is designed to make the roles look more amiable and the proportion of eyes on the face exaggerated to increase many child interests. In terms of color rendering, the color matching of high contrast, low brightness and low purity is applied to create a sense of primitive simplicity and thickness as shown in "Fig. 1" Furthermore, with respect to role modeling and representation process, joints of the role are decomposed and combined as shown in "Fig. 2" Fig. 1. Role Design Sketch Fig. 2.  Upon completion of the plane image design and production of the role, 3D modeling will be conducted for the role with 3dsMax software. Cubic modeling is more convenient for skeleton binding and animation production at the later stage of the role. For the effect of role modeling, see "Fig. 3" As role modeling is composed of cubes, the audience will see a plane image when the direction changes, which is closer to the demonstration effect of traditional shadow play. The figures in traditional shadow play are very vibrant in color combination, so rendering of the role map has a strong contrast. Besides, the brightness of the figure map is lowered to complete the 3D effect of the roles.  The scene is designed closed to the artistic style of traditional shadow play, which is reflected in the production of scene model and map. The scene elements in the Fantastic Double Sword Story like arrow tower, war drum and palace, based on the overall design style of the e book and representative element of traditional shadow figures, refer to traditional shadow images. 3D modeling and map production is carried out on the basis of designing and drawing plane figures. UV spreading and rendering of maps are made after completing the scene modeling with the method of patch modeling. When the scene map is to be drawn, the inherent color and the color and patterns at different parts should be depicted first. "Fig. 4" shows the effect of local map of the