A method for automatically animating lip synchronization and facial expression of three-dimensional characters comprising:</claim-text> obtaining a first set of rules that defines a morph weight set stream as a function of phoneme sequence and times iated with said phoneme sequence; obtaining a plurality of sub-sequences of timed phonemes corresponding to a desired audio sequence for said three-dimensional characters; generating an output morph weight set stream by applying said first set of rules to each sub-sequence of said plurality of sub-sequences of timed phonemes; and applying said output morph weight set stream to an input sequence of animated characters to generate an output sequence of animated characters with lip and facial expression synchronized to said audio sequence. view more

The method of claim 1, wherein said first set of rules comprises:</claim-text> correspondence rules between all visual phoneme groups and morph weight sets; and morph weight set transition rules specifying durational data between morph weight sets.

The method of claim 2, wherein said durational data comprises transition start and transition end times.

The method of claim 1, wherein said desired audio sequence is from a pre-recorded live performance.

The method of claim 1, wherein said plurality of subsequences of timed phonemes is obtained from a file.

The method of claim 1, wherein said generating said output morph weight stream comprises:</claim-text> generating an appropriate morph weight set corresponding to each subsequence of said timed phonemes; and generating time parameters for transition id appropriate morph weight set from a morph weight set of a prior sub-sequence of said timed data. view more

The method of claim 1, wherein said plurality of subsequences of timed phonemes comprises a timed aligned phonetic transcriptions sequence.

The method of claim 13, wherein said plurality of subsequences of timed phonemes further comprises time aligned emotional transcription data.

The method of claim 9, wherein said transition parameters comprises:</claim-text> transition start time; and transition end time.

The method of claim 16, further comprising:</claim-text> generating said output morph weight set stream by interpolating between morph weight sets at said transition start time and said transition end time according to a desired frame rate of said t sequence of animated characters. view more

A method for automatically animating lip synchronization and facial expression of three-dimensional characters comprising:</claim-text> obtaining a first set of rules that define output morph weight set stream as a function of phoneme sequence and of said phoneme sequence; obtaining a timed data file of phonemes having a plurality of sub-sequences; generating an intermediate stream of output morph weight sets and a plurality of transition parameters between two adjacent morph weight sets by evaluating said plurality of sub-sequences against said first set of rules; generating a final stream of output morph weight sets at a desired frame rate from said intermediate stream of output morph weight sets and said plurality of transition parameters; and applying said final stream of output morph weight sets to a sequence of animated characters to produce lip synchronization and facial expression control of said animated characters. view more

The method of claim <HIL><BOLD>1</BOLD></HIL> wherein said timed data is a timed aligned phonetic transcriptions data.

The method of claim <HIL><BOLD>7</BOLD></HIL> wherein said timed data further comprises time aligned data.

The method of claim <HIL><BOLD>7</BOLD></HIL> wherein said timed data further comprises time aligned emotional transcription data.

The method of claim <HIL><BOLD>1</BOLD></HIL> wherein said first set of rules comprises:</claim-text> correspondence rules between a plurality of visual phoneme groups and a plurality of morph weight sets; and morph weight set transition rules r generating transitionary curves between morph weight sets. view more