Now you can have your very own lifesize Leo Messi – courtesy of EA Sports’ FIFA 14 and W+K Amsterdam
Remember avatars? They were supposed to revolutionise marketing about a decade ago with brands living in their own universe (or something).
But one at least seems to be back with a bang – your very own life-size Leo Messi for the launch of EA Sports’ FIFA 14 football game, courtesy of Wieden+Kennedy Amsterdam.
The new game is being launched for XBox One and PS4 later this month. Messi himself was created from hundreds of high-resolution photos of the real Messi and EA Sports 3D scans, which were then projection mapped over 750 ‘bones’ to mimic and reflect human actions. These bones, along with a variety of animations blended together through Artificial Intelligence mean that the great footballer’s actions change based on how you treat him.
Avatar Leo was conceived in Maya but bringing him to life in a browser environment required a custom-built 3D pipeline that was able to handle loads of 3D models and animations for playback in Adobe Flash. This is apparently the first time a life-size person has been created thus – the mind boggles. Who’s next? Miley Cyrus?
Rather brave of Leo we’d say. You can try it yourself using the link above.
The creatives included Mark Bernath, Eric Quennoy, Mike Farr, Pierre Janneau, Edu Pou, Ignasi Tudela Calafell, David Smith and interactive director Andrew Allen.
