What is Act-One
Act-One is Runway an AI generative character performance tool launched by Runway that generates expressive character performances based on simple video input. The tool uses generative models to transform an actor's live performance into a 3D model, suitable for animation pipelines while preserving emotion and detail. Compared with traditional facial animation, Act-One simplifies the production process and requires no additional equipment; only a single camera is needed to generate realistic virtual character animations. Act-One supports diverse character performances and the generation of multi-turn dialogue scenes, providing new creative pathways for film, animation production, character design, and narrative content creation.
Act-One's main features
- Generate realistic character performances: Based on video and voice input, it captures the actor's live performance, including eye gaze, micro-expressions, intonation, and movement rhythm, and transforms it into dynamic animation for a virtual character.
- Simplify the facial animation workflow: Compared with traditional facial animation production, Act-One requires no complex motion capture equipment or manual facial modeling; only a single camera is needed to generate virtual character animations.
- Support diverse character performances: It can convert an actor's performance into virtual characters of different proportions and styles, enabling more creative character design and performance.
- Generation of multi-turn dialogue scenes: It supports the creation of complex multi-turn dialogue scenes, using one actor and one camera to perform the dialogue of multiple characters and realizing multi-character interaction based on generated virtual characters.
- Flexible creative applications: Users can perform in front of a home camera, and Act-One can generate professional-grade animation, suitable for animation of a single character or narrative scenes containing multiple characters.
Act-One product official website
- Product official website：runwayml.com/research/introducing-act-one
Act-One's application scenarios
- Film and animation production: Act-One provides an efficient facial animation tool for films, short videos, advertisements, and more, enabling animators to quickly generate character animations with rich expressions and movements.
- Character design and development: Game developers and artists can quickly generate character samples with different styles and expressions, accelerating the creation and iteration of character prototypes.
- Narrative and creative content: For video content with strong narrative needs, such as social media videos, educational content, or virtual reality experiences, Act-One supports creators in generating multi-character narrative videos with simple equipment.
- Education and training: Act-One is used in the education field to help students and teachers enhance the learning experience through role-playing and simulated scenarios.
- Broadcasting and news: In programs such as news broadcasts or weather forecasts, Act-One generates virtual anchors to provide more vivid and engaging visual content.