The Interactive Narration of Chinese Shadow Play

Abstract

This paper presents a method of performing traditional Shadow Play with the user's motions via Kinect depth image. Given the discrepancy between planar shadow puppet and spatial human body, we propose triggering puppet movements by the recognition of the user's motions, which could precisely maintain the motion feature of traditional shadow play, and the user could perform complex movements of the shadow puppet with simple motions. Besides, we render the background scene with Chinese Ink Painting effect to be compatible with planar image of shadow puppet, add waterfall, mist and flying birds to establish artistic conception, and also integrate traditional operatic arias to complete shadow play. The implementation results reveal that shadow puppet possessed of traditional puppet characters can be manipulated by users' motions in real time, and scenes of ink painting effect integrate planar shadow puppets well.