The characters in the latest film about the Tintin comics features characters that are borderline uncanny valley.
Image: Columbia Pictures | Paramount Pictures
When Pixar screened a computer-animated short film called "Tin Toy" in 1988, test audiences hated the sight of the pseudo-realistic baby named "Billy" who terrorized the toys. Such a strong reaction persuaded Pixar to avoid making uncannily realistic human characters — it has since focused its efforts on films about living toys, curious robots and talking cars to win Academy Awards and moviegoers' hearts.
Today, the "uncanny valley" phenomenon remains almost as mysterious as when Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori first coined the term in 1970. But scientists have begun venturing deeper into the metaphorical valley to better understand why robots or virtual characters with certain human characteristics can trigger such mental uneasiness. That understanding may prove crucial as humanlike robots or virtual companions enter homes and businesses in coming years.
"We still don't understand why it occurs or whether you can get used to it, and people don't necessarily agree it exists," said Ayse Saygin, a cognitive scientist at the University of California, San Diego. "This is one of those cases where we're at the very beginning of understanding it."
The uncanny valley metaphor suggests that a human appearance or behavior can make an artificial figure seem more familiar for viewers — but only up to a point. The sense of viewer familiarity drops sharply into the uncanny valley once the artificial figure tries but fails to mimic a realistic human.
"If you look humanlike but your motion is jerky or you can't make proper eye contact, those are the things that make them uncanny," Saygin told InnovationNewsDaily. "I think the key is that when you make appearances humanlike, you raise expectations for the brain. When those expectations are not met, then you have the problem in the brain."
All too human
Saygin and fellow researchers don't think the phenomenon follows the valley metaphor exactly. Instead, they suggest the uncanny valley sensation arises when an artificial figure looks or behaves real enough to trigger a mental switchover — the viewer's brain suddenly begins to consider the figure as a possible human. The artificial figure almost inevitably fails such close inspection.
"Pixar took a lesson from 'Tin Toy,'" said Thalia Wheatley, a psychologist at Dartmouth College. "We have to nail the human form or not even go there."
Wheatley's lab has found that everyone from Dartmouth college students to a remote tribe in Cambodia shows a strong sensitivity to what does or does not appear human. But such findings held up only when the researchers showed people human faces that were familiar to their ethnic group.
When shown a series of doll-like and human faces made with "morphing" software, people said a face was more human than doll only if it had at least a 65 percent mix of a human face. People could even judge an artificial figure's human appearance based on seeing a single eye.
"Evolutionary history has tuned us to detect minor distortions that indicate disease, mental or physical problems," Wheatley explained. "To go after a human-looking robot or avatar is to go up against millions of years of evolutionary history."
When it matters
Today's world has gotten by without conquering the uncanny valley. Most people don't yet expect (or want) perfectly humanlike robot lovers, servants or virtual companions in their lives. But some cases already exist where a more humanlike artificial figure could prove helpful.
Medical students perform better in real-life emergencies if they trained with a simulator that appears and behaves like a real person, said Karl MacDorman, a robotics researcher at Indiana University. More ambitious Hollywood films that want to use computer-animated figures for real-life scenes could also benefit — whether they need a virtual stunt double or a realistic emotional performance to match the gravitas of films such as "Schindler's List."
"For medical applications or certain films, aiming for the first peak [of the uncanny valley] is not adequate," MacDorman said. "We really do need to overcome the uncanny valley."
Most experiments up until now have focused on studying the human perception of a "mismatch" in an artificial figure's human realism. But MacDorman has begun developing an interactive experiment that makes volunteers talk with either real actors or their digital doubles — a next step toward clearing the mists from the uncanny valley.
"We predict that uncanniness will interfere with participants' normal empathetic response within this scenario," MacDorman said. "This will help us understand how the uncanny valley influences emotional empathy during an interaction."
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10 Comments
Add CommentThe uncanny valley is alive and well. Just watch Polar Express.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPolar Express?!That was 2004 I guess you don't get to the movies much? Check out a movie by James Cameron called 'Avatar' it did pretty well, and took care of the uncanny valley problem by using performance capture to get the actors facial expressions perfectly into the CG characters. Its quite cool!! ^_^
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAvatar proves that people can relate to humanlike entities if they are "likeable" by general social standards.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt seems that Donald Hebb's theory of fear not only explains the phenomenon but also predicts it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAn old Sci-Fi tale addressed this issue decades ago, the author said that after finding a way for travelling to the stars, humans had met many different kinds of intelligent beings, most with looks fully bizarre to our habitudes. Once upon a time they met aliens very close to us; just seeing them approaching, the feeling came into the astronauts minds: "You monkeys!", along with an extremely strong drive to start an aggresion to the newly found aliens. Hope this never becomes true. Salut +
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCould not watch Tintin- Too weird. Definitely in the valley.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf you think the avatars or the natives looked like humans, you have an insanely wide definition of human. The uncanniness of the Navi species wasn't an issue because they were visibly not even remotely human. The humans in the movie were never CGI so Avatar doesn't apply.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPolar Express creeped me out but TinTin looks less disturbing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn our youth, friends and I used to purposely, suddenly, develop a slight stiffness of movement and speech just to create that creepiness. And then we'd laugh. The creepiest part was when the "characters" we were playing would finish and sentence and lock our gaze on the person being spoken to with a complete momentary stop of motion.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe text-to-speech software used to create the XtraNormal animations on YouTube is an example of that kind of thing. But in that case, the somewhat stilted and halting speech mimics the statements of real people who've uttered these phrases - making some of the dialogue hilariously funny. Also, having such characters utter truly profane statements strikes many people as funny. I'd guess that using the uncanny valley effect to perpetrate parodies of beliefs and ideologies cancels the effect and makes people laugh.
Funny that no one's brought up the "Alien" movie series, starring Sigourney Weaver as Lt. Ellen Ripley. The cyborgs in that series create some really great freak-out moments. But of course the cyborg beings are there primarily to "fill in" between the scenes involving truly frightening parasitic-predatory aliens which are un-human as can be.
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