Hand Shadow Art: A Differentiable Rendering Perspective

TL;DR

This paper introduces a differentiable rendering method to deform hand models so that their shadows match target images, enabling creative shadow art and pose interpolation.

Contribution

It presents a novel differentiable rendering approach for hand shadow art, allowing precise control over shadow shapes and smooth pose transitions.

Findings

Successfully deforms hand models to match target shadows

Enables interpolation between different shadow images

Provides a new tool for artistic and graphics applications

Abstract

Shadow art is an exciting form of sculptural art that produces captivating artistic effects through the 2D shadows cast by 3D shapes. Hand shadows, also known as shadow puppetry or shadowgraphy, involve creating various shapes and figures using your hands and fingers to cast meaningful shadows on a wall. In this work, we propose a differentiable rendering-based approach to deform hand models such that they cast a shadow consistent with a desired target image and the associated lighting configuration. We showcase the results of shadows cast by a pair of two hands and the interpolation of hand poses between two desired shadow images. We believe that this work will be a useful tool for the graphics community.