# X-Dyna: Expressive Dynamic Human Image Animation

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2501.10021 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.10021/

## Key facts

- Cited by 18 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 40 of its 54 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 17 Jan 2025.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 40)

- [Learning Transferable Visual Models From Natural Language Supervision](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.00020/) (2021)
- [Denoising Diffusion Probabilistic Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.11239/) (2020)
- [High-Resolution Image Synthesis with Latent Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.10752/) (2021)
- [Denoising Diffusion Implicit Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.02502/) (2020)
- [Score-Based Generative Modeling through Stochastic Differential Equations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2011.13456/) (2020)
- [Segment Anything](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.02643/) (2023)
- [Adding Conditional Control to Text-to-Image Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.05543/) (2023)
- [SDXL: Improving Latent Diffusion Models for High-Resolution Image Synthesis](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.01952/) (2023)
- [Progressive Growing of GANs for Improved Quality, Stability, and Variation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1710.10196/) (2017)
- [Stable Video Diffusion: Scaling Latent Video Diffusion Models to Large Datasets](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.15127/) (2023)
- [Video Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.03458/) (2022)
- [Align your Latents: High-Resolution Video Synthesis with Latent Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.08818/) (2023)
- [IP-Adapter: Text Compatible Image Prompt Adapter for Text-to-Image Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.06721/) (2023)
- [AnimateDiff: Animate Your Personalized Text-to-Image Diffusion Models without Specific Tuning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.04725/) (2023)
- [Towards Accurate Generative Models of Video: A New Metric & Challenges](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.01717/) (2018)
- [MasaCtrl: Tuning-Free Mutual Self-Attention Control for Consistent Image Synthesis and Editing](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.08465/) (2023)
- [Animate Anyone: Consistent and Controllable Image-to-Video Synthesis for Character Animation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.17117/) (2023)
- [MoCoGAN: Decomposing Motion and Content for Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1707.04993/) (2017)
- [CameraCtrl: Enabling Camera Control for Text-to-Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2404.02101/) (2024)
- [One-Shot Free-View Neural Talking-Head Synthesis for Video Conferencing](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2011.15126/) (2020)
- [AdaFace: Quality Adaptive Margin for Face Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.00964/) (2022)
- [KonIQ-10k: An ecologically valid database for deep learning of blind image quality assessment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1910.06180/) (2019)
- [MagicAnimate: Temporally Consistent Human Image Animation using Diffusion Model](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.16498/) (2023)
- [Follow Your Pose: Pose-Guided Text-to-Video Generation using Pose-Free Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.01186/) (2023)
- [Champ: Controllable and Consistent Human Image Animation with 3D Parametric Guidance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.14781/) (2024)
- [DragNUWA: Fine-grained Control in Video Generation by Integrating Text, Image, and Trajectory](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.08089/) (2023)
- [Temporal Generative Adversarial Nets with Singular Value Clipping](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1611.06624/) (2016)
- [MimicMotion: High-Quality Human Motion Video Generation with Confidence-aware Pose Guidance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.19680/) (2024)
- [AniPortrait: Audio-Driven Synthesis of Photorealistic Portrait Animation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.17694/) (2024)
- [DreamPose: Fashion Image-to-Video Synthesis via Stable Diffusion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.06025/) (2023)

## Built on by (most cited first, 18 of 18)

- [GAS: Generative Avatar Synthesis from a Single Image](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.06957/) (2025)
- [X-Dancer: Expressive Music to Human Dance Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.17414/) (2025)
- [AniCrafter: Customizing Realistic Human-Centric Animation via Avatar-Background Conditioning in Video Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.20255/) (2025)
- [SteadyDancer: Harmonized and Coherent Human Image Animation with First-Frame Preservation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.19320/) (2025)
- [PoseGen: In-Context LoRA Finetuning for Pose-Controllable Long Human Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.05091/) (2025)
- [DreamActor-M2: Universal Character Image Animation via Spatiotemporal In-Context Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.21716/) (2026)
- [MTVCraft: Tokenizing 4D Motion for Arbitrary Character Animation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.10238/) (2025)
- [Consistent and Controllable Image Animation with Motion Linear Diffusion Transformers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.07246/) (2025)
- [UniMo: Unifying 2D Video and 3D Human Motion with an Autoregressive Framework](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.03918/) (2025)
- [LatentMove: Towards Complex Human Movement Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.22046/) (2025)
- [Soft Tail-dropping for Adaptive Visual Tokenization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.14246/) (2026)
- [HairWeaver: Few-Shot Photorealistic Hair Motion Synthesis with Sim-to-Real Guided Video Diffusion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.11117/) (2026)
- [DreamDance: Animating Character Art via Inpainting Stable Gaussian Worlds](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.24733/) (2025)
- [STARCaster: Spatio-Temporal AutoRegressive Video Diffusion for Identity- and View-Aware Talking Portraits](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.13247/) (2025)
- [SesaHand: Enhancing 3D Hand Reconstruction via Controllable Generation with Semantic and Structural Alignment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.00443/) (2026)
- [Generate Your Talking Avatar from Video Reference](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.27918/) (2026)
- [Beyond Skeletons: Learning Animation Directly from Driving Videos with Same2X Training Strategy](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.06903/) (2026)
- [AvatarDynamizer: From Static to Dynamic Human Avatars via Generative Dynamic Textures](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.19900/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

We introduce X-Dyna, a novel zero-shot, diffusion-based pipeline for animating a single human image using facial expressions and body movements derived from a driving video, that generates realistic, context-aware dynamics for both the subject and the surrounding environment. Building on prior approaches centered on human pose control, X-Dyna addresses key shortcomings causing the loss of dynamic details, enhancing the lifelike qualities of human video animations. At the core of our approach is the Dynamics-Adapter, a lightweight module that effectively integrates reference appearance context into the spatial attentions of the diffusion backbone while preserving the capacity of motion modules in synthesizing fluid and intricate dynamic details. Beyond body pose control, we connect a local control module with our model to capture identity-disentangled facial expressions, facilitating accurate expression transfer for enhanced realism in animated scenes. Together, these components form a unified framework capable of learning physical human motion and natural scene dynamics from a diverse blend of human and scene videos. Comprehensive qualitative and quantitative evaluations demonstrate that X-Dyna outperforms state-of-the-art methods, creating highly lifelike and expressive animations. The code is available at https://github.com/bytedance/X-Dyna.