VPTwin: Real-Sim-Real Video Prediction for Robotic Manipulation Planning
Organizations: Carnegie Mellon University · Shanghai Artificial Intelligence Laboratory · Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Abstract
While action-conditioned video prediction provides an intuitive world model for robotics, purely data-driven predictors often suffer from compounding errors and physically implausible hallucinations in long-horizon rollouts, severely undermining downstream action planning. We propose VPTwin, a Real-Sim-Real video prediction framework that anchors real-world future prediction using real-synchronized simulation twins. For a target manipulation task, a VLM reconstructs an executable digital twin from a real demonstration episode. To accommodate the ill-posed estimation of unobserved physical properties, Isaac Sim simulates multiple forward dynamic rollouts across randomized physical configurations under candidate action trajectories. Using these rollouts as in-context references, VPTwin harmonizes both domains, using simulation dynamics to enforce physical plausibility while capturing unmodeled contact interactions from real video. Furthermore, we establish a predictive planning loop using VPTwin to visually verify VLM-proposed actions and guide reliable real-world execution. Evaluations show substantial reductions in physical hallucinations during video prediction and marked improvements in manipulation planning performance.
Figures & tables
| Model | MSE | LPIPS | FID | FVD | PSNR | SSIM | UIQI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Measured-catalog (548), 6 families | |||||||
| IWS ( 2026 ) | |||||||
| VPTwin | |||||||
| VLM-authored (277), 4 families | |||||||
| IWS ( 2026 ) | |||||||
| VPTwin | |||||||
| Grasp Cup | Open and Close Drawer | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Method | Success | Precision | Recall | F1-score | Success | Precision | Recall | F1-score |
| 0/7 | na | na | na | 0/5 | na | na | na | |
| SIMPACT | 2/7 | 0.33 | 1.00 | 0.50 | 2/5 | 0.67 | 1.00 | 0.80 |
| VPTwin | 3/7 | 1.00 | 1.00 | 1.00 | 5/5 | 1.00 | 1.00 | 1.00 |
| 30 frames | Full-episode | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Start | Task | Failmix | Success-only | Failmix | Success-only |
| First frame | Grasp Cup | 23.38 | 23.30 | 23.21 | 23.13 |
| Open and Close Drawer | 22.46 | 22.39 | 21.22 | 20.25 | |
| Perturbed frame | Grasp Cup | 23.36 | 23.23 | 23.20 | 23.11 |
| Open and Close Drawer | 21.32 | 21.03 | 20.76 | 19.90 | |
| Train Test | WipeTable | GraspCup | PickCup/Cloth | RemoveCloth | Open/CloseDrawer | PlaceCube | Mean |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 27.04 | 28.03 | 31.89 | 27.12 | 25.72 | 27.14 | 27.82 | |
| 29.04 | 28.33 | 32.08 | 28.65 | 26.58 | 27.43 | 28.69 |
Appendix figures & tables15 assets
Supplementary material from the paper’s appendix.
Appendix
| Task | Placement | Catalog reference | VLM suggested |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wipe Table | Folded blue towel on one of the five markers. | Pack cm. | Pack cm. |
| Grasp Cup | Upright cup on one of the five markers. Catalog episodes use a green or blue cup; VLM episodes use the green cup. | Height cm; bottom / top radius / cm; g. | Height cm; bottom / top radius / cm; g. |
| Pickup Cup and Cloth | Cloth covers the cup. Both sit on the left, center, or right marker. | Sheet cm, mm thick, g. | Sheet cm, mm thick, g. |
| Remove Cloth | Cloth covers the cup. Both sit on the left, center, or right marker. | Same sheet as Pickup Cup and Cloth. | Same VLM sheet and VLM cup. This family is catalog-only. |
| Open and Close Drawer | Fixed on the center marker. | cm; travel cm. | cm; cavity depth cm; travel cm. |
| Place Cube into Drawer | Fixed at the center; blue or red cube on the left or right marker. | Cube cm, g. | Cube cm, g. This family is catalog-only. |
| Parameter | Mild | Mid | Harsh |
|---|---|---|---|
| Towel mass (g) | – | – | |
| Towel friction | – | – | |
| Cup mass (g) | – | – | |
| Cup friction | – | – | |
| Cloth mass (g) | – | – | |
| Cloth friction | – | – |
| Parameter | Suggested | Suggested range |
|---|---|---|
| Towel width (cm) | – | |
| Towel depth (cm) | – | |
| Towel pack height (cm) | – | |
| Towel density (kg/m 3 ) | – | |
| Towel mass (g) | – | |
| Towel friction | – |
| Measured-catalog | VLM-authored | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Task | Train | Val | Test | Train | Val | Test |
| Wipe Table | 86 | 10 | 10 | 62 | 8 | 8 |
| Grasp Cup | 103 | 13 | 13 | 24 | 5 | 3 |
| Pickup Cup and Cloth | 85 | 10 | 10 | 68 | 5 | 8 |
| Remove Cloth | 35 | 5 | 5 | – | – | – |
| Open and Close Drawer | 84 | 10 | 10 | 70 | 8 | 8 |
| Task | Instruction | Success Condition |
|---|---|---|
| Remove Cloth | Remove a white cloth from over a cup while leaving the cup standing on the table. The arm grips and gathers the fabric beside the covered form, then pulls or lifts the cloth clear rather than carrying away the covered object. | This kind is successful when the arm removes the covering cloth completely, exposing the green cup and leaving it standing on its base near the previously covered location. The cloth must no longer cover or hang over the cup at the end, and the cup must remain on the table rather than leave with the cloth. The final view should show the uncovered cup, the surrounding bare tabletop, and the unchanged red markers after the arm withdraws. |
| Place Cube into Drawer | Open a white drawer using its yellow front knob, pick up the cube from the table, place it inside the open compartment, and close the drawer. | This kind is successful when the drawer is pulled open far enough to receive the cube, the arm transfers the cube from the tabletop into the compartment, and the drawer is then pushed fully closed. The cube should no longer be at its original outside location or sitting on the unit’s top. The final view should show the closed drawer unit standing in place, with the cube enclosed following the visible placement sequence and the surrounding table markers undisturbed. |
| Open and Close Drawer | Pull the initially closed drawer outward to expose its empty compartment, then push it closed again without transferring another object. | This kind is successful when the arm produces a visible opening of the drawer, revealing the empty compartment, and subsequently returns the drawer front to its closed position against the housing. No object needs to be added or removed. At the end, the unit should remain standing in approximately its original place, the drawer should no longer be extended, and the surrounding tabletop should be unchanged. |
| Pickup Cup and Cloth | Grasp the raised portion of a white cloth-covered bundle and lift the entire bundle away, leaving no uncovered object behind. Its concealed contents are not separately revealed in these photographs. | This kind is successful when the arm takes hold of the cloth-covered raised portion and removes the whole bundle from the tabletop, including the trailing fabric. The former covered area should be clear at the end, with no cup or other loose object left standing there and no cloth remaining on the table. The visible endpoint is a bare tabletop apart from its stationary red markers; identifying the concealed contents is not necessary to judge that outcome. |
| Wipe Table | Press a blue cloth against the table with the gripper held nearly horizontal and slide it through short local strokes, then lift the arm away while leaving the cloth on the table. | This kind is successful when the arm maintains contact that presses the blue cloth against the tabletop and moves the cloth through a visible short wiping stroke or back-and-forth motion. It should then withdraw, leaving the cloth resting on the table in roughly the same local area rather than carrying it away. Small shifts, changes in outline, and rearranged folded edges are consistent with the photographs, while the fixed markers remain undisturbed. The supported success criterion is the contact-and-sliding action, not a claim that unseen dirt has been removed. |
| Grasp Cup | Grasp a standing cup, lift it off the table, and set it down near its original position. | This kind is successful when the gripper takes hold of the cup, lifts it clear of the tabletop, and subsequently returns it to a stable standing position near where it began. The cup may tilt while held or temporarily leave the image, but it should finish upright on its base after the gripper releases and withdraws. The final table arrangement should remain essentially the starting arrangement, apart from a small placement difference, with the red markers unchanged. |
| Task family | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Measured-catalog setting | |||
| Wipe Table | 10 | 1369 | 166 |
| Grasp Cup | 13 | 3346 | 412 |
| Pickup Cup and Cloth | 10 | 1207 | 146 |
| Remove Cloth | 5 | 713 | 87 |
| Open and Close Drawer | 10 | 2463 | 302 |
| Metric | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Measured-catalog (548), 6 families | ||||
| MSE | ||||
| LPIPS | ||||
| FID | ||||
| PSNR | ||||
| SSIM | ||||
| Family | Metric | B | C | B | C | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pickup Cup and Cloth | MSE | ||||||
| LPIPS | |||||||
| FID | |||||||
| PSNR | |||||||
| SSIM | |||||||
| Family | Metric | B | C | B | C | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pickup Cup and Cloth | MSE | ||||||
| LPIPS | |||||||
| FID | |||||||
| PSNR | |||||||
| SSIM | |||||||
| Task family | MSE | LPIPS | FID | FVD | PSNR | SSIM | UIQI | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Measured-catalog (548), six task families | ||||||||
| Wipe Table | 10 | / | / | / | / | / | / | / |
| Grasp Cup | 13 | / | / | / | / | / | / | / |
| Pickup Cup and Cloth | 10 | / | / | / | / | / | / | / |
| Remove Cloth | 5 | / | / | / | / | / | / | / |
| Open and Close Drawer | 10 | / | / | / | / | / | / | / |
| 30 frames | Full rollout | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Start | Task | Failmix | Success-only | Failmix | Success-only |
| First frame | Grasp Cup | 0.714 | 0.704 | 0.707 | 0.700 |
| Open and Close Drawer | 0.674 | 0.637 | 0.624 | 0.579 | |
| Perturbed frame | Grasp Cup | 0.713 | 0.703 | 0.707 | 0.700 |
| Open and Close Drawer | 0.620 | 0.590 | 0.605 | 0.558 | |
| MSE | SSIM | LPIPS | UIQI | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Task | 3 3 | 10 3 | 3 3 | 10 3 | 3 3 | 10 3 | 3 3 | 10 3 |
| Wipe Table | 0.0124 | 0.0060 | 0.823 | 0.847 | 0.197 | 0.173 | 0.312 | 0.335 |
| Grasp Cup | 0.0073 | 0.0067 | 0.792 | 0.794 | 0.244 | 0.241 | 0.266 | 0.269 |
| Pickup Cup and Cloth | 0.0028 | 0.0026 | 0.876 | 0.876 | 0.173 | 0.174 | 0.329 | 0.329 |
| Remove Cloth | 0.0117 | 0.0068 | 0.800 | 0.806 | 0.261 | 0.252 | 0.248 | 0.240 |
| Open and Close Drawer | 0.0112 | 0.0090 | 0.723 | 0.730 | 0.314 | 0.304 | 0.247 | 0.255 |
| FID | FVD | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Task | 3 3 | 10 3 | 3 3 | 10 3 |
| Wipe Table | 231.90 | 230.12 | 2182.2 | 2136.6 |
| Grasp Cup | 255.10 | 255.43 | 2431.9 | 2391.0 |
| Pickup Cup and Cloth | 220.18 | 217.52 | 1709.4 | 1693.5 |
| Remove Cloth | 296.15 | 292.55 | 1653.2 | 1781.9 |
| Open and Close Drawer | 309.82 | 307.23 | 2087.1 | 2011.7 |
Action-Conditioned Video Generation
Action-conditioned video generation creates videos whose motion and scene changes are guided by controls, actions, or interaction signals.
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