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Thanks for a much better insight to your issue.
Replies to issues stated in order:
1) Yes, you CAN use passive and active cables together separately depending on length cam is from Machine, passive only works best directly from machine to cam with a max length of 6 ft, (iPi states 3M Max), you CAN use active cable directly from machine to camera and a single cable 10M (30 ft) should be fine, it's what I use too.
Passive and active cables ONLY when used together for a single camera must follow the
computer->active cable->passive cable->camera structure.
Cameras CAN be plugged directly into the machine also, and probably best to test each that way first, to eliminate the cables being an issue, if cams work directly plugged, should work through cables as stated above.
2) I figured your PC Power was High Performance, just asked to confirm.
3) For graphics card in machine using, a 560 Ti is a Direct X 11 card, so should be ok for Recording, but tracking will not be at a very good speed for PS Eyes recordings, but maybe you plan on using better home machine for tracking.
4) Active cable always have a larger Female plastic end on them and some have a small plastic cylinder around the cable on the Male end, but not all have this, it is used as a signal enhancer, so they say. I have only one with this cylinder and 5 without it, and no difference in signal quality from the PS Eyes.
Yes, it is fine to work with 640x480 @ 50 fps recording, many do that run on 50 Hz electric wall power, which I believe you may be running on, especially if located in Europe.
5) Lighting is a pretty personal choice, for now to get all your cams recording at a good frame rate, that light you have is fine, but later, you really don't need to go expensive lighting solutions, better to have more smaller wattage lights around the performer, any lighting on a subject will cause some self shadowing, that is why I choose to wear as much black clothing as possible, to eliminate these shadows as much as possible.
I also have 2 - 4 ft. LED lights, very bright cold light at front and rear of the capture area, about 8 ft off floor, but I had to make a shield that covers the bulbs and directs light downward more, or it causes color washout, (a light white film on the recordings in the cams they affect), that's not a good thing to occur for any lighting solution to cause.
Basically you want enough ambient lighting to illuminate the actor colors, but not enough to cause harsh self, or floor shadows, or hazing of the camera lenses and I suggest cold lighting, as it is a bit whiter light, so can use less wattage bulbs, and bulbs can be new style screw in LED type also.
6) Camera positioning seems to be mostly a personal choice, you can probably get 5 different answers, from 5 different users, depending on their rooms, but I will explain my set up, room is 22 ft (7 m) length x 12 ft (4 m) wide, all cameras are fixed to walls, so never get moved, but tripods are fine also.
I run 6 cams also, 3 - front cams (1- centered @ 1.50 m, other 2-approx. 1 ft forward of the center one @ 7 ft. (2.15 m?), 2 - sideish cams off centered by about 5 ft. to the rear, facing more down on area @ 8 ft. (2.42 m), 1 - rear cam at 7 ft. (2.15 m), had to place this way due to my room width.
You need to maintain at least one cam at 1.00-1.50 m, ( I use 1.50 m), in order for calibration to work accurately once in tracking process, best to be the front cam for this.
Some also use real low cams facing upward, but unless room is completely free of obstacles, this is a hard placement to achieve and also hard to keep lighting out of the lenses.
Make sure cam FOV of lens on all PS Eyes is turned to blue dot before recording anything, alert in top right corner to warn you also :)
7) Cams should run in order of the circle from #1 to #6, so drag the order in the view ports to match that, I don't think this matters per say, but easier to keep things in order in your head when you look at the monitor.
Calibration process is the most critical part of the tracking process, so get that very good, seems you have a lot of misdetects shown, that number should really never have a whole number in front and optimally be very low, like .25% or less, I usually consistently get .15-.09%, BUT iPi says up to 10% should be fine, I have just never got that many and all cams misdetects should be a very similar number, mine are always all the same, if 1 cam is 13%, all the rest will show that, but may not be a very big issue as long as all cams are closer in % number for misdetects.
Your reprojection error amount is fine, this should always be below 1.00 on all cams, lower the better, so .45 is very good.
I also use a different light marker trajectory than iPi shows theirs, I dont use the high trajectory cage method, I just run my light 2-3 ft off the floor around the circular perimeter of my capture volume, once more around touching the floor on front, r-side, rear, l-side, then once more around 2-3 ft. off floor, then touch the center point to finish and my calibrations are always very good.
Yes, when you change the value of the first cam, it will adjust the rest to match, this is proper, no need to play with the manual adjustment tools ever!
I use my front 1.50 m cam as my main #1 cam, so set all rest correctly to that, and with new v4 calibration, all cams are exactly perfect to the floor in Studio now for tracking.
(Note: Attaching the flashlight, Move controller, or whatever type light you use, (best to attach a ping pong ball over a flashlight bulb to get better full 360 view for all cams, all the time while moving it around), to the end of a sturdy 3-4 ft. dowel, or pvc pipe works well, and stay positioned in one area of the floor will most likely help your misdetects, position your body where not in a view of cam first and reach to touch the floor points and cover perimeter of capture volume.
8) For capturing, since you are using 2D video, clothing colors are very important, as well as a tighter fit of clothing, iPi suggest a different color for each part, or set of body parts, feet one color, hands another color and so on, but I don't use that method either, so maybe not my place to deviate from their suggestion.
You must have detected the Actor colors before refit, but since didn't have the right clothing at all, that process would never work properly anyway, until you do.
The floor is a major issue, Yes, if have to use that room for a while yet, get a piece of solid color (tan) linoleum, or a lighter colored throw rug large enough to cover the capture volume, something lighter, even a heavy white canvas painter's tarp will work, just affix it tightly stretched on the floor, so feet don't pull it and bunch it.
9) New style PS4 Move controllers will not work (yet), I believe iPi is looking into the issue, but they don't have a magnetometer, so even if iPi does get them working, there will be drift issues I guess.
PS3 controllers up to a certain time of manufacture have magnetometers, I explain it more here, and post several eBay postings to show the numbers needed:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=9988These in my opinion are a must have for the most optimal tracking results achievable, 3 per performer is best, 2 hands and head and how you attach them is personal choice, but I broke mine all down to the basic circuit boards and batteries only, to make hold free gloves and head wrap and still work correctly, but many may not want to go that route and just attach the whole controller in some means that will work too.
As far as the reliability of the PS3 Moves, I guess that depends on the seller and the luck, as all are used now, so do due diligence to try to protect from bad sellers and get the information off the rear tags before buying, but all 8 I have work, hold a charge, and calibrate correctly every time... (knock on wood) :)
Hope this helps a bit more, but iPi may want to add to this reply, or suggest more, but I am confident in my statements, I get the program to record with 3 Moves, 6-cams, great calibration, and great tracking, so all I can do is state my situation, over time you will learn how to make it work very easy, just don't over think things past the basics, it's a very basic system to get working great, once you figure out those basics and stick to them.
Best Regards!
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