I notice you recommend the Logitech QuickCam Pro 9000 Webcam.

Logitech doesn't seem to make it anymore.

There is a: QuickCam® Vision Pro

http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/webca ... 8&cl=us,en

But, I do see some QuickCam Pro 9000's available on-line.

1. Which currently sold camera gives best results (of any camera in that price range - could be USB or Firewire - I just want to avoid problems)?

2. Can your software run in Win7 64 bit?

3. What is the minimum size room?

4. I saw on another post that you recommended using 3 cameras. But, that was with an earlier version of the software. What is the current recommendation?

5. Is an additional codec required besides what comes with Logitech? I noticed you recommended http://www.morgan-multimedia.com/technicalsV3.htm at one point.

6. With the beta, I'd feel much better about buying if you removed that restriction to upgrade for free to version 1.x only within the 1st year - as you could go 2.0 at any time.

BTW - your software looks very cool!

Thanks!

QuickCam Vision Pro looks very much like QuickCam Pro 9000.

So far, QuickCam Pro 9000 was the best choice for working with our system.



Yes.


Depends on Filed of View of your cameras. With wide-angle lens cameras, minimum size can be about 10 by 10 feet.



3 cameras is still a good balance of usability and quality. 4 cameras should provide better quality.



Yes, additional codec is required. You can use Xvid - it is free. For best results, we recommend MJPEG codec like Morgan Multimedia MJPEG.



There'll be a discount to upgrade from 1.x to 2.0.



Thanks!

A few last questions.

I'm considering trying this on a dual Xeon Processor 'early 2008' Mac Pro with an ATI Radeon HD 3870 video card running Win7

So I'd have 8 cores running at 2.8 GHZ.

1. Any reason why this shouldn't work? Will your software take advantage of the extra processors?

2. Trying to figure how many drives to set up.

Does you software work better if you can write the video stream to more than one drive (have a drive for each camera, or have 2 cameras writing to drive C, 2 cameras writing to drive D?

3. Are cameras best placed on same level, or is there any advantage to having one or more higher than the others (like looking down from 10 feet)?

4. I'm glad there's a discount, but would be nice to know the cost after $495 would be zero within the 1st year, especially as beta testers generally do a lot of free work for the beta testing company and have to deal with a lot of hassles.

Thanks!

Configuration looks OK, it should work.



Current version of our recording software cannot take advantage of multiple drives. Anyway, our tests show that it is not realistic to capture uncompressed video even from one camera to hard drive without lots of dropped frames. If you are using a fast codec like MJPEG to compress video during capture and you have a fast multi-core CPu like 2.8 GHz Xeon, you should be able to capture 4 videos at 640x480 at 30 FPS.

You may need to have cameras connected to separate USB controllers to be able to capture at 640x480. At 320x240, you should be able to capture at 30 FPS even with all cameras connected to the same USB controller, but having cameras connected to separate controllers still improves synchronization delay.

Typical modern PC should have 4 or 8 USB controllers implemented in its chipset. Usually, ports on the back and front of PC are connected to separate controllers.



Yes, it is recommended to have at least some of your cameras installed high (like looking down from 10 feet).



We believe that current price of $495 for Beta is already very low. Customers who purchased beta will get free version 1.x updates for 1 year. Version 2.0 is a thing of distant future, it will probably have totally new set of features.

Michael - Could you make it possible to write, not to multiple drives, but to another drive?

I had problems using my MacPro, so I'm going to have to use a lesser machine, and I have observed reports of users having issues capturing at the desired frame rate.

I will have 12GB RAM, so I bet that if I could write to a RAM disk, this would have to help my frame rate and maximum resolution, as the compression codec would have to deal with hard disk seek times for 4 cameras at a high frame rate - but would not have to with a RAM disk.

Could you give this RAM disk a try, and let me know if this helps in capturing (my new computer is maybe 10 days from shipping so I can't test it).

http://www.farstone.com/software/virtual-hard-drive.htm

I'm familiar with their backup software, so I expect it is a good product. They have a 30 day free trial.

Hi McWannabe,

Try downloading the latest iPi Recorder; it now allows you to select a different drive. I tried it this this morning and I am now able to change the destination to my external raid drive. I haven't tested capturing yet, but I'll do that later tonight.

Greenlaw

_________________
Greenlaw
Artist/Partner - Little Green Dog | My Demo Reels (2013,) (2015,) (2017,) and (2019)

Watch a one minute excerpt on Vimeo now!

Greenlaw - great! Hope it goes well.

Could you also try the RAM disk mentioned in the above link? I bet that will allow a higher resolution and frame rate.

BTW - did you get the beta for JimmyRig Pro yet. I'm certainly curious as to whether the iPi capture data will work ok with that. Kind of a deal breaker for me if it doesn't as I see both of these tools working together.

I'll try the RAM disk maybe tomorrow night. Right now I want to make sure what I have works before throwing in more variables. :)

No J|R Pro beta yet. Hope it's soon.

Greenalw

_________________
Greenlaw
Artist/Partner - Little Green Dog | My Demo Reels (2013,) (2015,) (2017,) and (2019)

Watch a one minute excerpt on Vimeo now!

Michael - what would be the ideal setup for 4 cameras? I can easily give one or more a hight of 10 feet (or greater??).

Would I have them arranged in a box where 2 opposing corners were 10 feet high and 2 opposing corners were 4 feet high?

What do you think the ideal setup would be? What's the best height for each corner?

Or, should the cameras be arranged in kind of a circle where the cameras are at the middle points of the 'box' surrounding the stage?

Ideal 4-camera setup would be 4 cameras installed in a circle at 10 feet high looking down to actor.

It is important that you do not point opposing cameras directly into each other. They should look down so that there is some 20-30 degrees angle between their optical axes. Parallel optical axes would be a degenerate configuration (impossible to calibrate).

In practice, you can use 4 cameras in some kind of semi-circle setup just because you do not have proper background for 360 degrees in your room. This should also work OK.

I would recommend that you start your testing with 3-camera setup (central camera at 10 feet high, side cameras at 3 feet, 60-70 degrees angle between central and side cameras). 3 cameras is just easier to manage for novice users.