Hello!

I've just got my 4 PS3 eyes, and am eager to get things set up, but I've ran into a few snags and I'm not sure what the problem is. I've read through the tutorials multiple times, but I'm still getting problematic results, I think it's due to the calibration video but I could be wrong. although I've re-recorded about a dozen calibration videos now...

Anyways, this is what I'm doing, maybe someone will see where my error is.
Firstly, I've set up my cameras:

Next I create my calibration video. After calibrating and setting several ground points I have something like this. NOTE: Auto detect initial camera positions is CHECKED. This looks good to me, barely any red, and the cameras look like how they are set up.

I save this scene and record some action.
Click new, select action project, and choose my calibration scene config.
I change the ROI to the beginning of the T-pose, and match the default character to my actor as best I can. Alternating between refit pose and analyze actor appearance.

First thing I notice is the default character height is set to 1.70m, so I change that to match my actors height (1.75m) and right away I notice that things are not lining up, switching between the views the problems get worse as we go..


What can I do to get better results? I've recorded a dozen new calibration videos, and they all give the same results, and after a week of trying I'm out of ideas. I've read a few things about manual calibration, but I'm still a little confused when to do that. Do let it calibrate and auto detect the positions, then modify them and click calibrate again? Any insight would be great.

Thanks!

Hi

So, what's your problem? The calibration looks good, though computed heights for cameras #3 and #4 differ by a few cm from the actual(?) ones you've supplied. But that should not be of a big issue. On the last screenshot (action) it looks like you only need to move the model a bit towards camera #1 and maybe bend forward a little to get a good match with the video.
When processing an action, you should first set up the size parameters of a model (height, BMI etc), then run Analyze Actor Appearance. Don't stick strictly to the actor's known height, choose a value that allows better matching of a model to the video. There usually some errors involved in measuring actor's height, setting the scene's scale etc. So, selecting a model's height within some range from measured actor's height is quite normal.

Oops, sorry about that I guess I forgot a few screenshots.

Since it looks like the camera positions aren't calculated correctly (even with error) I can't get the actor to fit on the default character. Every time I hit "Fit to pose" or begin tracking motion it goes crazy and gets completely unusable results.


Only once I hit analyze actor appearance and refit post about 10 times things start to match up a bit better, although the error is 100x better already, so this is normal? I guess in my naivety I thought things would be fixed on the first pass.

I'm still having a few problems though, like character arms being bent while trying to match the t-pose, and feet not quite tracking right, and some other mismatching actions Any tips to fix this? I'll try putting on some dark shoes, and maybe a dark long-sleeve shirt and gloves to increase contrast.

You should press Analyze Actor Appearance before Refit Pose for the first time. Because Refit Pose expects the colors are already properly defined.
Usually 2-3 iterations of Analyze-Refit are sufficient to get obtain good color match.

I see that your skin color (arms) is close to the surrounding walls, that's why you may experience troubles with excess arm bend. Yes, putting clothes of more contrast (to environment) colors makes a big sense. Also, wearing T-shirt over long-sleeved shirt of different color would help to track arms when they are close to the body.

Alrighty, thanks for your help. After changing to more contrasting clothing and doing more analyzing of the actor I've managed to get good results. I'm still getting a bit of stuttering motion while tracking (especially on feet) but I'm gunna guess that's from the shadows on the ground, dark colour floor getting lost with the black shoes. I'll try getting better lighting in here too, and hopefully that will give a little better results.

I'm currently letting an action video track, and so far it looks pretty spot on!

Thanks again! :)

If by 'stuttering' you mean jitter, seeing some of that is normal--you will almost always see jitter in the initial tracking pass. Don't worry too much about that as it should get cleaned up in the Jitter Removal stage.

When running Configurable Jitter Removal, set the strength of the legs higher than the rest of the body. This is more important when the actor is standing still. When the actor is walking or jumping about, you can ease up on it.

G.

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