Hi,

Now that my 6 PS Eye setup is working just fine, I'm trying to add the move controllers to it, in order to track the wrists. The problem ist that my results have not a very high quality.

1) The first problem I have is when having to aim at a camera with a hand. I'm not sure if I'm allowed to "break" my wrist in order to aim at a camera, or if i have to keep it aligned with the forearm. But in any case, it's hard to be precise. I notice it when watching the captured video: the hand is not 100% in the direction of the camera, and if I'm not wrong, this directly affects the wrist movement. Maybe I should try adding a small laser on each hand along with the controller?

Would it be possible to do things differently maybe, like in giving us the opportunity to rotate freely the hand, until it is aligned with a known position in the scene, for example: flat, aligned with the forearm. A simple button could do the job in fact: it would simply align the ps move data with the forearm, with a 0 degree rotation.

2) The second problem I have has to do with the jitter. It is very high, even after post-processing.

Any thoughts maybe?

Thanks!

Philippe

Wrist angle doesn't matter here--all you're doing is aligning the controller to camera for Mocap Studio. Adjusting for wrist angle comes later, after you've finished body tracking.


Do you mean after Jitter Removal? If so, something is wrong--if properly set, Jitter Removal should clean it all up.

G.

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

Watch a one minute excerpt on Vimeo now!

You only need to hold the controller in direction of the camera for properly matching it. The arm and hand orientation has no value for this. To get better precision of aiming, place the hand with controller in front of your eyes to directly see how it is oriented.
If you have matched the controller with the camera correctly, the quality of wrist rotation tracking is determined only by your manual adjustment of the hand bone before applying the motion controller data.

Thanks a lot. I missed that last point, the "manual adjustment of the hand bone". I'll try hat again.

I just watched iClone6 and noticed they have wrist tracking out of the box (without the need for PS Move controllers). Is that something ipisoft users can expect in the future or?

This is the feature of Kinect plugin, right? I suppose they only use built-in tracking of Kinect drivers.
Support for wrist rotations in Kinect tracking is very limited. This may be enough for basic gestures, but not suitable for motions with active wrist movements like dancing, sword fighting etc.
Anyway, you can try it yourself and share your experience :)

Actual tracking of wrist rotations inevitably involves some kind of sensor. We continue to monitor market for a less bulky than PS Move yet inexpensive solution.

One important tip for using the PS Move for wrist tracking: Be sure to maintain a firm grip throughout the recording. If you loosen your grip or otherwise change it during the recording, the tracking will inaccurate. That probably sounds obvious but when I've worked with performers who are new to this or who don't understand how the controllers work, they will loosen their grip once the recording starts. If their grip changes often during recording, the data becomes pretty much useless.

This is another reason I usually perform the motions I need myself. It can take a bit of practice to get the most effective performance out of the equipment.

G.

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

Watch a one minute excerpt on Vimeo now!

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If you don't do this already, it is best to have the Bluetooth dongle on a repeater cable away from your machine, not plugged directly into the machines USB port, or you will most likely get interference in the recorded data.

To be honest, I don't use the "Match to Camera" button at all, it's useless to me since I don't use a starting T-Pose at all, I just use a natural standing pose with the Move controllers held naturally in the hands by the performers. (I do however use black gloves with velcro on the palm and use black cloth tape to to affix the controllers to the index fingers and around the wrist of the performers, this allows them to release the controllers with fingers and it will maintain controller positioning in their palms), this works excellently. I was using a black ACE bandage to cross wrap the controller to the hand, but this taping method works better for me.

The rotations from the Moves are recorded at the time of the recording, not in the Studio software, I record high action motions/dances with a lot of wrist movements and using this procedure with very good results now, considering iPis skeleton doesn't use twist bones in the forearms, so you will get some quirkiness on extreme wrist rotations.

No need to worry with the wrist positioning during your first track forward anyway, just refit properly is usually fine, then track the video, I usually start takes 5-10 frames ahead of where I will eventually edit the tracking to start for exporting the animation, sometimes iPi Studio adjusts the actors floor height position in tracking within these first few frames anyway.

Once tracked, then you can position the Moves and wrists to the video, (a good several angle view of the hand is needed)-(Also no real need to position the Moves, up, down, in, or out, in the iPi Actors hand, just rotate it, the Moves will automatically adjust to the recorded rotation from the recording pretty closely. (Note: iPi tracking of the arms works better for me with the arms set a little bit longer than actual as seen in the video, it helps when the performer reaches, you can do this or not, that's user choice, just thought I would mention it).

To set the Moves rotation, just run each for about 20 frames then stop, then...

Go back to take start frame and re-adjust the wrists and Moves to align with the video using the iPi Move Tool and click on each Move to rotate it to a good position.
(At this point the Actors wrist should be positioned as close to accurate as seen in the video, forward and backward, in and out wrist rotations matter here now).

Then, you can apply Moves data to full ROI. (This can be done before, or after the JR process is run), I apply moves data one time each before I run the JR, because I will run it again twice each as the final step in the processing and I think it helps in the JR processing, my preference.

Once both completes, run the Jitter Removal at settings you choose, JR DOES NOT remove jitter from the Moves data very well.

To correct the jitter experienced in the hands, just apply the data to the Moves twice, (meaning run it back to back one time for each move).

Always do the Moves data apply as the final step in your processing, DO NOT run the JR process again, if you do, you will just have to re-run the Moves data twice each again!

You will get much better consistent steady results this way.

Once you do this often enough, your workflow and time doing it will increase, as you see the basis of how it works.

Snippet of a dance with Moves: https://youtu.be/hxx9FtgEBqM

Hope this helps.

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