Success! And more questions: capture area, pose, etc.

[The_Nomad]

First up, a huge thanks to the Naturalpoint team for shepherding Strange Company through the setup of our Arena system so far. We've now got our first piece of nice, clean capture out of it (which I'll render and put on the Videos page tomorrow), and it's a wonderful feeling.

Second - I've got a couple of questions:

1) The capture area we're getting before we start seeing red body parts and general problems is about 7' across.

We're currently set up with 12 cameras, 2 per tripod, in a hexagon, with the hexagon 10' per side and 20' across at the widest point. Cameras are mounted at 6' and 9', all in portrait, as per the videos, with the top cameras not quite able to see their opposing counterpart and the lower cameras just able to see the top of the wand when it's placed in the calibration square, at full extension, in the middle of the space.

I was expecting, from what I've been told on these forums before, to be able to manage more like a 10' to 12' capture area. Any tips for extending it? I can provide photos of the setup if required, but it'd take a day or so. I'm also happy to provide more description.

2) When we're recording a T-pose, the model always ends up snapping to the pose in such a way that it looks like his arms are a bit bent in the pose. I'm definitely standing with straight arms - any idea what could be causing this, or how to fix it?

[VincentG]

1 - Couple of things here

the lower cameras should be at 2-2.5 feet below the upper cameras.

You should aim all of the cameras, at the single marker, on the end of the wand, at waist high. The marker should be centered within the view for each camera.

2 - This could be due to the height set incorectly within the skel;eton setup, or the placement of the markers on the suit itself being slightly off.

[The_Nomad]

Aha! Interesting. I was wondering if we could point the cameras slightly down to, effectively, where you're suggestiing. Reckon that would increase capture area a fair bit.

2) Anything to watch for on the arm marker placement? We've been following the videos, which may not have been ideal.

[VincentG]

Nothing specific to watch for.

[russfrancis]

One thing I noticed that threw me off (I blame my contact lenses ) on the arms is that it helps to have the middle marker opposite on each arm. Meaning on one arm it's toward the bicep and on the other arm more on the tricep side. also make sure the middle marker is not centered between the elbow and upper arm marker. It shows this plainly in the images but I just didn't notice it the first few capture sessions.

[The_Nomad]

Thanks - I'll keep an eye out for that.

[The_Nomad]

Thanks - I'll keep an eye out for that.

[The_Nomad]

OK, we've been playing around with the setup, and we've managed to get about a 10' - 11' diameter circle capture area, which is pretty usable, but still not as big as we'd like.

What we've currently got are the 12 cameras set up in a hexagon which is 28" across at the widest point. I know that's wider than we're advised to do, but it seems to work and seems to increase the size of the capture area.

We've got them all pointed at a marker at waist height as instructed. The cameras are still at 6' and 9', which I'll confess is just me being lazy - it's quite a pain to move them - and they're using the default lenses.

Some pictures of the setup:

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/AX ... directlink

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/3g ... directlink

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/bW ... directlink

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/F4 ... directlink



Questions:

Is this the maximum capture area you'd expect us to be able to get out of our current system?
If not, are there any tips to increase it?
Will changing the height of the cameras have a significant effect? I can do it if it'll get us a couple of extra feet.
How much of an effect does wanding technique have on capture area?
Would we be able to get a wider capture area by changing out some or all lenses, and if so, which ones and how?