Update FaceTrackNoIR

[m1n1d0u 29]

hi thanks for your logiciel it works , but i have a little problem the track ir in game "Shaking" why ?

[Muahaha 10]

Hello guys (and girls?),

Thanks for giving me feedback. Some of you wonder if it's legit: it is! I've made it myself, to make headtracking available to those with a small purse ;)

To reduce the jittering ingame, you may have to tweak the settings. For the sensitivity I would recommend settings around 100 (which actually means amplify movement by "1"). In FlightGear this settings seems too small: 300 works there...

The smoothing slows down movement, because it adds up 'n' samples and takes an average of those. Too high a number makes headtracking 'laggy'.

The neutral-zone put a band around the initial '0', so keeping your head in the initial position should keep the head still. When you press 'Start' in FaceTrackNoIR, you should try to keep your face in a neutral position :cool:

I would like to remind you that this is just a first release. Using your feedback, we will try to improve!

P.S.: Before switching to ArmA, minimize FaceTrackNoIR: it should reduce CPU-load. The faceAPI however is quite demanding...

Hi,

Can you provide us with a stable profile of using the wonderful tool? This tool seems to be the next evolution of 6DOF in the making!

Hope you are able to optimize it to minimize impact on FPS rate.

[MavericK96 0]

One problem I'm having is that even if I click "Stop" and "Start" again to calibrate the tracking, it will not "zero" my initial position. For example, in the program it always says the Y axis is at around 10 when I'm looking straight ahead. In game, this apparently translates to me always looking downward by default, and I have to tilt my head at an absurd angle to get it to look up. It isn't calibrating my initial face position when I start the tracking, because it won't start everything at a zero point, but rather some arbitrary points that screw up the in-game view.

[v4friend 10]

Hello Maverick,

Have you tried the headtracking demo from SeeingMachines http://www.seeingmachines.com/product/faceapi/downloads/? If I remember correctly, using the demo you can see the 'initial picture' the faceAPI takes on startup. Maybe you should change the position of your web cam?

Perhaps we must consider implementing 'offsets' that are applied to the '0'-position. However we wanted to keep the number of settings small, because they tend to confuse people.

m1n1d0u: shaking will be reduced if you set 'smoothing' higher...

[MavericK96 0]

Yes, I tried the demo. The tracking seems perfectly fine based on the video preview, like I was saying, but the problem is that it doesn't seem to use the "base" location of my face as the zero value for all axes. If you included a "zero" button that instantly calibrated all values to zero for the current facial position when pressed, I think that would help a lot. Also, as another "for instance" for this problem, when I try to use the zoom (z-axis) feature, my "default" facial position will cause the game to be zoomed in all the way. The same with the leaning function, where if I am not leaning at all in real life, in-game it will have me skewed slightly to the side.

Also, I have tried setting the sensitivity from 90 to 200 with no change in jitter. All the sensitivity changes is how much you turn in-game versus how far your head turns. I've tried smoothing as well, but if you turn it above 15 or so you get a very long delay between your head turn and the in-game view change. Setting the neutral-zone higher does also help, though, in terms of staying "locked" in the central view and not going crazy when you're not trying to move your head. Somewhere between around 10 or 15 seems best for me personally.

[ronski 10]

Hi all,

I'm "the other guy" of this project, and have been using the software during online play. Each user should set their own settings, there is no one-size-fitts-all solution alas! We (me & V4Friend) both have used the software, and both came up with different settings which we both found acceptable.

To my experience the center angle setting of 10-20 degrees seems ok.

I will post my settings this evening, you should be able to read them in in the File/Open menu. And after tweaking you can save them again.

Remember to turn of the facetracking provided by some of the webcams !!!

Also remember; the software is not considered perfect yet!

I use a C500 logitech cam.

And I can confirm this software is legit. I'm a big fan of ARMA, some of you might have seen me around (callsign Ronksi ). And it's true that these are our first posts. But before we had nothing sensible to say ;)

Try it and post your findings!

[Herr_kalashnikov 10]

Always wanted to try this out but I'm to cheap to spend 150eu on it or to lazy to make my own hat clip. So this will give me an opportunity to test this kind immersion. Greatly appreciated and will give some feedback when I get home and test it on a default xbox360 web cam.

[alef 0]

If you included a "zero" button that instantly calibrated all values to zero for the current facial position when pressed, I think that would help a lot.

I've still not given a try, but this kind of problem is usually what FreeTrack calls "centering". You cannot remember you face position all the gameplay long, so time by time you need another center position to be taken.

Another option would to talk with FreeTrack guys and use your faceapi application as input for their software. They already implemented lot of features you probably would be asked in the future, like profiles, curves, hotkeys ...

[Fergola 10]

FaceAPI has already been integrated into a test build of FreeTrack.

[alef 0]

I've tried smoothing as well, but if you turn it above 15 or so you get a very long delay between your head turn and the in-game view change.

Same here. FaceTrackNoIR runs at 14Hz, while game FPS are 40Hz.

FreeTrack has a multiplier in "Frame rate" tab that seems outputs data more often to the game, and as I remember it fixes it around 120Hz.

As in FreeTrack, a good way to speed up FPS on your webcam is to set exposure to min and gain to max. With default I did run at 8Hz.

[ronski 10]

@Fergola; can you give us a lead/link to that test build of freetrack?

It seemed to me that freetrack was frozen, no new developments were made for quite some time. But I might be wrong of course.

The development of this tool started because there was a personal demand, and no available solution seemed to exist...

---------- Post added at 08:37 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:07 PM ----------

for those of you who have problems running the software due to an error (ippcore.dll missing):

This is a part of software provided by Intel, Intel® Integrated Performance Primitives. This an be downloaded from their site, see below:

http://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/ipp-downloads-registration-and-licensing/#Downloading

I think it was part of PPjoy (??)

[MavericK96 0]

I'd like to see some videos of people using this to see how the stutter/jitter is for them. I've tried messing with the settings a lot but I still can't get it to be playable as the jitter back and forth is just too severe.

[EricM 0]

same here... Full of promises, but I'm unable to stabilize it to decent level for now...

[MavericK96 0]

Another reason I'd like to see a "calibrate" or "zero" button is that I have to wait for my webcam to initialize before I control settings like zoom, and so if I try to zoom after FaceAPI has already started tracking, it perceives me as being zoomed in on the z-axis all the time. Having a zero function would fix this.

[Muahaha 10]

I've tried, only works for 1.05 and not the beta as it will cause CTD immediately. Acceptable delay is to set smoothing to 10 to 15. but the jittery is too much to handle after a while.

I have a A4 PK35N webcam. Will higher resolution or exposure translate to lesser jittery?

[MavericK96 0]

I've been messing with this, and one tip I have for people is to put your webcam down below your monitor (if raised) instead of on top. Mine was on top of my 25.5" monitor and it was too high, since there's no zeroing function. It was causing me to look at the ground all the time.

I set all the rotational axes (the ones typically used) to about 55 sensitivity, neutral zone to 8-10, and smoothing to 10-15. This seems to provide the best overall experience. However, the jittering is still much to severe to use this regularly. It defeats the purpose of having the look when you can't look to the side and have it be stable.

[Muahaha 10]

Hmmm... I was wondering whether setting a range or limits to the minimum boundaries of all the movement axis will prevent the program to translate the micro movement and causes these unwanted jitters?

Since I think I am ok to move abit more to turn my visions or leaning left or right in game.

[Xerxes-17 10]

So the only way to get this to work is to get this ippcore thing which will either cost me money or last for only 30 days? Is it possible for the devs of this to make a one-click full installer with all needed files?

[v4friend 10]

@ Xerxes-17,

Our intention was indeed to include all the files needed to run FaceTrackNoIR. The computers we tested it on (XP, Vista and 7) all worked with the first release. Feedback from other users suggests, that in some cases it is necessary to install the faceAPI from SeeingMachines first, to get it running.

We will look into it and see if it is possible to prevent extra pre-requisites. Your feedback helps us, so keep posting :cool:

@ Muahaha,

We will make a list of nice-to-haves and see which of those have 'top-priority'. Implementation must be done in my spare time, but we will release updates in the near future, to make FaceTrackNoIR playable. Mind you, I have also tried it in FlightGear and most problems mentioned for ArmA don't apply there...

P.S.: I guess there are so many different scenarios, that it may not be possible to create this one-size-fits-all installer. We will try though ;)

Edited May 27, 2010 by V4Friend

[MavericK96 0]

So the only way to get this to work is to get this ippcore thing which will either cost me money or last for only 30 days? Is it possible for the devs of this to make a one-click full installer with all needed files?

No, all you have to do is download the FaceAPI kit at the site that was linked earlier in the thread:

http://www.seeingmachines.com/product/faceapi/downloads/

You have to register, but that is free, and the download is free and does not have a time limit.

[Muahaha 10]

@ Muahaha,

We will make a list of nice-to-haves and see which of those have 'top-priority'. Implementation must be done in my spare time, but we will release updates in the near future, to make FaceTrackNoIR playable. Mind you, I have also tried it in FlightGear and most problems mentioned for ArmA don't apply there...

P.S.: I guess there are so many different scenarios, that it may not be possible to create this one-size-fits-all installer. We will try though ;)

Hey no rush pal, glad you guys took the initiative to start such a project. Just trying to give ideas or suggestions so we can get the best out of it for Arma2 enjoyment.

[due-_- 10]

-solved-

Edited May 27, 2010 by Due-_-

[Xerxes-17 10]

Well using logitech S5500 camera at 320x200, I find the end result lacking. Using the default arma2 profile provided it's a complete jittery mess. It's like i'm on meth and have late stage parkinsons. Changing the smoothing slider brought negligible change. Also, the inability to "zero" it is problematic as since I am looking at things on the screen the camera will think i am looking down. Need much more polish.

edit: The jittering I describe is a consistant up/down jitter that happens about 6+ times a second. Possibly related to the facetracker running only at 20Hz?

Ok tried it again this morning with natural light. Could be perception bias but it seemed slightly better. I have flourescent lighting near my computer so that might be a compounding factor to the jitter problem. However jittering was still a massive issue. Just sitting still as much as I can makes the rotX,Y,Z values jump around +/-1 degreee. Less jitter is seen in the XYZ movement, but the X,Y,Z value will +/-.1 .

What is sorely needed as others have said is a "zeroing" command. I can easily see players developing neck/back aches if they try to stay in the same posture for hours on end. The lack of a zeroing comand also would help immensely with getting the settings right. Also a deadzone for leaning towards or away needs to be implemented as at the moment I am constantly moving in and out of zoom.

Also, does anyone else have a beard? Might be throwing off the tracker, haha.

Edit: Also just had the idea of possibly making it be key activated. For instance atm you can press ALT to freelook with the mouse, insead you would freelook using the NOIR software.

Edited May 28, 2010 by Xerxes-17

[Fergola 10]

I used FreeTrack + FaceAPI test build and I think it was not released for reason. FaceAPI is unstable and not 100% reliable. This is a big problem for games and most important rotation resolution is very very poor and gets worse as you turn.

You need special consistent face lighting. I tried IR mod camera, IR lights on four corners of screen with some improvement, even illumination with no shadows, but was still too unstable.

If you look at official FaceAPI demos on youtube they only show rotation used 1:1 and not amplified like FreeTrack/TrackIR, it is not accurate enough for that.

FaceAPI is not currently a practical alternative to putting something on your head, if you don't want to build it you can buy TrackClip Pro.

[EricM 0]

The tracking really seemed solid to me using the Solver 2, even at 90° from the screen, something where many led system would fail due to the low angle of some IR leds.

I really think the filtering is the issue here, not the tracking. I'm okay to sacrifice a little bit of precision and response time for a much easier, non intrusive and cheap alternative.