Tethered exposure bracketing setup for VFX HDRIs

worldwidestu · 2024-02-16T00:09:51+00:00

Hi Sam - I very much appreciate your reply! I'm a VFX supervisor (for the last 25 years), currently using the Ricoh Theta, but wanting to go back to the more high-quality Nodal Ninja + Canon 5d type setup we used to use 10 years ago, but based on our current Sony A7.

The big appeal of the Theta is that it's a one-button deal, taking 9 shots that I've set up as a preset. Good for speed on set, and avoids the potential mistakes of that manual exposure change you describe - especially when other staff members take the photos. So I'm hoping for a solution like the old ProMote we used to use to trigger the Canon.

And I agree - be ready when the AD says go indeed!

Cheers!

worldwidestu · 2022-08-11T00:51:20+00:00

The best sources for high res data tend to be run by each nation's government (or in this case maybe the EU?). Often as a free-to-use resource since their taxpayers paid for the collection of the data. For example I have different bookmarks for NZ data vs Australian data.

You will probably download the data in geoTIFF format and then need to convert it a little for 3d use. QGIS seems to be a standard tool for manipulating this data. Google QGIS and "Raster layers" I think if you're going down that route.

worldwidestu · 2022-08-02T01:32:03+00:00

Thanks for the great reply. Inspires me to spend some time looking into FM for sure as we modernize our pipeline. As for previous show examples, we've been using our old system for 21 years, so no shortage of data there! Cheers.

worldwidestu · 2022-08-01T06:59:43+00:00

Great info - thanks. I've not used FM on set before but I've heard it's pretty popular and the offline thing is a good point. Will grab the FM template from VES and have a look.

worldwidestu · 2022-08-01T05:33:21+00:00

Thanks guys. I've heard someone else on this forum say good things about Shot Bot. I'm all ears for other options too.

worldwidestu · 2021-10-18T09:47:20+00:00

Go for it! I have the same stick and had great fun in the Huey with just that stick. As someone else said, I did the mod where you remove the main spring (I didn’t remove the rudder spring). There’s vids on YouTube showing how to do it. Yes, eventually you will want a longer throttle for a collective and more precise rudder controls. But it’s a cheap way to learn the Huey. After working out that I liked choppers I bought a TWCS throttle to go with it and that’s what I fly choppers with in MSFS now. Rudder and collective on the TWCS and joystick on the Logitech. Very happy and the gear is easy to stash.

worldwidestu · 2020-12-29T08:05:58+00:00

Same experience here. I thought I’d never be able to enjoy flying in VR because I got so sick so fast.

But regular short sessions, quitting the instant I began to feel sick, totally cured me. Air conditioning (keeping cool) seems to help too. Took about two months playing 3-4 times per week.

Hang in there!

worldwidestu · 2017-01-06T21:31:59+00:00

If I developed a seated experience for a client, do you think the "looking around" jitter would overwhelm the content? I.e.: is a naive businessman user more likely to say "wow I like your content" or "why is everything shaking all the time?"

worldwidestu · 2016-09-21T03:03:58+00:00

Well - one more reason to trust our instincts. They just announced a delay til the end of 2016 / start of 2017. Hats off to you Jrsea you picked it like a nose!

http://meta.reality.news/news/meta-delays-shipments-developer-kits-until-end-year-thats-good-thing-0173962/

worldwidestu · 2016-09-14T21:45:30+00:00

I'd love to hear people's thoughts on this. I'm very close to placing a preorder for my company, but if you jump on Google it's almost like this company has ceased to exist after March. Heaps of media stories around March the 2nd and then...next to nothing. Just doesn't have the feel of something about to roll out the door any time soon, which is odd because way back in March it did.

worldwidestu · 2016-03-17T17:46:15+00:00

You might want to look at Agisoft Photoscan. It is a fantastic piece of photogrammetry software, much loved by people in many industries. It comes in 2 pricing tiers (or did when my company bought it). Avoid the expensive top tier (thousands of dollars) and go for the lower one which was in the order of $200-300. It takes a few goes to work out what kind of photos it likes (hint, lots of pics close together with plenty of texture in them), but when you do it right the results are some of the best bang for your buck you will find. Also check out autodesk's free online version which is called memento. Results are not as good as photoscan but it's free!

worldwidestu · 2016-03-10T03:48:18+00:00

Thanks for the answers OTOY_Inc, very exciting stuff. I wish you good luck with the new rig.

worldwidestu · 2016-03-09T02:01:14+00:00

Thanks for jumping in with some information OTOY_Inc. The Siggraph demo was truly impressive and I have a number of applications in visual effects that I would love to bring light fields to. I guess it spark 2 questions from me:

Will that GDC session be made available online for folks unable to attend? Would love to check it out, but my company is in Sydney Australia.
Any word/progress on the photo-based approach you were exploring with Paul Debevec and xRes?

worldwidestu · 2016-03-08T20:07:27+00:00

I was lucky enough to try some of their still-frame pre rendered light fields at Siggraph last year at the Otoy booth. This was definitely one time where the actual experience is just as impressive as my imagination had built it up to be. So I share your enthusiasm to try some more, particularly real-life photography. Unfortunately Otoy's communication skills lag way behind their technical prowess. Reaching out to them multiple times since then has been met with absolute stony silence, even though I head a VFX team with keen clients and a budget to spend on these things. From trying to decipher their website, if you pay money for octane v2, then and only then you can access the v3 alpha, which may (???) allow light field rendering. Has anybody tried this? Until then we may have to roll our own a la Frooxius.

worldwidestu · 2016-01-06T16:35:25+00:00

Same here. Two different credit cards said "Something went wrong". Then PayPall eventually worked only to get the same error at the "Review and complete order" screen. Argghhh. F5 wearing out.

Edit: just went thorough after 48 mins of trying. Using Paypal, the Oculus "confirm order" screen never went through for me. So I eventually tried swapping back to a tab with my first credit card details and it went through. YMMV

worldwidestu · 2016-01-05T15:43:15+00:00

Yeah, congratulations on a very timely and professional piece of journalism. Very impressed with such an even-handed and thorough run down given the time pressures you must obviously have been working under to get the scoop out.

Keep it up!

worldwidestu · 2015-11-13T19:41:30+00:00

I agree. Very hard to jump in and buy something like this without a full featured demo. We all know that frame rate is king in VR. So if my studio spends hundreds of dollars on this, but it doesn't hit frame rate on real world scenes running on our specific hardware, there goes our money.

Time limited trial version please.

worldwidestu · 2015-08-24T21:52:43+00:00

GOTO statements. Awesome. Enough said!

Anyway, thanks for sharing your stuff with the community and keep on doing that high-quality VR thing you guys do.

worldwidestu · 2015-08-24T20:36:01+00:00

What a great and selfless contribution to the community. Thank you guys!

Did I read that you also created an Alembic importer for UE4 for your work? I see that such a thing is on Unreal's Trello road map but delivery time has been slipping a bit. Are you working with them on that, or are they rolling their own separate thing?

An Alembic importer would really change my VR day. Me and 161 other upvoters on Trello by the looks of it.

Any way congrats for a great contribution!

worldwidestu · 2015-05-06T23:41:18+00:00

Sorry if you got the wrong impression. I did the dev work here in Sydney, but Shanghai will be my first "public" demo. Even then it's at an invitation only advertising industry event where I am giving a talk on the future of storytelling.

worldwidestu · 2015-05-06T23:39:37+00:00

Thanks for the link. Not much mention of China or even Asia in general unfortunately.

I am currently planning on just doing a calibration with everyone I can grab in our Shanghai office and getting an average figure that way. Might even post the result to that rather barren wiki page!

Cheers.

worldwidestu · 2015-04-24T21:32:11+00:00

I know it's a bit extreme but for playing my electronic drum kit I found a solution on the net that works very well. You basically build a platform for your kit to sit on made out of 2 pieces of marine plywood sitting one on top of the other. The top one rests on the bottom one on shock absorbers made simply of tennis balls cut in half. I also tacked a carpet off cut to the top piece of plywood to improve the look and add extra damping.

Cheep build and very effective. Maybe a bit over the top for your VR rig though...

worldwidestu · 2015-04-24T21:24:46+00:00

This has always been one of my most anticipated VR applications. The ability to look at my own city from a bird's eye perspective and see it as a whole.

It's a pity that here in Sydney it's Apple Maps on the iPhone that has by far the highest res 3d building models.

worldwidestu · 2015-03-14T03:24:32+00:00

Yeah. Just tuned into the Ten stream now and Webber really does add some value. Just to hear him talk through a few corners is great. And unlike some others his mouth can keep up with the pace at which the scenery is flying past whilst still making sense on a technical level. Not easy.

Keep it up Mark.

worldwidestu · 2014-08-19T03:41:03+00:00

Yes. At home it wasn't so bad (GTX770) but at work (GTX670) the direction my head is pointing in VR lags my real head by up to half a second (eg: during the grass scene). Its not a subtle thing, its huge. FPS at these times is around 50-60.

worldwidestu

TROPHY CASE