This page covers the main improvements in this release of Shogun.

Shogun Live 1.10 improvements

Shogun Live 1.10 provides substantial improvements to live subject calibration and finger solving as well as an overhaul of the user interface, in addition to fixing a number of minor issues.

Improved live subject calibration stability

Improvements in Shogun Live 1.10 produce better and more consistent subject calibrations when a ROM is performed.

• Live subject calibration is more stable overall than it was in earlier versions of Shogun Live (1.8 and 1.9).

• The solving skeleton is allowed the same freedoms to optimize from the ROM, but the calibrator is now aware of how much data is available before applying big fluctuations to the bone lengths.

  Note that the calibrator computes both the bone lengths of the subject and the target positions. Where little data is available, fluctuations in the bone lengths and the target placement (compared to the template skeleton) are strongly regularized. As more data is collected, more freedom (ie, less regularization) is given to the calibrator to adjust bone lengths and target placements because the available data is sufficient to constrain that freedom.

• Situations where bone lengths can vary wildly when there is little data available are now mitigated.
• Subject calibrations are more consistent for the same subject, compared with Shogun Live 1.9. For example, based on 16 different ROMs, in the worst case of optimizing the upper leg length in 60% of samples, there is a divergence of 2.5 mm in 1.10, as opposed to a divergence of 9 mm in 1.9.

The following graphs compare the cumulative distributive functions of bone length divergences (given in mm) for 16 captures.

Live subject calibration in Shogun 1.9

Live subject calibration in Shogun 1.10

Finger tracking - increased accuracy

Wrist and finger animation is now tracked and solved more accurately compared with previous versions of Shogun.

These improvements result in:

• Greater accuracy in calibration:
  • The location of the wrist joints is more accurate.
  • The scale of the hand and thus the location of the finger joints is more accurate.
• Better solving:
  • With the default settings, the solve normally achieves the pose of the actor.
  • When the default settings don't enable the solve to reach extreme poses, you may be able to achieve the desired result by reducing the Plausibility Importance (an advanced setting in the Processing panel). This improves the accuracy of the hand pose by relying more on the constraints imposed by the new setting defaults and latest VST (3.7 or later). However, we recommend that you do this only when you're using the 10-finger skeleton template and the marker reconstruction trajectories have been gap-filled and their labels have been fixed.

The following images show the improvements in Shogun 1.10, compared with earlier versions of Shogun Live:

• In general, the reproduction of hand poses is more accurate and less damped:

  

• Flat hand poses are reproduced much more reliably in Shogun 1.10 than they were in Shogun 1.9 and earlier.

  

• The reproduction of curled fists is also more reliable in Shogun 1.10:

  

• In Shogun Live 1.10, you can achieve higher hand pose fidelity by reducing the Plausibility Importance from 12.5 to 5.0.
  However, we recommend that you do this only when:
  • You are using a 10-finger skeleton template; and
  • The marker reconstruction trajectories have been gap-filled and their labels have been fixed.
  
  The following image (from left to right) compares the results obtained using Shogun 1.9, the same results in Shogun 1.10 with the solver using the default settings, and in Shogun 1.10 with the solver using a low Plausibility Importance (5.0 instead of 12.5).

  

For more information on using the optimal settings for finger solving, see Solve the data in Getting started with Vicon Shogun.

User Interface enhancements

Shogun Live 1.10 provides an updated UI, enabling you to customize it to suit your workflow.

Flexible layout

Shogun Live 1.10 features a flexible UI, enabling you to customize the layout to fit your workflow. You can access all panels via the View menu and you can then re-position and re-size each panel using the dynamic docking manager.

To save current layouts:

• Click the View Settings button at the top right of the window and select Manage from the menu.
  This menu also provides an option to return to the default layout.

  

To learn more about the Shogun Live 1.10 layout and its controls, see Introducing Shogun Live in Getting started with Vicon Shogun.

Intuitive controls

In each panel, you can access the advanced settings within each section (if present) by clicking the Advanced Parameters button . For an example, see the Camera Calibration panel, which features multiple sections, each with standard and advanced settings. You can also revert each setting within each section to its default value by clicking the Default Parameters button .

In the Processing panel, any setting that is set to a non-default value is displayed in bold and italics to indicate that a change from the default has been made.

Here are some of the more notable changes to the Shogun user interface and controls:

Quick multi-select for cameras

To select multiple cameras, you previously had to drag to select cameras in the System panel or SHIFT+click first and last camera.

In Shogun 1.10, either in a Cameras view, double-click a single view; or in the System panel, click the Vicon Cameras heading.

If in multi-camera view, double-click to select only that view.

Clearer camera calibration information

In the Camera Calibration panel, you control camera calibration, including masking and calibrating cameras and configuring the volume origin. Previously, this panel contained multiple sections for each operation.

Now, operations are grouped into sections containing related functions, for example, Volume Setup now contains Set Volume Origin, Set Floor Plane, Set Floor Grid and Auto Number Cameras, each of which can be expanded to reveal relevant controls.

Customizable capture information

Shogun 1.10 introduces improvements to the panels that enable you to control captures, including naming, triggering and specifying the type of data to capture and replaying takes.

Previously, the Capture panel contained a Review section, which listed captured takes.

In Shogun 1.10, capture-related controls are displayed in separate panels:

• Capture panel: Record and manage captures including capture folders or filenames, capture triggers, and data sources to capture.
• Data Capture panel: Start and stop captures and view information about the current capture. By default, this panel is displayed at the bottom of the Capture panel.
• Review panel: Access all recorded captures for playback.

You can choose to display or hide these panels as required by selecting or clearing the relevant option on the View menu.

Simplified tracking information

Previously, the Tracking panel included subject filter buttons at the top of Tracking panel, with subjects listed in same section.

To clarify the display of subjects and props, in Shogun 1.10 subjects and props are displayed in categorized sections.

Updated terminology

In addition to the changes to the Shogun Live layout and controls, we've renamed some of the elements of the user interface to make it easier to identify them and understand what they do:

Customizable workflow

Shogun 1.10 features multiple view panels grouped by functionality, enabling you to expose/hide the panels that best reflect your workflow. You can then save these panels into different View layouts as described in Flexible layout to streamline the controls made available during a session.

The default layout is similar to previous versions of Shogun Live for setting up your system, calibrating and creating objects. It comprises these panels, which are selected by default on the View menu:

• Camera Calibration: Mask, dynamically calibrate and set the system origin. Options for setting floor plane and large volume scaling are also included.
• Capture: Record and manage captures including capture folders or filenames, capture triggers, and data sources to capture.
• Data Capture: By default, displayed at the bottom of the Capture panel. Start and stop captures and view information about the current capture.
• Log: Monitor overall system activity.
• Processing: Settings within this panel control how subjects are tracked and the type and/or amount of data that is available for viewing and capture
• System: Manage individual camera and hardware (including analog) settings and change system-wide parameters such as frame rate.
• Tracking: Create and manage your objects (subjects and props). Object manipulation (eg, origin location, object orientation) is controlled through the Object Manipulator tool (see Create props and related topics ).
• Workspace: Visualize your scene, whether it is reconstructed markers, objects or graph plots.

The remaining panels in the View menu contain controls for:

• Agents: Enables you to add and monitor secondary machines for multi-machine processing
• Connections: Displays all clients connected to Shogun and includes settings for the Datastream
• Review: All recorded captures can be accessed for playback from this panel.

For more information on using panels, see Live - Work with panels in Getting started with Vicon Shogun.

Expanded API for automation

The Vicon Live API now includes additional services that enable you to further automate your workflow. In all cases, you can find sample scripts in the SDK:

• Camera calibration services
  • Enable you to calibrate selected camera(s) or all cameras
• Camera device services
  • Enable you to monitor camera connection status
• Selection services
  • Enable you to select/deselect a specified device
• View services
  • Enable you to load a named view file

Improved prompting before Shogun Live closes

By default, when you press the Close button at the top right of the Shogun Live window (or if you go to File menu and select Exit), Shogun Live now prompts you to confirm that you want to close Shogun Live. This helps to prevent errors such as accidentally exiting Shogun shortly before something important (such as a new take) is scheduled to begin.

To turn off the prompt, select the check box in the Confirm Exit dialog.

If you change your mind and want to restore prompts to close:

1. On the Settings menu, select Preferences.
2. In the User Preferences go to the General section and select Show application exit confirmation dialog.

Clearer server alias setting for Control app

To enable you to identify Vicon Control servers more easily, you can now set an alias for a Vicon Control server in Vicon Shogun Preferences. If you don't specify an alias, the PC host name is used.

To set an alias for a Vicon Control server:

1. On the Settings menu, select Preferences.
2. In the User Preferences go to the Connections section and in the Control server alias field, enter a name that you want to be displayed in the list of available servers in Vicon Control.
   When you view the list of servers in Vicon Control, the name you specified is displayed.

Live support for VST 3.7 files

Shogun Live now imports and exports full-body skeletons using the new VST 3.7 file format, for both labeling (VSK) and solving (VSS) skeletons. Files with earlier VSTs are still supported for subjects such as props and labeling clusters.

For more information on improvements in Shogun Live 1.10, see the Shogun 1.10 Release Notes.

Shogun Post 1.10 improvements

Shogun Post 1.10 includes the following improvements, in addition to fixing some minor issues.

Live fingers in AutoSkeleton

In Shogun Post 1.10, you can benefit from both the improved finger calibration in Shogun Live (see Finger solve improvements) and superior body calibration from Auto-Skeleton (see Use Auto-Skeleton and Retain solving skeleton finger calibration in Getting more from Vicon Shogun).

BVH export improvements

Shogun Post now provides several new options when exporting a retargeting skeleton as BVH. These new options enable you to:

• Unscale the target skeleton
• Define the desired up axis

To select the new options:

1. Open the Preferences dialog box (General > Preferences or press F7).
2. On the File Export tab, select the BVH file format.

3. Ensure the desired option is selected:

   • Unscale retargeting skeletons When you select this option, the target skeleton's scale is restored to 1.0 and its root's translation animation is scaled by 1/scale so that the motion matches the skeleton's scale.

   • In the Up axis list, select Scene, Y or Z.

     In addition, to rotate the motion 180° about the new up axis, ensure Rotate to face positive is selected.

     This ensures that motion that started facing positive remains facing positive on export.

     

You can also produce the same results via HSL scripting, (see bvhExportOptions in HSL scripting with Vicon Shogun).

Updated Post user interface

As part of the general update of the Shogun 1.10 user interface, new buttons in many of the Shogun Post panels now enable you to access advanced settings. For example:

Attributes and Channels panels toolbars

Subject Setup panel

Edit Time options

Post support for VST 3.7 files

Shogun Post 1.10 supports the import and the export of full-body skeletons using the new VST 3.7 file format, for both labeling (VSK) and solving (VSS) skeletons. This enables you to benefit from the robust range enforcement priors on the next-generation full-body skeletons (see Finger solve improvements and Live support for VST 3.7 files).

Files with older VSTs are also still supported.

For more information on improvements in Shogun Post 1.10, see the Shogun 1.10 Release Notes.

Vicon Video Viewer 1.12

The Shogun download bundle includes the latest version of the Vicon Video Viewer.

For more information, see the Vicon Video Viewer documentation.