You can record a video right at your workplace using a Microsoft Kinect sensor and have it converted to 3D animation on your PC. iPi Motion Capture is a desktop solution that brings a totally new workflow paradigm to filmmakers, CG animator broadcast motion graphics designers, videogame developers and prosumers in entertainment, military and other vertical markets.
iPi Soft Mocap brings a low-cost professional solution for capturing accurate animation data comparable to expensive traditional marker-based mocap systems, without the need for expensive facility space, clumsy sensor suits with reflective markers or a team of technicians. The iPi Basic system supports up to 4 Sony PS Eye cameras or 1 to 2 Xbox Kinects, the iPi Standard system supports up to 6 Sony PS Eye cameras or 1 to 2 Xbox Kinects. The iPi Express system is designed for use with Xbox Kinect.
It works with MS Kinect, ASUS Xtion, Sony PlayStation3 Eye cameras and DirectShow-compatible webcams (USB and FireWire).You can use it with iPi Desktop Motion Capture, a breakthrough markerless motion capture digital content creation software tool that uses sophisticated image processing and computer vision algorithms to recognize and track the human body.
Mesh Online says that there are no plans to port the project to macOS or Linux, but it should be possible to compile from the old source code on GitHub, which was actually developed for macOS.IPi Recorder is a multi-camera video recording tool. It works with Kinect for Xbox 360 sensors. Kinect Mocap Toolkit for Windows is available free for Windows 7+ as both source code and compiled binaries. You can find sample data generated by the software and user feedback in the comments to this story on BlenderNation, which dates back to the time of the original source code release.
The system doesn’t require manual calibration or any complex set-up work: according to the instructions, once the sensors are connected properly, the only other step is to wrap a piece of light-coloured cloth around one knee so that the software knows which leg is which.
Kinect Mocap Toolkit for Windows enables artists to use Kinect for Xbox 360 sensors – it doesn’t work with the Kinect v2, as it uses the third-party NiTE SDK – to record mocap data in BVH format.Īlthough the software supports up to four sensors out of the box, Mesh Online says that three is usually sufficient, including for fairly demanding use cases like capturing dance moves. While the original Kinect hasn’t been sold since 2015, and the entire Kinect consumer product line was discontinued in 2017, it’s still possible to find second-hand units: they currently sell on eBay for around $20.Ĭapture full-body motion capture data in BVH format using up to four Kinect sensors Originally intended as a gaming controller, Microsoft’s Kinect motion sensor quickly became the tool of choice for many indie artists looking for a low-cost motion capture system on its release in 2010.īoth iPi Soft and Jasper Brekelmans released commercial mocap tools based around the hardware: Brekelmans still has a free version available to download. Needs the original Kinect sensor: you can pick up econd-hand units cheaply The source code on which the software is based has been online since 2017, but the new 1.0 release makes it available as a compiled Windows binary, and implements a true 360-degree capture field. Mesh Online – aka Unity tools developer Mingfen Wang – has released Kinect Mocap Toolkit For Windows 1.0, a free tool for recording full-body motion capture data using up to four Microsoft Kinect sensors.
The system now supports 360-degree recording using up to four Kinect sensors, and is available for Windows. An early demo of Mesh Online’s Kinect-based motion capture technology, recorded on macOS.