Pixotope 1.3 is released

In the last few months, we have been tirelessly working on Pixotope 1.3 and we are proud to bring you the following updates: 

• Perfected object tracking workflow

• Upgraded Keyer

• Air-gapped licensing

• Color managed viewport in Editor

• DMX control (Art-Net) and Slider widget

• Native integration with Unreal 4.24

• and more

Object Tracking Workflow

With Pixotope 1.3, object tracking allows your talent to walk around AR objects, pick them up or easily interact with them in any way. From showing a 3D model in the palm of their hand to controlling any aspect of a virtual scene with their own physical movement, your talent becomes free to interact with the virtual world around them. The configuration and assignment of object trackers are easy, using the same methodology that we use for camera tracking. With our object tracker groups, you can configure object trackers in independent tracking spaces. Currently, we support object tracking with Stype Follower.

Keyer improvements

• Subpixel erode

• Improved background color picker logic

• Separate color channel keying

• Improved luma despill/respill

• Automatic despill of bg color

As a part of our continual improvement, we have added additional color separation tools to help key colors closer to green, such as yellow, and to extract additional detail like fine strands of hair without increasing the noise levels. The new subpixel erode allows for extra-fine control over edge treatment, dealing with issues from in-camera chroma-subsampling and sharpening. Improved keying algorithm allows for more predictable background separation and better shadow extraction and noise levels.

Air-gapped licensing

The broadcast infrastructure is critical and therefore has to adhere to high-security standards. Often, this means that production machines cannot ever be connected to the internet. With our new offline  license activation, you can effortlessly get and release licenses for your air-gapped machines. Our option to temporarily take machines offline continues to work as before.

Completed HDR and color workflow

Getting the look and feel of your scenes right from the start is even more important when working in a real-time virtual production environment. The HDR and color workflow, which was introduced in Pixotope 1.2, has now been completed by providing a color-managed viewport in the Editor. The artist can now trust the image in the viewport will match their video output, assuming they have calibrated their monitors. 

DMX control (Art-Net) and Slider widget

Controlling physical and virtual lights simultaneously is another step towards perfecting your real-time composition. With our ArtDmx Light-Controller Plugin and slider widget controlling physical lights (via Art-Net/DMX) from a Pixotope control panel becomes easy to set up and use. Support for controlling virtual lights via Art-Net is available upon request.

Unreal Engine 4.24

Pixotope 1.3 offers native integration with Unreal 4.24.3. Among a wide range of new features, here are some highlights you may find particularly useful:

• The new non-destructive, layer-based Landscape workflows enable you to build more interesting and engaging outdoor environments where the terrain automatically adapts to other elements in the world. 

• The Sky Atmosphere component generates a physically-accurate sky that can be updated dynamically depending on the time of day, and it can be viewed from the ground or from the air to create realistic-looking planetscapes. 

• The new experimental strand-based hair and fur system brings characters to life with realistic, flowing hair. 

• With Screen-Space Global Illumination, you can achieve natural light-filled spaces using fewer resources.

• Datasmith is now available to all Unreal Engine users, bringing high-fidelity, whole-scene conversion to the "masses".

• The new Visual Dataprep makes automating data preparation workflows more accessible so smaller, design-focused teams can benefit from them. 

• Pixar's Universal Scene Description format can now be accessed directly within the Unreal Engine. The USD Stage Actor provides a live link to the USD file on disk, to give faster interaction and allow better collaboration

For a complete changelog go to login.pixotope.com

We are always happy to explain the new features in a private demo.