PFTrack 3.5r2 review

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With its unique feature set and ease of use PFTrack 3.

License: Demo
OS: Mac OS X
File size: 34K
Developer: The Pixel Farm
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Price: $5500.00
Updated: 04 Dec 2006
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With its unique feature set and ease of use PFTrack 3.0 takes tracking to the next level. Version 3.0 can now track many separate moving objects within a sequence, as well as solving camera motion issues - users simply export data from tracking groups, whether it’s camera data, object movement or motion-capture sessions. With the addition of the unique geometry tracking, V3.0 now allows 3D geometry to be imported into PFTrack and then matched to sequences, making this an ideal tool for head and facial replacement, meaning artists can now be confident that animated CG, when rendered and composited, will exactly match the live action. Complex Geometry can be imported and used to solve cameras in addition to the use of automatic or user placed features. This is perfect for problematic shots or for fast head or face replacement. The new camera solver in version 3.0 is now much faster enabling the software to deal with the most complex of shots.

New fully editable F Curves within PFTrack make cleaning up tracking data extremely easy and accurate. You can quickly view and edit each individual property of the camera within a graph editor in the timeline; curves can be represented by both linear and Bezier splines and simply smoothed or edited using the tools provided. Once edited, the new camera solver quickly produces a new camera without the need to totally re solve every parameter in the sequence.

The, new, fully integrated image based modeling capabilities allow users to quickly build up 3D environments by using the background image as a guide. Previously this has only been available as a stand alone system, so the improved image based modeling tools in V3.0 provide an integrated environment which delivers a much more flexible solution. Perfect for pre-visualisation and animation guidance, textured models can be exported to all major 3D applications.

Integrated Z depth extraction tools assign depth data, on a per pixel basis, to sequences for exporting as a grey map. This data can be viewed within PFTrack, in 3D, using the new orthographic view options which can then be broken down into any number of layers.

PFTrack is available for Mac OS X including Tiger and full G5 optimisation, Linux, Windows and IRIX. New licenses cost ?3, $5500, ?4500 upgrades from ealier versions ?600, $1100, ?900. Educational licenses are available for full time students and teachers for ?100, $200, ?150.

Here are some key features of "PFTrack":
Geometry TrackingImport .obj models from 3D Applications to use as tracking guides
Fast head and face replacement using imported geometry
Track set models into footage for set extensions
View geometry as wire frame, transparent and flat shaded modes
Full geometry manipulation tools
Key frame tracking for greater accuracy
Vertex to Pixel pinning

Object Tracking
Track individual rigid moving objects
Export object data independantly of camera motion

Integrated Z depth extraction
Extract per pixel depth from moving images
View pixel depth as 3D image
User defined depth layer generation
Export of Z depth data as grey map or mesh

Integrated image based modeling tools
Vertex based primitive modelling
Full texture extraction and mapping
Export of geometry to all major 3D systems

Optical Flow Analysis
Optical flow calculation algorithm
Proxy resolution flow field support
Brush-based flow editing tools
Matte and feature-based flow control
Export to floating-point and RGB images
Option to ignore specific user/auto-features from the camera solve
Multiple undo for features and mattes

Full camera F-Curve editing with fast camera resolve
New Camera Solver
Semi automatic lens distortion correction
Enhanced Interface
New image manipulation tools
Ability to snap user loadable test objects to features
Object manipulators to help position test objects
Edit range of frames
Improved matte editing functionality
Matte-feature attachment
Improved image manipulation algorithms
Support for graphics tablets
Improved calibration algorithm, giving more accurate calibrations of difficult shots
Motion capture for matchmoving non-rigid objects
Survey data points to assist calibration of measured scenes
Feature grouping to manage exported data points
Planar and linear feature constraints in bundle adjustment
Improved feature tracking engine
Improved free-motion camera calibration engine
Per-camera and per-feature statistics (numerical and graph), to help clean up calibration data.
Improved batch manager progress reports
On-screen cache indicator, and improved frame caching algorithm
Improved Shake support, with corner-pin script export
Per-user-feature footage brightness/contrast/etc.. manipulations
Image de-noise functions for improved tracking of noisy footage
Accelerated footage import and playback
Reduced memory usage when auto-tracking long shots
Improved Batch Processing
Full Mac OS X 10.4 'Tiger' support including full G5 optimisation.

Limitations:
Once installed your license will run for 3 days. This provides you with enough time to evaluate the full functionality of the software.
What's New:
New Object Tracking
New Geometry Tracking
Image Based Modeling Tools
Per-pixel Z Depth extraction
Editable Motion F-Curves
New Camera Solver.

Requirements:
Mac OS X 10.3.8 or later including 'Tiger' OS X 10.4
750 MHz PowerPC G4, G5 Recommended
Hard Disk Space - Installation requires 100mb
Suitable space to store footage to be tracked
Memory 512MB
Graphics Card
Must support OpenGL and for SGI platforms a TRAM option is highly recommended.
Working with Large Images
For working with HD and film, it is recommended that a multi-processor system with at least 1GB of RAM should be used.
A fast disk subsystem for loading large image sequences
Spreading processing across clusters via batch processing will result in enormous productivity enhancements
Mouse
A three-button mouse is required for maximum functionality of the software.

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