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What's new?

Updates for 22.3.5

When working with XR, the time between filming the LED screen and displaying the rendered content should be as short as possible. Introducing a virtual set extension into the mix adds to the temporal alignment challenges. To avoid the “seam” between the LED wall and its set extension when the camera moves, we have added 2 new features:

  1. To reduce latency for XR machines we added the option of lowering the overall delay even further

  2. To mitigate the remaining time difference between XR and the set extension, we have developed a new proprietary method of matching the 2 graphics

Learn more about how to improve the temporal alignment between XR and a virtual set extension in Configure and calibrate multi-machine syncing

Wouldn’t it be great if you could spend more time creating virtual productions and less time fussing with technical tweaks and adjustments? Yeah, we thought so too. That’s why we rolled up our sleeves to make some tweaks and adjustments of our own. Now, virtual production is even more accessible than ever.

Twenty-what-dot-what?

If you’re an existing Pixotope user, you may be wondering if you missed a few releases as we jumped from 2.2 to 22.3. Don’t worry, we’ve just changed our release numbering. To make it easier to make sure you've got an up-to-date release, we’ve changed the numbering such that the first/big number (22) is the year, subsequent numbers will indicate major, minor and services releases in that year. Since we've already released 2.1 and 2.2 this year, that makes this release 22.3. With this numbering scheme, you'll never need a look up table to make sure you’ve got all the latest functionality.

AR + VS + XR

We are introducing the new Pixotope Live XR plan. In addition to AR and VS, this plan also includes all XR features.

As a thank you to our trusted Pixotope customers we are upgrading all Pixotope Live plans to the new Pixotope Live XR plans for the remainder of your subscription, allowing you to expand your creative horizons even further.

The previous Pixotope Live plans are now called Pixotope AR/VS.

To top it off, we have also included a Control license for every plan. So your virtual production can now be controlled from a separate machine without the need for a Live license. Just ask your admin to assign it to you.

To use the new XR features, log out of Director and log in again with your new Live XR license.

XR

Multicam input switching

When switching between 2 cameras, essentially only ever displaying one of them, why should you need a separate machine for each? With our Camera input switching feature, you can route 2 camera systems to 1 machine which you can then seamlessly switch between using the Control panel or the API.

Learn more about how to Set up camera input switching

Color Matching

Matching the colors of the LED walls to the AR set extension can be seriously tedious. Our robust and adaptive automatic color calibration makes color matching a breeze.

Learn more about how to Calibrate color matching

Multi-machine syncing

Synchronizing all XR and AR machines is absolutely essential. With our timecode-based multi-machine syncing, your machines will run in complete unison, regardless of if you are just running a level or trigger animations via the Control panel or the API.

Do you need different offsets for your controls via the API? Change the Execution time per machine.

Also, to better debug your timecode sources you can now easily grab single or continuous timecode samples directly from the Syncing or Status panel.

Learn more about how to Configure multi-machine syncing

This is also available in the AR/VS plan.

Use arbitrarily shaped LED walls

Forget about recreating your LED walls in the Editor. You can now easily import any 3D mesh into the Engine and convert them into XR wall objects.

Learn more about how to Convert pre-made meshes to XR walls

Selective rendering

To make rendering XR on multiple machines easier, we added Selective rendering for XR walls. This allows you to specifically select on which machines an XR wall is rendered.

Learn more about how to Adjust XR and selective rendering

Tracking without video input

Finally we have removed the limitation of requiring a video input feed if you only really need the tracking data of the camera. Simply select Tracking only as the Input option in the video IO panel and you are good to go.

Learn more about how to Configure video I/O

General

UE4.27 & UE5 dual release

Are you curious about what the future of Unreal looks like? Do you want to test UE5s latest features? With our dual release you are able to do all that, without losing the stability and reliability of UE4.27.

  • If you are looking to seamlessly use existing projects with new features in Pixotope 22.3, we recommend using the UE4.27 version (4.27.2)

  • If you are eager to start using rendering features of Unreal 5.0, we are providing a feature complete version using Unreal 5.0 (5.0.3)

Download the UE5 version from the Pixotope Cloud → Pixotope Cloud

Improving the user experience for SETUP - part 1

One of our main goals is to make Pixotope as user-friendly as possible. Setting up a show is currently more cumbersome than needed. With our complete overhaul of the Syncing panel, we are taking the first step to help speed up setup time and reduce the risk of making mistakes.

The new panel lets you change delays while seeing all machines simultaneously and use multiple filter options to help you focus on the right things. When setting up your timecode sources you now also have the ability to view the timecode directly in the panel.

Learn more about Calibrate syncing

Change indicator

Pixotope is known for helping you make last minute adjustments. Now we also help you to keep track of them better. With our change indicator, you can easily spot which values have been adjusted, allowing for better transparency and clear collaboration.

Learn more about the Change indicator

Fade out graphics

Fading graphics in or out was always a bit cumbersome. So now we added a simple slider so you can easily use it to overlay graphics when aligning your objects, or in production as an interesting visual effect. You can, of course, also control it via the Control panel or the API.

Learn more about Adjust composite

More editor improvements

Ever wondered about where all your other cameras are in the scene? To help you get an overview of your scene, we have now added an option to show the cameras of all connected machines in the Editor viewport.

Learn more about how to preview cameras of other engines

We have also added a new actor for preloading and displaying images from a URL in 3D space. It supports web links and local resources.

Learn more about the URL Image Actor

Diagnostics

Monitoring the frame rate can be essential. We have now added the ability to monitor the frame rate, both in the Health and the Status panel.

Control panel

For our new Control panel we had, at first, focused on controlling the Pixotope Engine. In our second iteration, we are now covering more advanced use cases, allowing you to control every single aspect of Pixotope. And it has gotten even prettier :-)

Improvements for more advanced use cases

With support for Pixotope API calls, you can update any parameter of your show file (Pixotope Store), or call actions on any other service including 3rd party Pixotope services!

  • Use the values of the store as source or target

  • Observe all API calls happening on the network and pick the ones you want to call from the Control panel

Improvements to the editing experience

We know how important speed is when it comes to setting up virtual productions.

  • In case you want to link properties you have not exposed, you can now access all properties directly in the Engine tab. There is no need to open the Editor anymore.

  • If you want to set up control of the same property of multiple objects at the same time, now you can easily do that in one go

  • We also improved the ability to handle multiple widgets at the same time. You can now resize them, align them or change their color all at once, even if they are not the same widget type.

  • Groups and their content can now easily be dragged by grabbing the group header, and by double clicking it you can select all its content

  • For your convenience and safety, we have added a version history to easily move between saved versions

Of course we did not stop there. For a complete list checkout the changelog.

Experimental features

Asset Hub

Easily synchronize files between machines.

Learn more about File syncing using Asset Hub

Lens file editor

The Lens file editor allows you to visualize and edit lens file data manually. In addition you can also import lens files from other formats.

Learn more about the Lens file editor

Tracking plotter

The Tracking plotter allows you to inspect incoming tracking data. In addition you can also export plotted data for debugging.

Learn more about the Tracking plotter

Pixotope Content

Our creative engineers have published an ultra fast and simple lighting tool. It can be used to create visual depth, fog or haze or emphasize other effects. It is based on cards which are super fast to render.

Upgrading to Pixotope 22.3

Check out Upgrading to 22.3

Changelog

  1. Log in to the user section of the → Pixotope Cloud 

  2. Go to Downloads

Known bugs and limitations

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