Friday, November 13, 2015

Perception Neuron Template v0.4.0 released

The fourth version of my "Third Person CPP Neuron" Unreal Engine 4 template is finished and
I have published it for free under the MIT license on Github.

Download: Github Repository
Latest template version: v0.4.0
Latest plugin version: v0.2.0

Changes Template:
- Network and player controller actors now support manual configuration
of reference skeleton instead using external BVH reference file.
- To have an example how to add custom skeletons,
the Mannequin now uses the new bone map feature of the plugin.
For a "HowTo" please have a look into the Mannequin BP function "Init Bone Map".
- Update to Plugin v0.2.0

Changes v0.2.0 Plugin:
- It is now possible to initialize Reference skeleton manually and
initialization with external BVH reference file is optional.
- Support all rotation orders and add missing XZY, YZX, ZYX rotations
- Better support for custom skeletons:
Bone coordinate system can now be mapped in blueprint.
- Fix a synchronization bug when using Neuron format
- Further comments and minor improvements

Thursday, November 12, 2015

Texture Merge Plugin v0.2.0 released

The second version of my "Texture Merge" Unreal Engine 4 plugin is finished and
I have published it for free under the MIT license on Github.
Many thanks to DarthCoder who gave me the permission to use his code in the plugin.

For further details, please have a look into the Unreal Wiki.
Download: Github Repository
Latest version: v0.2.0

Tuesday, October 6, 2015

Perception Neuron Template v0.3.0 released

The third version of my "Third Person CPP Neuron" Unreal Engine 4 template is finished and
I have published it for free under the MIT license on Github.

Download: Github Repository
Latest version: v0.3.0

Changes:
- Source code restructure: C++ code is now placed in a plugin to be more project independend.
  This plugin can be used in any of your projects and
  there is no need to create a C++ project anymore.

  The binary plugin version 0.1.0 can be downloaded from here:
  https://github.com/Cyx69/TP_ThirdPersonNeuron/releases/download/v0.3.0/Perception_Neuron_Plugin_0.1.0.zip
- Further comments and minor improvements

Monday, September 28, 2015

Perception Neuron Template v0.2.0 released

The second version of my "Third Person CPP Neuron" Unreal Engine 4 template is finished and
I have published it for free under the MIT license on Github.

Download: Github Repository
Latest version: v0.2.0

Changes:
- Playback Controller added.
  Now you can directly play BVH files placed ín your content
  folder instead connecting to a BVH server.
  See new Blueprint nodes Play and Pause.
  To have an example Neuron character is now connected
  to a player controller instead to a network controller.
  In other words: You can now play your recorded Neuron BVH animation files in Unreal.
  And you can also play animations created by other tools
  if the skeleton matches the reference skeleton (see axis.bvh file).
- Neuron and TPP_Hero are now part of a character blueprint (To have an example for that)
- Hips bone of TPP_Hero mesh is used to translate complete actor (capsule).
  Actor rotation is still a problem and is not connected.
- Add support for standard BVH format
- Add support for disabled displacement and/or enabled reference bone in motion line
- Add DNS name support
- Add Blender source file for Neuron character
- Further comments and minor improvements

Thursday, September 24, 2015

Minimal BVH send server v0.1.0 released

The minimal BVH Send server reads in a BVH motion file,
opens a listening TCP socket and
sends each motion line to the connected clients.
The delay between the motion lines can be configured or is read from the BVH file.
If all motion lines have been sent the server loops back to the first one.

Download: Github Repository
Latest version: v0.1.0

Changes:
v0.1.0: Initial version

Installation Notes:
Download the archive from above link
and unpack the file to a folder you want.

Configuration:
Following command line options are available:
bvhsend <port> <frametime> <format> <bvhfile>
For e.g. bvhsend 7001 10000 0 test.bvh

With:
port: TCP port number.
frametime: Delay between each motion line in microseconds.
Set to 0 if frame time from BVH file should be used.
format: 0 = Just send complete line as it is in BVH file.
1 = Use Axis Neuron format.
bvhfile: Name and path of BVH file to be sent.

Tuesday, September 22, 2015

Perception Neuron Template v0.1.0 released

The first version of my "Third Person CPP Neuron" Unreal Engine 4 template is finished and
I have published it for free under the MIT license on Github.

Perception Neuron (TM) is a motion capture suit from Noitom financed by a
Kickstarter campaign last year.
Further details about the suit here: https://neuronmocap.com

Please use this thread to discuss the technical details about this template:
Unreal Forum Thread

Download: Github Repository
Latest version: v0.1.0

Changes:
v0.1.0: Initial version

Videos:
Live connection between Perception Axis Player and Unreal Engine 4 (Part 2)
Live connection between Perception Axis Player and Unreal Engine 4

Quick Installation Notes:
- Download the template from above link
- Unpack the ZIP archive to your UE4 template folder, for e.g.
  "C:\Program Files\Unreal Engine\4.9\Templates\TP_ThirdPersonNeuron".
  Make sure that the project files are placed and visible under
  "...\Templates\TP_ThirdPersonNeuron" after unzip.
- Launch Unreal Editor and click on "New project".
- Under C++ you should now see a template called "TP Neuron".
- Create a new project with the above template selected.

Requirements:
- Unreal Engine 4.9.1 or higher
- MS Visual Studio 2013
- Axis Neuron SW Player (Free version is available here: https://neuronmocap.com/downloads)

Configuration:
To connect from the template to the Axis Neuron SW following settings should be done in the Axis Neuron SW:
- Open File|Settings dialog
- Activate under Broadcasting BVH and choose port 7001
- Configure under Output Format:
  * Frequency reducing: 1
  * Block type: String
  * Rotation: YXZ
  * Activate 'Displacement'
  * Deactivate 'Reference'
Per default the template connects to 'localhost' (127.0.0.1) and to port 7001.
You can change these settings in the Controller Blueprint if you want to use a separate PC or other ports.
And you can add further controllers if you want to retrieve motion data from further suits or BVH server.

Monday, September 21, 2015

Live connection between Perception Axis Player and Unreal Engine 4 (Part 2)

Here a second video from a newer template version that shows the live connection between Noitoms Perception Axis Neuron SW and Unreal Engine 4:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzWr83AEHQk

Changes in template since last video:
- Added preliminary support for the standard UE4 TPP_Hero and Mannequin skeletons
- Added ability to connect to several Axis Neuron Player instances at the same time.
  Just add a new controller actor to your level and configure the
  additional IP address and/or TCP port.
  Multiple characters can use the same controller or different ones
  (It's freely configurable and has no limit).
- Template uses now actual Unreal Engine Version 4.9.1
- Several code cleanup and beautification

Saturday, March 21, 2015

Blood Mine v0.2 released

I have just released the second version on my separate blog: bloodminevr.blogspot.de.

Saturday, February 7, 2015

Live connection between Perception Axis Player and Unreal Engine 4

Here is a first video that shows a live connection between Noitoms Perception Axis Player and Unreal Engine 4:
http://youtu.be/47bWEpQupUo

How it is done:
- UE4 connects over a local TCP connection to the Axis player and retrieves the raw ASCII BVH data
- Each tick one motion line is parsed and locally stored
- The stored rotation and transition data is then recalculated to map between the different coordinate systems and rotation orders.
- The animation graph reads this information and replaces the rotation and transition for each bone.

Most of the code is programmed in C++, especially for the connection processing and the data recalculation.
But there is also some blueprint code to start the connection and to pump the animation data into the skeleton.

Tools that I used:
- Unreal Engine 4.5
- Perception Axis Player 2.0 Beta
- Microsoft Visual Studio 2013
- Blender 2.72
- Makehuman 1.02

I want to thank Noitom for providing the perception axis player beta version and the BVH data to us bakers.
If you have missed the last years Kickstarter campaign for the Perception Neuron motion capture suit you can preorder it here:
http://perceptionmocap.com/pre-order.html

Thursday, January 1, 2015

BVHacker patched for Perception Neuron BVH files

Some BVH files have very long motion lines (like the ones created by Perception Neuron).
To be able to load them into BVHacker, I have patched the tool and posted a new executable here in the release folder on Github.

Please have also a look to the original BVHacker website created by davedub.
Thank you davedub for creating such an awesome tool!

Blood Mine v0.1 released

I have just released my new VR tech experience on my separate blog: bloodminevr.blogspot.de.


Update 06.January.2015:
Oculus Share just accepted the tech demo and published it here: share.oculus.com/app/blood-mine