Igloo Setup

Introduction

Igloo Setup is used to generate configuration files for an Igloo installation, also known as a projection scene.

A projection scene specifies the geometry and properties of a set of screens in a given space.

The application starts up with the initial view shown below.

The user interface consists of four tabs - Screen, Canvas, Projectors and Export, which are intended to be used sequentially. These represent the stages in the Igloo Setup modelling pipeline. The workflow begins by defining the geometry of the Screen. The Canvas tab uses the screen dimensions to determine the pixel resolution of the space. Likewise, the Projectors tab uses the canvas to specify the projector regions and other attributes. Finally, the configuration files are generated in the Export tab.

Screen

The Screen tab specifies the geometry of the projection scene.

The geometry is specified as a Screen Type with the following types supported: Immersive Room, Cylinder and Dome.

The Screen starts with a text box entry specifying the Eye position. It is followed by a dropdown menu used to specify the Screen Type. The Show Screens checkbox shows the dimensions of individual screens.

Immersive Room

Create a box with specified Width (distance between Left screen and Right screen), Depth (distance between Front screen and Back screen), and Height (distance between Top screen and Bottom screen).

The Screens listbox enables the corresponding views (Left-Front-Right-Back-Top-Bottom) in the scene. The coordinates of these views are automatically updated from the dimensions of the box.

Cylinder

Create a cylinder scene with a given Radius (radius of the circle at the base of the cylinder), Height (distance from the base to the top of the cylinder), Angle Range (number of degrees in the circle e.g. 360 for complete closed cylinder) and Angle Offset (number of degrees to rotate the screens about the vertical axis).

The Wall-Floor items in the Screens listbox enable the corresponding wall and disk (floor) views in the scene. The coordinates of each screen are automatically updated from the cylinder parameters.

Dome

Create a dome scene with a given Radius (radius of the circle at the base of the dome), Angle Range (number of degrees in the circle e.g. 360 for complete closed dome) and Angle Offset (number of degrees to rotate the screens about the vertical axis).

The dome is modelled as a hemisphere and can be adjusted using the Lower Pitch and Upper Pitch parameters. Typically, an Igloo dome will use a front-facing projector setup with the projectors located at the top of the dome. In this case, the Upper Pitch value should be reduced so that the non-projected area where the projectors are located is defined. The Lower Pitch value of 0, represents the equator of the sphere. Adjusting this parameter allows for domes which have a bottom edge above or below the line of the sphere’s equator.

The coordinates of each screen are automatically updated from the dome parameters.

Canvas

The Canvas tab displays a planar layout of the screens generated in the projection scene. The screenshots below illustrate examples of canvas layout for a box and a cylinder projection scene respectively.

The canvas region is a composition of all screens in the projection scene with empty space in between. The canvas border is an axis aligned bounding box whose purpose is to give a visual cue of the canvas region and is drawn as thick yellow line.

Canvas Resolution (px) this is the overall canvas resolution in pixels specified in width and height respectively. The canvas resolution is calculated using the resolution of one of the width and height parameters together with the aspect ratio of the screen. Enter the known value of one of the parameters, based on the immersive space design drawings. The other dimension will then be automatically calculated and updated.

The height and width values of each of the views which make up the projection scene are also calculated automatically. These are displayed below the Canvas Resolution as width, height pairs and labelled Left Resolution, Front Resolution, Right Resolution etc.

Projectors

The Projectors tab presents settings which control the appearance of the test cards. It also defines how many projectors are used in the immersive space, which in turn, provides settings for a multi-window setup of ICE.

Grid Spaces, Grid Thickness and Font scale are purely visual changes. A test card preview is at the bottom of the screen to help visualise the effects of changes.

Each Screen can also be edited to increase the number of projectors. To add a second projector to the left screen, for instance, we’d change the number of columns to 2:

Export

The Export tab enables the exporting of the generated configuration files.

An export folder can be selected which acts as the destination for the files when the Export button is pressed.

Export will produce the following files: AppSettings.xml, masks.png, ScreenModel.mtl, ScreenModel.obj, TestImage1.png, TruePerspective.xml.

AppSettings.xml

The contents of this file can be used in the Igloo Warper settings file (C:\ProgramData\Igloo Vision\IglooWarper\AppSettings.xml). Copy the relevant sections from this file into the Warper’s version of the file.

masks.png

This file should be copied to the Warper masks folder (C:\ProgramData\Igloo Vision\IglooWarper\masks).

ScreenModel.mtl, ScreenModel.obj

These files should be copied to the ICE models folder (C:\ProgramData\Igloo Vision\IglooCoreEngine\models). They are used in ICE as preview tool to visualise the ICE canvas in the projection scene (see the Screen tab in the ICE Desktop UI).

TestImage1.png

This file can be shared with content creators and also used during the initial setup of the projection scene. It can be copied to the Warper test images folder (C:\ProgramData\Igloo Vision\IglooWarper\test images) and subsequently displayed on the Warper canvas to ensure the warping and blending settings are correct.

TruePerspective.xml

This file should be copied to the ICE settings folder (C:\ProgramData\Igloo Vision\IglooCoreEngine\settings). It is used to generate the perspectively correct views for each screen in the projection scene when displaying 360 degree content.