Summer 2022 - Igloo Playback

Software name	Release Version (if applicable)	Software Icon

Software name	Release Version (if applicable)	Software Icon
Igloo Playback	1.43.x

Function:

Igloo Playback is the primary control mechanism for an Igloo System. It has 3 primary functions:

Playback controls: Igloo Playback provides an interface for playback controls, such as pausing, playing, scrubbing through a playhead bar etc. Also allows for the creation of playlists.

Content-Based settings: Igloo Playback sets and stores settings for content that are applied whenever a piece of content is selected for playback through Igloo Control

OSC Routing: Igloo Playback acts as a hub for the Igloo Software suite, receiving all external messages and forwarding them on to the relevant pieces of software based on the message received.

The User Interface:

The Main tab is the one pictured above, and it contains a few main areas:

Banks: The 8 numbered boxes in the top right of the application allow the switching between content banks, allowing a total of 320 unique Images/Videos to be stored in Igloo Playback.

Buttons for Loop, List Player and Pause: Loop, List Player and Pause are all On/Off settings, so use buttons to determine their state:

Loop: Content based setting, although one that only applies to video files. At the end of the video, the video will resume playback from the start of the video.

List Player: Overrides Loop. Video content only. Creates a playlist out of your content banks; when the first video in the bank ends, the next video begins. When the final clip in the bank ends, the first clip begins.

Finally on this page, there are the content-based bars:

Alpha: applies an alpha filter to the entire canvas based on the canvas colour - when the bar is full, content plays as normal, when empty, the canvas will be the colour defined in the warper (Black as default). This is also how the fade in/out between videos operates.

Vertical Stretch: Stretches the content on the Y-Axis based around the centre point of the movie. Has the effect of “Letterboxing” equirectangular images/videos. Right-clicking on the bar will reset it to default.

Vertical Position: Repositions the content on the canvas. Can be used to bring into view something that had previously been stretched off screen using the vertical stretch setting. Right-clicking on the bar will reset it to default.

Wrap Position: Changes the position on the canvas where the movie starts. Any content that would “Spill” off the end of the canvas is drawn from the start. In a 360 environment this has the effect of rotating the content around the users. Right-clicking on the bar will reset it to default.

Config:

The Config tab contains many settings, many of which may not be used in any given installation, in a single compact tab.

Some of these settings can dramatically alter the image that appears on screen, and many can make difficult to revert changes. Use with care, and it’s advised to take a backup of settings before utilising this tab. Such settings will be marked with similar warning panels

Client Machines:

Defines all instances of the Warper this app will send messages to. A green light indicates an active connection.

127.0.0.1 is the loopback address, which refers to the same server Igloo Playback is running on. 9001 is the default Warper OSC receive port

Sync control is deprecated and included to support legacy Warpers.

The playback controls, also showing hotkeys for each function, are also listed in the central column:

Loop clips: Same function as the button on the main tab.

Palindrome Looping: Deprecated. Included to support legacy Warpers.

Mute volume: Stops audio output from the Warper

Play: Plays the current movie from the start.

Stop: Stops the current movie and displays the canvas background colour.

Pause: Toggle. Pauses/Unpauses playback.

Previous movie: Plays the previous movie in the media folder. Alphabetical by filename.

Next movie: Plays the next movie in the media folder. Alphabetical by filename.

First movie: Plays the first movie in the media folder. Alphabetical by filename.

Last movie: Plays the final movie in the media folder. Alphabetical by filename.

3D Top Bottom Strip: Content-Based setting. Marks a piece of content as 3D ready in the top-bottom format.

Playback Speed: Changes the speed at which the video plays. Affects audio too.

Playhead: An additional, normalised, playhead bar.

Movie Playlist Folder & Clips/Video Bank folder: Deprecated. Included to support legacy Warpers.

Blending:

The next 3 settings will dramatically alter the image appearing on screen and are difficult to precisely reverse.

Blend Overlap: Sets the overlap percentage for the left and right of each screen globally.

Blend Width: Sets the portion of the screen that is affected by gamma adjustments/colour correction.

Gamma power: Sets the intensity of the colour correction. A value of 0 is a plain black mask over the blend width.

Display Options:

Warp output: Defines whether warping is turned on, or off

Blend output: Defines whether blending is turned on, or off

Test image: Shows/Hides one of the Igloo full-canvas test images to check alignment

Next test image: Cycles through the available test images.

Control points on/off: Shows/Hides the control points which are used to manipulate the mesh

Fullscreen: Places the Warper canvas in fullscreen, or brings the Warper canvas to the terminal display for debugging purposes.
Information panels: Shows/Hides the info panels which denote screen number and the application framerate, as well as the “active screen” when warping

Tile movie: For use with lower resolution content, replicates the content on each projector.

Reset warp grid: Sets the warp grids back to their default, rectangular position.

3D Toggle: Deprecated. Included to support legacy Warpers.

3D Invert: Requires “Projector Control” to be enabled in Igloo Warper. Sends a message to each projector to invert the 3D (Content show to left eye is now shown to right eye, and vice versa)

3D Side by Side: Requires “Projector Control” to be enabled in Igloo Warper. Sends a message to each projector to change the 3D format to Side-by-Side

Show Preview: Enables/disables the Warper preview at the bottom of the Igloo Playback user interface.

Load & Save: Igloo Warper can save up to 3 configurations of warps. The Save Warp 1, 2 & 3 will save the current warps to one of those banks, while Load Warp 1, 2 & 3 will apply the warps saved in those banks to the current canvas

Open Settings: Shortcuts for the Warper and Playback apps. Default parent folder: %programdata%\”Igloo Vision”\

Save Capture Configuration: Saves the current Igloo Capture configuration as a .ivc file.

Vertical stretch: Temporary vertical stretch. Does not persist between clips.

Auto Scale: Automatically scales the image/video based on the aspect ratio of the clip and the aspect ratio of the rendering pipeline.