Well luckily enough I happened to already have a Wii so i didn't have to buy that sperately. Still if I were to compare the cost of my FT setup vs even TIR4 then the FT setup would be 1/4 of the price.

No, I have not tired trackIR though I do someday intend to when I can afford to buy it. However I feel all these comparisons are pointless - I would expect trackIR to work better than a home solution but that doesn't mean I think developers should favour one over the other.

Ideally I would like a standard interface for headtracking as it would save developers time, allow for real consumer choice, stop workarounds or hacks that have appeared since NP encrypted the API and stop the pointless TIR vs FT threads popping up all the time.

Best of all I think headtracking would be supported in more games because there would be more people in support of headtracking asking developers to implement.

I think i'm going to stop now for good, because even i'm starting to repeat myself.

EDIT: WR, i'm not even going to bother responding - same replies from you as the whole way through the thread. "it's a hack, it's a hack, it's a hack" is not an argument. "Prove it's not a hack" is also not an argument as the onus would be for you to prove that it is. Our opinion on this matter differs and it would be pointless for either of us to continue.

consensus was reached very early on in the discussion about alternative forms of headtracking.




that would be nice and hopefully, notwithstanding the way FT went about it, the consensus becomes adopted.

GIGANTIC lie ever.

Proof it! That's the point:

- NP pretends that they "own" HT solution for games, simply as that!

Freetracks does UNIQUE calcutations, uses a vast array of cameras, have A LOT of tweak tools and provide a lot of output options!

NP dislikes a lot Freetrack becuse it's a BETTER software than all NP does so far. That's because they request FT to remove support for NP hardware. And that's why NP keep the broken record of "reverse engineering", as if nobody can do the math behind provide 6DoF HT with some 2D image as source. Pathetic.

Stop the lies, loser! Be a man! :-)

Better a man, than a troll like yourself LoBi. this is my final post on the matter, thanks for being relevant and adultlike in your responses Vicinity, I appreciate that behaviour. Wolf_Rider, I think you should join us and leave this troll by itself.

http://www.chicagonow.com/blogs/geek...x445-68506.jpg

http://www.findagrave.com/forums/use...5262-troll.jpg

@ LoBi...

Prove it? run FT without TIR files being used

how about you prove it is using those files? make a youtube movie for the eternity showing how it is (ab)using them... :)

Read back through the threads... or just ask LoBi.

Surely this is the bone of contention.

Quite clearly FT can run without using TIR files but no developer has yet to accommodate this.

Nobody disputes that FT does use TIR files but that is simply because no game developer has incorporated FT native support.

Bohemia Interactive did for Armed Assault 2.

Anyway, we've seen Oleg say that joystick axes will be able to control the camera in CoD, which is clearly the most open and sensible solution that any head-tracking device could use. What remains to be seen is whether all 6 axes will be available for use or whether 6DOF will be artificially restricted to a few head-tracking solutions.

Yes, that is the bone on contention



ArmaII, as mentioned before... also mentioned before is FSX through its Simconnect


Thank you, but, even with support, many users pass the support over in favour of using TIR files.


@ Grunch

Joystick or mouselook?

And about NewView, that emule TrackIR with POV HAT?

Use NPClient.dll. Is "evil" like FT too?

http://www.newview.hruks.com/index_en.php

Sokol1

does it need TIR files in any manner?

http://www.newview.hruks.com/links_en.php

http://www.hruks.com/projects_en.php


lol

That npclient.dll sure gets around a lot.

You spin so fast in tight circles that you got dizzy.

No idea...don't play Arma, so I'm not sure how complete the head-tracking is in that game anyway. Certainly this video shows a player leaning using Freetrack, at least according to the video description. FreeTrack - Infantry soldier- Arma II

4DoF, X and Y rotation, leaning and zoom with translation. All hooked to Freetrack axis, in control settings.

And BIS wasn't in any court with NP lawers and ArmAII and O:A sales are really good!

And we ended with 81.60% for FreeTrack suport in IL-2:CoD.

Let's see what's happens now...

The release of COD would be a nice start.

Looks pretty laggy to me but better than nothing I guess. If everything is on the up-and-up I don't see why FT shouldn't be available to people in some manner or other.

Does FT have "absolute mode" tracking where you don't have to constantly re-center for drift like the TIR1 did before it was introduced (and implemented support from 1C in a patch) in the TIR2?

You get a laggy video when you make a video with free version of FRAPS.

Actually, I can tell the difference between laggy video and input lag. Not saying it's there, just that it looks like it is by the slow deliberate movements when I get near instant response with a TIR5.

Gotcha. It could be many things. Anyway, I have Freetrack and I don't get the lag you see in the video. It is smooth and I use Logitech webcam. If there is any input lag, I don't percieve it. Also, you can use wiimote if input lag is a concern. Regarding drift, I don't get drift. I center it up once when I start playing and I'm good for the duration provided I don't shift my sitting position. A steady chair is a must. Also, I made my mouse cursor visible so I always know my vision center. But that is personal taste.

Absolute mode is the default mode in FT.

It's impossible to judge input-output lag when you can't see the person's head movement. The person might just "move like that", or they may be compensating for excessive input sensitivity, or they might have too little sensitivity, or they may just be making slower movements to create an easy to watch video.

I wouldn't be surprised if TIR has faster and smoother responses than FT (I hope so), however FT gives you a smoothing slider, which allows you to set your preferred compromise between instant response and smooth response.

FT uses a x4 multiplier for the data captured by a standard 30fps webcam to overcome the lower frame rate. In use I havent really noticed much difference in performance using a 30fps webcam with FT compared to my 120 fps TIR4 kit. A PS3 cam or a Wimote can be used with FT to have 120fps tracking (from what I have read).

I know what you mean, it is difficult to tell without a live shot of the guy's head. Maybe he's just not using quick and precise head movements in this demo, which is often a symptom of input lag which is why I brought it up.

People perceive input lag differently, like frame rates. I see lots of folks who can't consciously tell the difference between 25fps and 60fps but it shows on how slow they tend to react since it takes that extra split second to get their bearings after spinning around.

Anyway, not having used FT I wouldn't judge it's performance, I just question certain aspects of performance and precision since it lacks the dedicated hardware advantage of TIR. It may be as some say that the extra cpu load is not significant enough to make enough difference to justify the cost of a TIR.

I've never really found much use for a webcam but I may pick one up sometime to try out FT for myself and compare.

I'm actually thinking of getting one of those PS3 cams, i'm just waiting to see if CoD will support freetrack first.

I had a trackIR4 which died, i tried FT as an alternative with my standard 30 FPS webcam and the trackclipPro that i already had and i did notice it's slower to react than trackIR. I wouldn't mind getting a used PS3 cam with 120FPS if CoD supports alternative head trackers.

With a current mid-range PC the CPU load of FT is negligible. I think it's the 30FPS webcams that cause this slight delay, plus my own has a somewhat narrow field of view which further complicates things: i sometimes need to move around in weird angles to compensate for my crappy profiles and then it loses track of the dots at certain points :-P

What i'd really like in Freetrack is an interface more like the one used by trackIR for setting up the response curves, as i can't seem to get a good profile for FT no matter what i try. As for the rest, it is a very capable alternative and i guess that using a 120FPS camera would get rid of most of the slight delay between actual and in-game motion.

why don't you just get the real thing, instead of a sponge that offers less than optimal performance?

everytime somebody talks about freetrack you come in and say your idiocy...
why don't you go to hell and shut your mouth? you are only a spammer

Or you could stop taking it so personally and just not reply.

That x4 multiplier quantizes between samples taken from the lower framerate of the webcam which enhances accuracy the same as "smoothing" on a mouse or TIR. The unfortunate trade-off for using a quantizing algorithm is input lag response which is unavoidable.

With TIR for example, I keep the smoothing fairly low, around 15% because the benefit of a little more precision is negated by the lag it introduces. It's not as noticeable on newer mice because of the insane sampling rates they work at now don't really require it.

You may not think you notice it but it definitely affects the way you pivot around in-game, even by milliseconds. You can equate it to playing an online FPS shooter game at 50ms vs 200ms, not as a direct comparison but to illustrate that sub-second lag can have a big impact on your effectiveness.

Well, i'm spending 70 Euros on a collector's edition of CoD and possibly 70 more on a RAM upgrade, so i can't spare another 150 for a trackIR right now to replace my previous unit which proved unreliable and died after only 2 years of use. But tell you what, if you are willing to send me the cash i'll gladly buy a trackIR 5. Until you do however, it's none of your business what i use ;)

and who are you to tell me that? you know nothing at all of what he told me in other posts, so is just not your business

Actually I do since I read them.

It's just that you have been far more offensive in your responses than WolfRider has, you just don't see that since you're too busy clutching your pearls in indignation.

Not sure if my settings will suit you BlackdogKt but they may help as a starter. These are for 6DOF which I use with a MS VX1000 30fps lifecam. You will see that I have dumbed down the roll, sideways and zoom axis with varying amounts of deadzone to suit each axis for my preferences. I tried this profile with my TrackIR Pro Clip (vertical LEDs) rather than my Hatclip (Horizontal LEds) - it needed a little bit of tweaking on some of the axis.


http://i626.photobucket.com/albums/t.../ftsetupwp.jpg

you could always go practise what you preach...


aww, diddums

Good to see this thread back on top of the heap where it belongs.:grin:

Ok this thread seems to have ended up being 99% about software related legal arguments but nobody has, as far as I can tell, actually answered the question as to whether or not Cliffs of Dover will work with freetrack.

Because wow I would be seriously choked if it didn't.

W_R pull out your head from the @ss of some NP's person... you'll see finally the light and the freedom...

Well albx, it seems that your fanatical support for FT has deleted your "be civilized - files".
Hopefully you find, maybe with a group therapy, a way back to normal.

you are wrong, i'm not a "fanatic", i'm only answering W_R with his same words, perhaps he is a NP's fanatic, everytime we start to talk about this argument he begins to say "Tir is better","buy TIR","why don't you just get the real thing, instead of a sponge that offers less than optimal performance?" is this a sort of "TIR fanatic"?? or I'm again wrong?

Any fanatic is beyond reason!
I think everybody here should appear as if he seriously thinks about his answering posts and doesn't see only black and white.
I have missed that impression on quite a few posts here from both sides.
Besides that its fun reading.

At least in this case fanatics have reason, people who resist do not.

I will fire up my TrackIR (which is safely tucked away for CoD duty if required..:grin:) and concentrate on the issue of FT's response/lag times and wether it affects my game. It may well be that I haven't percieved the problem due to the fact I set my axis curves for a small deadzone , slow initial movement to the side and then rapid acceleration to my 6 (on both systems). If you are correct, and you may well be, I will look into getting a PS3 eyecam as I prefer FT with IL946 + 6DOF.

The lag that people talks about is a webcam limitation that the max framerate is 30 not the software (if you fine tune your curves you'll not notice any), but with a ps3 you can get 125 fps at 320x240 and 75 fps at 640x480

I use FT with a PS3 Eye with no lag. And yes - I tested TiR products. It's the same thing.

Simple as that: use some "webcam" with more than 100FPS and the magic is done, but cheap 30FPS webcams provide good experience too.

Waiting for Oleg's response about FreeTrack suport. Any word?

I also have a ps3 eye, and about FT support, I think we should just wait and try if will work, i don't believe anybody will come here and tell yes or not.. :rolleyes:

Yes, I believe that too... And I'm a little bit "happy" with that, if you understand me... lol!

For the most part you are right that a higher framerate camera will likely make the most difference and provide an adequate experience, perhaps even on par with one of the older TIR versions (the TIR3 was 120hz) even though it probably cannot match the field of view a TIR5 has.

The software limitation I mention effects everyone on FT or TIR, it doesn't matter. It comes from the amount of time it takes the computer to "guess" the amount of in-between frames (quantizing) from actual samples. You get better accuracy at the expense of lag (the amount of milliseconds it takes to process and return the information) which gets worse, linearly, with the amount of smoothing.

It's important to note that the higher the sampling rate of the camera, the less smoothing you need, much like a mouse.

How much is one of these PS3 eyes you mention? And is there any technical specs on it's field of view?

Google it first. Do a little research, because you have a lot of opinions and voted NO in this poll... I'm not suprised with that: you know very little but have a lot of opinions!

:cool:

Hush...adults are having a conversation here.

Actually, I say - FT is a hack ;) sooo, it looks like you're wrong.. it does offer less than optimal performance


how could you have done that?

Just spent an hour or so with my TIR and, compared to FT with a 30fps web cam, TIR has a faster response time. Never thought about it before or the possible impact on game play. I don't know much about the PS3 eyecam other than it is compatible - wether to get one depends on COD's headtracking API support but, from what I understand, they are reasonably priced so worth getting for my second PC set up and have FT on one and TIR on other.

here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FreeTrack you can see some comparisons, ps3 eyecam have a max field of view of 75° instead TIR5 is 51.7° if the data there is not wrong. I paid for a new ps3 eyecam about 25 euros, and i can use like a webcam also not only for freetrack

CharveL, what people complain here is that TIR is overpriced, so for who can't or don't want afford it there is freetrack, cheap because today almost everybody have a webcam. I want be clear that i don't say one is better than another, just that one is "cheaper" than another.

can you prove FT is an hack? give us the prove.... and a technical explanation why is TIR better than freetrack.

You must let the guy do a little "adult" research by himself... :cool:

For the always stupid W-R: I used a lot of TiR hardware bought by friends, tested since TiR2 to TiR5.

If the "VOTE NO!" crowd don't know a thing about Freetrack work, what's the specs of cameras avaliable for PC use, I don't care. I know how TiR performs. I like TiR performance, but like more "do yourself" Freetrack approach, with equal performance.

Simple as that.

read back through the threads, and you'll see



@ LoBi

with equal performance? yes, Lobi, that's because FT uses part of NP software

LoBiSoMeM, it seems that with CharveL is possible to have a decent conversation, with W_R is impossible... do you see his answers? always the same... hack,hack, performance, hack... it's like he get paid every time he write those words

you again are offending my intelligence and testing my patience... the words that you write about what YOU think are NOTHING, you have to PROVE what you say ok?

you edited after i wrote my answer...

WICH PART OF NP'S SOFTWARE DOES FT USE?

@ albx

you've already done that

your posts are so clear.... :cool:

@ albx...
so, who are you??

Interesting. Coupled with the cheap price it does sound like a decent alternative for those who don't want to pony up for the more expensive unit.

I totally agree that, barring any of the legal stuff, FT is a good alternative.

I'll reserve any judgements on performance comparisons until I can see for myself but I only bring up the technical aspects out of an interest in finding out or explaining what I do know about TIR, not to tell people what they should or should not use.

This part according to Wolf_Troll. This little source code from linux-track, another evil hacking project stealing from Naturalpoint. ;)

the LT looks hard

what he probably don't and will never understand is how it works. The software (the game) call some functions of a .dll, this .dll give back at the game the values X-Y-Z-yaw-pitch-roll. what freetrack do, when a software that don't use FT protocol, is to use a .dll with the same name of TIR's .dll, but are 2 completely different .dll. The game think is talking with NP's .dll and get the values back, but is freetrack, and no NP's .dll or software is involved in it. The complain that could only had NP was the string
that was removed, so can you again explain your statement?
thanks

And this is one of the "VOTE NO" guys... Glad to see! One vote less for "NO"?

Funny stuff!

I set the multiplier down to x2 and reduced the smoothing algorithms and it didn't make a fat lot difference to the slight (and it is very slight) lag. Having immediately changed from one system to another I am left unsure as to what, if any, impact the slight lag would make in actual use as I seemed fairly comfortable with both set-ups in full switch (others would probably say otherwise, I can only speak for myself). I'm sure if you were to try it you would be suprised at how well it 'can' perform even with a 30fps webcam - even if it didn't quite match your TIR performance. All will be revealed in a few weeks!

thanks for all that albx... you just wrote your own response

:lol::lol::lol:

that's the most obvious trolling so far.

buahhhhhhhhhhhhhh TROLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL you are only a TROLL

said this, you'll not get any other answer from me, think wathever you want, you think FT is an hack? I DON'T CARE WHAT YOU THINK

goodbye

@ albx...

Cya :)


hmmm... let's see now - hmmm, a difference of opinion = troll, eh? (sticks and stones, sport.. sticks and stones)

For what it's worth I would like to see CoD support freetrack's interface. It's just another tickbox in a menu which provides more options for people. Simple as that.

Thanks,
tjhowse.

From the English language manual (it's linked on another thread in the CoD sub-forum), Chapter "Flying the Planes - Pilot Controls", page 68, second to last paragraph:



So, i guess that seals the deal ;)

Thanks God. Some good news. :cool: Now if you can fix this epilepsy crapola, I go to church next Sunday.;)

Webcam software? Buh?

I suppose at least this confirms that it's not a TIR-exclusive thing.

Sounds good - I'll wait until I see the head axes in the controller setup screen before believing!

from http://forums.ubi.com/eve/forums/a/t...9/m/6751022719

"Jules: Can the six head control axes be assigned to by *any* game controller axis, rather than being limited to TrackIR?

Currently you can only control your head with the keyboard, mouse, or a head-tracking device.
Improvements to our in-game camera are high on our list, including smooth panning, axis support, “realistic” shaky-cam, etc."

hmmm. Sounds like IL-2 to me - 2 DoF for anyone without TIR. Given that the head position axes are axes (!), I'm a bit suspicious about the future "axis support".

Russian players say that Freetrack is working fine with the game.

I have a TrackIR 5, but I would like alternatives to be supported as well, competition helps drive technology forward.

Thanks for that, excellent news for all Headtracking users (apart for some who shall not be named....:grin:)

Well there has been a mod to allow 6 DoF support in IL-2 for years. Anyway even if they have to implement it a little later 2 DoF is plenty for normal situations. Just have to set a key to center the gunsight on German planes is all.

Relief to see they didn't swallow NaturalPoint's interface 'upgrade' offer like Bohemia Interactive and Eagle Dynamics, screwing their customers in process.

IIRC the Russian version of one of the DCS sims worked fine with FT, but the US/UK etc version didn't. We'll just have to wait and see.

According to the English manual (linked in another thread and hopefully appropriate for our version release) does state 'headtracking with webcam and software' support. Double whammy of no epi filter option and no FT for the rest of us would be .....:evil:

from one of the russian threads:

"Fritrek works, but are lacking in smooth zooms, although it could not have found yet"

and

"Joystick mouse emulation software, RRjoy works"

http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.ph...ml#Post3248766

Sokol1

LOL - CloD manual, pag. 68:

Sokol1

Freetrack using the old, unencrypted trackir interface works with CLOD.