Project: KISTI, Daejeon, Korea
Projectors: Barco UDM 4K
Screen: 360 degrees, 9 meter Diameter, 3.4m high.
Challenge: Tight curvature from wall to floor
Other software integration: Watchout, middleVR, WorldViz
The KISTI facility is part of KARST, the Korean Research Centre and located next to the supercomputer system. This on its own provided unexpected issues, due to the high network security, which made it extreemly difficult to access the facility remotely.
A second challenge was that the physical access to the facility was restricted and all work had to cease ay 10pm.
The job as such seemed easy. Calibrate all 13 projectors for wall and floor, so that a seamless 3D image can be created and that any calibration can be repeated semi-automatically within the shortest amount of time.
The particular challenges were identified as such:
a) The curved base of the wall was very tight and did not allow for many calibration points.
b) The wall was painted very bright, which reduced contrast by cross reflection.
c) The door, opening inwards, did not allow for a continuation of the curved floor edge, unless specifically designed wedges were manually moved. Without the wedges, there were points, tha camera could not see.
d) The camera was mounted on the same structure as the projectors, risking a repositioning of the camera, every time work was done on the projectors.
e) Due to a floating floor, vibrations of footsteps were tranferred to the camera and projectors.
f) Lightspill from a window, above the ‘cave’ created calibration artifacts.
The computer system, consisting of 13 Dell Media nodes and one Master, were already installed in an adjacent room. The computers are extreemly powerful and each is equipped with a NVIDIA GPU. This computer configuration would guarantee a smooth display of all high resolution content.
Unfortunately, the other software systems, such Watchout, middleVR and WorldViz had not been installed, so that some re-configuration of the system was required in the process, adding additional on-site days.
On site for VIOSO, was Jurgen Krahmann, who flew in specifically for the project. Jurgen is a highly experienced engineer who solved all occuring issues professionally and provided valuable training for the on-site team.
Initially we were considering 5MP Fisheye cameras with the possibility to move to a multi-camera set-up, if the capturing of all projection was impossible. While the 5MP camera worked, the resolution was not sufficient to cover the very tight wall-floor edge.
We ended up using a 12MP Fisheye camera, which allowed a seamless, bleding at this critical area.
A typical from scratch camera blending calibration takes about 60 minutes, considering the 4K resolution of the 13 projectors. A semi-automatic re-calibration based on te same parameters, provided that the camera-wall position has not changed, will take about 40-45 minutes.
However, the projector set-up and the inherent distortions, using short throw lenses in a curved screen environment, required many hours of painstaking manual corrections and masking to prefect the image.
In fact, due to the limitations in remote access, the client decided to fly us in again at the beginning of August to do some fine tuning and to ensure that the OEM software integration was perfected.
At the same time, an in-depth training of the support staff at our client VizWave, Korea was provided.
In summary it was a very interesting project which gave us great insights about the capabilities of VIOSO Anyblend VR&SIM in complex simulation and cave set-up’s. Anyblend VR&SIM has just recently be replaced with VIOSO 6 SIM and features added functionalities.
On external person associated with the project commented that they could think of no calibration system on the market, which would be able to calculate such tight curvature between wall and floor.
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