Ncam Reality Software
THE NCAM STORY
Since 2012 Ncam has been providing world class camera tracking solutions for the broadcast and film markets. The unique and patented approach includes the camera sensor bar and pioneering software solution, has seen use on a wide variety of productions from Hollywood blockbusters to live sports, news and entertainment shows and everything in between. It has changed the game in the field of augmented reality and has liberated producers to unleash their creative freedom without limits.
From day one we have been committed to collaborating with other technology suppliers, enabling our technology to seamlessly integrate with many third party applications. These close partner relationships and a deep understanding of our customers’ workflows have allowed us not only to deliver today’s creative vision and solve the challenges that content creators face day to day, but also to anticipate the future aspirations of our customers working in this space.
Our customers have demonstrated a consistent desire for six critical requirements from any camera tracking solution:
• Creative freedom to be enabled, not limited, by technology
• Simplicity of operation and speed of setup
• Accuracy of real-time tracking covering 6 DoF plus lens (FIZ) data
• Reliability of both data and system components
• Cost-effectiveness and a flexible business model
• Flexibility to operate anytime, anywhere on any rig and integrate with key third parties
For the past nine years our solutions have delivered against these requirements on some of the world’s most high-profile productions. However, our customers, partners and competitors continually inspire us to innovate further and so, leveraging the huge strides made by some of our technology partners, we have now re-imagined our solution;
ENTER THE MK2...
OUR NEXT GEN SOLUTION
We recently partnered with Intel to look at how improvements to current tracking technology could be realised and now the partnership will finally come to fruition. At IBC 2019 we proudly unveiled our prototype ‘Mk2 Camera Bar’ and since then our brilliant R&D team have not only been developing the hardware platform, but also redesigning the accompanying suite of software and adding a raft of new features.
The hardware itself leverages the Intel® ‘RealSense™’ hardware but is heavily modified to perfectly suit the most demanding broadcast and film environments. It is now smaller, lighter and able to mount more flexibly to an even greater variety of camera rigs. It can also be used with a jib, Steadicam, wire cam, and even drones.
Our previous generation hardware required an ethernet tether to return tracking data to the server running Ncam Reality software; today the software will run on the Mk2 Ncam Server mounted on the camera itself, meaning bandwidth requirements of the link from camera have been cut by almost a factor of 1000. This also means we can offer fully wireless tracking on a standard RF camera link. This opens up myriad possibilities for remote production of AR graphics, and also frees up valuable rack space in outside broadcast applications. More details on this will be coming soon.
The Ncam Reality 2020 software suite has also made great strides, with these key enhancements:
• Extremely simplified operation in consistent scenarios
• Hybrid feature extraction including natural features, markers and fiducials
• Wireless-ready with Mk2 hardware
• Global performance and stability enhancements
Our AR Suite software, which in its LITE form comes bundled as standard, provides seamless and future-proofed integration into the UE4 toolset. .
Ncam Mk2 offers everything content creators could want from an AR system:
• Creative freedom – leverage the gfx platform of your choice through our SDK or work natively with UE4 though AR Suite
• Simplicity – fast and accurate setup and calibration has been further enhanced by the release of a wizard-driven, role-based UI, reducing the requirement for specialist operators, potentially down to no operator requirement at all
• Accuracy – industry leading accuracy, further enhanced with the ability to track non-natural features with no requirement to ‘learn’ any marker patterns
• Reliability – rugged design with witness lenses now mounted internally
• Cost effectiveness – vastly simplified pricing model; best product, best value. Options to purchase outright or annual subscription
• Flexibility – track in real time in any studio or outdoor environment
THE FUTURE!
This release marks a huge milestone in the history of Ncam. This new platform will be the foundation of our technology moving forward and is just the beginning in allowing us to help customers realise their vision without having to worry about technology. The close partnerships we have with Intel, Epic and others will allow us to leverage further enhancements in both tracking and rendering technologies, as well as our own developments around spatial environment data capture and its reuse in non-live environments.