PhotosynthVR Manual

Usage

Basic Usage

The PhotosynthVR plug-in initially includes six data sets, although adding new data sets is very easy. The data sets include: "1983 - Sun God", "2005 - Bear", "Computer", "ET", "Kermit", and "Vase." To load these, select PhotosynthVR from the main OpenCover menu, and then select "Load File Set." You should see the mentioned data sets in that list, and you may simply click on any of them to initiate loading.
Not all of the data-sets come with stereo pairs. Of the mentioned data sets, only Sun God and Bear are stereo. PhotosynthVR automatically loads stereo images when they are available.

Options

Load from cache when possible

PhotosynthVR generates a cache the first time it loads a data set in order to greatly enhance future load times. If you edit the data, make sure to uncheck this option so it regenerates the cache with respect to the new data.

Verbose Output

"Verbose Output" is an advanced option that may assist with troubleshooting. It will make the plug-in output debugging information to the terminal. Enabling this option will slow down the plug-in, thus it should generally be turned off.

Take Screenshot

"Take Screenshot" will output a screenshot to the directory in which the "opencover" command was executed.

Show Picture Frame

This option will make a yellow border around all potential images (even the ones are currently not being displayed).

Transparency

The "transparency" option will set the opacity of the pictures. 1 indicates complete opacity, while 0 would indicates complete transparency.

Show Pictures

Use this menu to manually select which pictures you wish to be displayed. For this option to work, "Self-Select Mode" must be enabled. If "Self-Select Mode" is enabled but a picture does not appear when selected, that indicates that Bundler was unable to find a location for that image in the scene.

Enable Debug Visualization

This displays various visuals that are useful for debugging. This options should be left off under normal circumstances.

Point Options

Show No Points

Does not show any correspondence points.

Show All Correspondence Points

Shows all correspondence points in the entire scene.

Show Camera-Specific Points

Shows the correspondence points of only the pictures that are currently being displayed.

Show Reflected Camera Points

Shows the camera points when moved into the planes of the pictures.

Show Camera Reflection Lines

Shows lines connecting the camera points and the camera points in the image plane.

Picture Display Modes

Self-Select Mode

Shows only the pictures explicitly selected in the "Show Pictures" sub-menu.

Closest n Mode

Shows "n" pictures that are closest to the viewer.

n

Select the number of pictures to be displayed when using "Closest n Mode"

Transparency dependent on distance

The opacity of each pictures is determined by the distance between the viewer and the respective picture.

Enabling PhotosynthVR plug-in in OpenCover

If "PhotosynthVR" does not appear as one of the options in the OpenCover menu, you will need to enable it. Open the "covise/config/starcave.xml" document and find the line that states <PhotosynthVR value="off" />. Change the "off" to "on" and restart OpenCover. "PhotosynthVR" should now appear in the OpenCover menu.

Adding New Data

Data is automatically loaded from the "/home/covise/data/PhotosynthVR/dataAutomaticallyLoadedByPlugin-KEEPCLEAN/" directory. Create a directory there to have it automatically appear in PhotosynthVR's "Load File Set" menu. In that directory, make a "cache" directory, and leave it empty. Also, make a "pictures" directory and place all of your images in there. If you have a stereo pair for those images, create another directory named "stereo pictures" and place the stereo images in there. The names of the images do not matter, but when sorted, stereo-paired images need to correspond. Run the images through bundler (if you have a stereo images, do not run those through bundler). Place the outputted "bundle.out" file in the directory.
If you want text to be displayed during the loading sequence, create a file called "description" and write your text in there.