Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool - Click & Solve

Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool - Click & Solve — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 23:46:37 GMT

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re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

SharpGIS — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 03:02:18 GMT

Very cool!

May I suggest that you show the pixel error on each pin, so it will be easier to locate the pin that messes up the least squares adjustment?

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

SoulSolutions — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 06:16:06 GMT

So we will see a way to then view your collection of photos in VE3D as a fly through slideshow or something?

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

NikolaiF — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 22:25:09 GMT

Note: apparently there is an issue with the Locate feature. The workaround at the moment is to not use it :) Sorry about that.

Note2: Generally speaking we can't discuss the future until it happens. But that doesn't mean we're not listening.

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

jherod — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 19:02:54 GMT

Sort of the same question as above: What do we do with the calibrated pictures? Does VE3d understand how to display the calibrated pictures (i.e. can it use the altitude, pitch, etc), or will the pictures only work in the calibration tool for now?

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

NikolaiF — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 21:51:05 GMT

For now, the information is only used in the tool. In the long run, it would be great to have some sort of standard EXIF tag system where a variety of tools would be able to read and write the information, and cameras would populate as much of it as they could (you'd need a compass, accelerometer, GPS, and agreement on a datum and coordinate system). But that's obviously a little beyond the scope here. For this tool we just wanted to show what is possible.

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

Nate Lawrence — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 23:13:03 GMT

Greetings! I just came across this entry this morning and was very excited to try it but I'm getting server errors every time I attempt to download the zip.

Would someone mind looking into this? Thanks.

Nate

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

msperlin — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 01:40:32 GMT

As noted, there are not standard Exif tags for some of the data needed. Which tags does the tool use to store the Yaw, Pitch and Roll? Exif Comment, or a Makernote?

Thanks,

Marv

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

siddjain — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 19:39:20 GMT

following tags are used to store roll, pitch, yaw:

Roll = 0x001B

Pitch = 0x001C

Yaw=0x001D

I will also make a subtle correction to the writeup where it says: All angles (lat, lon, roll, pitch, yaw) are stored in degrees.

Correction: They are stored in degrees, minutes, seconds as mandated by EXIF specification.

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

msperlin — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 21:22:50 GMT

Thanks siddjain,

I would like to suggest that you store the Yaw setting in the 0x0011 17 GPSInfo Exif.GPSInfo.GPSImgDirection field: Indicates the direction of the image when it was captured. The range of values is from 0.00 to 359.99.

Since Exif doesn't have standards for Pitch and Roll, maybe an XMP data field would be appropriate. I too am trying to save this data in a standard format, but there doesn't seem to be one.

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

siddjain — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 23:53:20 GMT

Hi,

Thanks for the suggestion. Quoting EXIF specification v2.2 (p.56):

GPSImgDirectionRef

Indicates the reference for giving the direction of the image when it is captured. 'T' denotes true direction and 'M' is

magnetic direction.

GPSImgDirection

Indicates the direction of the image when it was captured. The range of values is from 0.00 to 359.99.

It is not obvious that GPSImgDirection is same as the Yaw field of the Photo Placement Tool. It perhaps is not. Our reference for Yaw is the normal vector at the Earth's surface. I am not sure if this equals either 'T' or 'M' of GPSImgDirectionRef. Therefore, I chose not to use this tag.

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

siddjain — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 23:58:37 GMT

Correction to previous post: its page 50 (appears as 54/154 in Adobe Reader).

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

siddjain — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 00:36:06 GMT

I did some research, and according to definition of true north in http://www.princeton.edu/~oa/manual/mapcompass2.shtml, it seems the Yaw angle could be stored in GPSImgDirection field with GPSImgDirectionRef as 'T'. I assume the angle in GPSImgDirection field rotates about the normal vector to the Earth's surface.

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

Nate Lawrence — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 04:41:02 GMT

Is anyone else getting an error message after installing the 2009 April 9th VE3D update?

I am now presented with the error message whenever I attempt to open calibration.exe:

"Unable to find VE3D v3.0 (helios) assemblies. Program will exit"

This could be due to any number of changes on my PC since I last opened the tool, but the reference to the version number of the assemblies made me instantly question whether this error was linked to the recent update to VE3D.

If I have correctly diagnosed the cause of this error, could we please have an updated version of the tool or directions about what files to modify on our local machines?

Thanks so much.

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

NikolaiF — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 20:28:59 GMT

Hi all,

The tool requires a recompile against the new control. Sid will post an updated version as soon as he can.

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

NikolaiF — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 01:50:32 GMT

Sid has rebuilt the tool, and I've updated the link under "Install". Thanks for your patience!

re: Sid has rebuilt the tool, and I've updated the link under "Install".

Nate Lawrence — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 18:43:49 GMT

Actually, thank you for actually responding!

I do have one question. As I'm sure you're aware, in Bill Chen's original tool his interface involved overlaying the photo on top of the VE3D view and then dragging points into agreement, rather than the traditional point for point correspondence marking.

For my fellow readers, visit the following link in Internet Explorer:

http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/UM/redmond/events/MSRNVideoContent/FacSum08/16080/lecture.htm

and jump to around the 48:00 mark for Bill Chen demonstrating the original tool. (If you jump a little further back you'll see him viewing a Photosynth of Smith Tower correctly positioned inside of Virtual Earth... I'm unbelievably jealous!)

My question is twofold: When will Sid be given the time to implement Bill's original drag and drop/toggle interface as a secondary option (given that the initial testing recorded that results using that interface were slightly less accurate on average than the current interface), and also when might this photo calibration tool be packaged into Microsoft Pro Photo Tools?

Looking forward to hearing back from you guys.

re: Microsoft Photo Calibration Tool

SoulSolutions — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 09:36:17 GMT

I 2nd Nate, love to see the overlay version.

It seems that others are also trying to automate this entire process using terrain mapping:

http://www.opengeodata.org/?p=552

very exciting.