Virtual studio
Virtual Studio is used for movies and TV program recordings, where real life and virtual reality merge. This solution allows to record video material with real actors/presenters acting in a tree dimensional computer generated scene. A new camera tracking system was especially developed for OGX|Virtual Studio. Owing to this, a cameraman can freely operate a camera during recordings, which significantly extends possible artistic expression methods and increases scene reality.
OGX|Virtual Studio is the next step of blue-box technology. Inside a standard blue-box studio an actor/presenter is recorded on a blue/green background, which is separated from an image using a transparency mask (generated by a chroma key). Mask creation consists in considering all blue/green pixels transparent. Actors’ silhouettes separated from a blue/green background are combined with a background from another video image source.
A standard blue box can produce a realistic illusion as long as the camera which is recording actors remains static. When the camera is moving, the actor is also moving inside a video frame (though the actor himself or herself is not moving) and the background remains still. This gives the effect of the actor “floating” on a TV screen and destroys scene reality. This effect is caused by a lack of synchronization between a real camera and a virtual camera which is “recording” a background.
This is the main difference between a standard blue box and a virtual studio. Owing to a very modern camera tracking which is applied in the OGX|Virtual Studio every movement of a real camera is synchronized with a virtual camera. Due to this images obtained from each camera are also synchronized. Free operation of a camera allows a cameraman to achieve even more artistic expression and take full advantage of virtual environment.
Virtual Studio is a part of a larger project performed at the Warsaw University of Technology within the framework of the State Committee for Scientific Research coordinated by Polish Television, titled “System udostępniania sygnału audiowizualnego w polskim Internecie optycznym w sposób zapewniający realizację telewizji interaktywnej”.
The project is carried out in a cooperation with:
