Shard - BORG Multi-agent Tracker

If you have not heard of these before consult your computer's manual (a handy Wikipedia entry: [[BIOS |http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BIOS]]). However, they are usually invoked by pressing the Delete or F keys during boot up.

BTF stands for BORG Tracking Format. In a nutshell, the 'file' is actually a directory containing text files whose file name is a property of the track being recorded (x location, y location, angle). More information is available at the BORG lab's BTF documentation [[website | http://borg.cc.gatech.edu/Software/gtrack/btf.html]]

The Shard Tracker works by keeping track of background regions detected by subtracting each video frame from the given background frame. At each pixel, the higher the value the more foreground like it is considered. In order to be considered foreground, the difference has to be greater than that defined by the parameter ''~Motion_Threshold''.\n\nTo be considered a valid track a foreground region detected through this method has to be present for at least a couple of frames, the exact number of frames is determined by the parameter ''Time_filter''. In addition, the region has to fill a minimum percentage of the area inside bounding box's parameter ''Template_width'' and ''Template_height''. This percentage is defined by the parameter ''Min_cluster_points''.\n\nThe tracker also reasons about the which side of the entity being tracked is the front by keeping track of the track's most prominent direction of motion. In the display, the tracker's current best guess of the front is indicated by a large yellow dot. To see the probability that the front of the track is in another position try View -> Show Hypotheses. Also, if all that is needed from a video is the tracked entity's position and not orientation then performance can be improved by decreasing the parameter ''Number_hypotheses'' (under File -> Properties -> PF) to 1.

Welcome\nGetting-Started\n[[Tracks Editing]]\n[[Basic Tracker Mechanics]]\n

\n|<html><img width=100% src="img/sample_bkg.jpg"></html>|\n| Corresponding background for the above video |\n\nIf a background has not been extracted from the video already (likely for new videos), then a background will be extracted for use with tracking (to see why a background is needed see [[Basic Tracker Mechanics]]). In the dialog box File -> Properties's BKG tab there is a option called Background_secs which affects the quality of the background extracted. The way the tracker extracts a background is by averaging frames of video together, the values of Background_secs tell the tracker how many seconds of video to average together to obtain a good background (normal values for this ranges from 3-200 secs). After background extraction, the background is automatically saved as a jpg file at the location next to the video.\n\nNote: this process can take up to a couple of minutes, progress for it is given in the Terminal application.\n\nTIP: If the background extracted comes out such that the the object being tracked is still there, try increasing Background_secs

Type the text for 'New Tiddler'

!!!Download and Burn\nDownload the tracker ISO by clicking on [[this link| xubuntu-7.04-shard.iso]]. The file contains a DVD ISO image and should be around 860 MB large. To use the tracker you will need to burn this image onto a DVD so you will need to have access to a computer with DVD burning facilities. As this is an ISO image, burning it to a CD should be standard with most software packages, but please make sure that the contents of the ISO image is burned and not simply the file. If you would like more details on the process, please refer to the Ubuntu project's [[BurningIsoHowto| https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BurningIsoHowto]].\n\n!!!Requirements\nThe default distribution of this tracker is shipped on a Xubuntu ~LiveDVD so the only requirement is that the computer running it should have at least a DVD drive and 128 MB of RAM. However, it is recommended that the tracker be run a fairly recent system as speed might become an issue.\n\n!!!~ReBoot!\nWhile reading this, insert the DVD and reboot your computer selecting the DVD as the boot disk using your computer's [[BIOS options]]. After restarting the computer in this new environment, make sure that the videos to be tracked are accessible. All the computer's hard drives should show up the new desktop, if the video is not accessible still, try placing it onto a USB Key.\n\n!!!Go\n<html><img width=100% src="img/btracking.jpg"></html>\n# Start the tracker by clicking Applications -> Multimedia -> GT Track\n# Wait for it...\n# In the window labeled 'Background', do either Video -> [[Extract Background]] or Video -> [[Load Background]]\n# Go to File -> Properties -> MS and set the options Template_width, and Template_height. These options specify approximate the size of the object tracked in pixels. The convention is that width represents the larger of the two dimensions (for animals such as ants, crickets, and beetles this is normally the animal's length). Don't worry if you don't have this quite right, these options can be tweaked later.\n# Load your video with Video -> Open Video\n# Click 'Step' a couple of times to see that the video is being tracked satisfactorily, if you would like to record the tracks select Track -> Record tracks (Note that the file recorded will be [[BTF]] formatted)\n# Click Video -> Run (~Ctrl-R) to process the rest of the video. While running the user interface will be frozen, to use it again you will need to pause processing by pressing ~Ctrl-P.\n\nIf you still have [[problems]]...\n

If the video is using a known background or if a background has been extracted before then this option loads it from disk thus preventing the need to use the more lengthy [[Extract Background]] process.

[[Welcome]]\n[[Getting-Started]]\n[[Tracks Editing]]\n[[Basic Tracker Mechanics]]\n[[Permanent Installation]]\n\n\n

<<closeAll>><<permaview>><<newTiddler>><<newJournal 'DD MMM YYYY'>><<saveChanges>><<slider chkSliderOptionsPanel OptionsPanel 'options »' 'Change TiddlyWiki advanced options'>>

\n<div id='header' class='header'>\n<div class='headerShadow'>\n<span class='searchBar' macro='search'></span>\n<span class='siteTitle' refresh='content' tiddler='SiteTitle'></span> \n<span class='siteSubtitle' refresh='content' tiddler='SiteSubtitle'></span>\n</div>\n\n</div>\n<div id='mainMenu'>\n<span refresh='content' tiddler='MainMenu'></span>\n<span id='noticeBoard' refresh='content' tiddler='NoticeBoard'></span>\n\n</div>\n<div id='sidebar'>\n<div id='sidebarOptions' refresh='content' tiddler='MochaSideBarOptions'></div>\n<div id='sidebarTabs' refresh='content' force='true' tiddler='SideBarTabs'></div>\n</div>\n<div id='displayArea'>\n<div id='messageArea'></div>\n<div id='tiddlerDisplay'></div>\n</div>\n<div id='contentFooter' refresh='content' tiddler='contentFooter'></div>\n

As the tracker links with proprietary software this option is not currently available. Please send me an email if this is a major issue; I am working to resolve this to open source the tracker.

Aenean eros arcu, condimentum nec, dapibus ut, tincidunt sit amet, urna. \n!heading 1\n!!heading 2\n!!!heading3\n----\n<<tag button>>\nThis is a link to a [[StyleSheet]] tiddler.\n\n> This is a blockquote\n> This is a blockquote\n> This is a blockquote\n|>|>| !This is a header |h\n|column1|column2|column3|\n|row2| row2 |row2|\n|column1|column2|column3|\n|row2| row2 |row2|\n|column1|column2|column3|\n|row2| row2 |row2|

BORG Multi-agent Tracker

Shard

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Tracks editing can be performed with the [[TeamView| http://borg.cc.gatech.edu/Software/teamview/]] application (also produced by the BORG lab) included with the tracking environment. Launch [[TeamView| http://borg.cc.gatech.edu/Software/teamview/]] by going to Applications -> Multimedia -> [[TeamView| http://borg.cc.gatech.edu/Software/teamview/]] . As [[TeamView| http://borg.cc.gatech.edu/Software/teamview/]] was written entirely in Java, unlike Shard, it is also fairly easy to run it on Microsoft based systems.

<html><center><img src="img/ant60.jpg"></center></html>\n\nWelcome to the Shard tracker, a BORG software package created for tracking multiple agents using video. This package was created in the BORG lab to track multiple targets recorded in video where the object to be tracked is the only moving object in the given video. Video examples of what is possible with this package is available on the [[BioTracking| http://borg.cc.gatech.edu/biotracking/recent-results.html]] website. If you have any questions or comments please forward them to the author, [[Hai Nguyen|http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~haidai/]].

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This, of course, is to be expected. There are a few strategies that will help:\n* Check that the background captured is valid: Pause (~Ctrl-P), View -> ~X-Ray, click Step a couple of times. The object to be tracked should be a prominent white blob in this mode, if it isn't try decreasing the Motion_threshold property (File -> Properties). If the background subtracted image looks noisy (many white speckles) try increasing the threshold.\n* If the target is still not being picked up try decreasing Min_cluster_points under File -> Properties -> MS. This value should range between 0 and 1. It controls the percentage the box defined by Template_width and Template_height needs to be filled before the background subtracted region is considered a track.\n* The software libraries that the tracker depends on is fairly liberal with the video formats that it will support as well as video codecs. However, these libraries (as do most software) do not support *.vob files copied directly from a video DVD. For this case, please refer to the variety of resources and software available on the internet for video conversion from DVD to a more acceptable format such as Quicktime ~MPEG-4 or AVI files.\n* email the author at [img[email | img/email.jpg]]