Properties Pane: Rigid Body

An in-depth look at the properties available for Rigid Bodies.

Rigid body properties determine how the corresponding Rigid Body asset is tracked and displayed in the 3D Viewport. This page covers the properties specific to Rigid Bodies. For general information on using and customizing the Properties pane, see the Properties Pane page. For detailed descriptions of properties for other asset types or devices, please see the following pages:

• Properties: Take

• Properties: Trained Markerset

• Properties: Skeleton

• Properties: Camera

• Properties: eSync

• Properties: Force Plates

• Properties: NI-DAQ

Rigid Body Properties

Select a Rigid Body asset in the Assets pane or in the 3D viewport, and the corresponding properties will be listed under the Properties pane. These properties can be modified both in Live and Edit mode. Default creation properties are listed under the Assets Settings.

A Rigid Body with Properties.

Advanced Settings

The Properties pane contains advanced settings that are hidden by default. To access these settings, click the button in the top right corner.

Use the Edit Advanced option to customize which settings are in the Advanced Settings category and which appear in the standard view, to show only the settings that are needed specifically for your capture application.

Show or Edit Advanced Settings.

General Properties

The following items are available in the General Properties section. Properties are Standard unless noted otherwise.

Rigid body properties: General, with Advanced properties displayed.

Asset Name

Enter a custom name for the Rigid Body. The default name is "Rigid Body X," where X is the Rigid Body ID. The Asset Name can also be changed by right-clicking the Rigid Body in the Assets pane.

Enable

Enable or Disable tracking of the selected Rigid Body. A disabled Rigid Body will not be tracked, and its data will not be included in the exported or streamed tracking data or displayed in the 3D Viewport.

To hide the markers associated with a disabled asset in the 3D Viewport:

• Click to open the Visuals menu.

• Select Markers -> Hide for Disabled Assets.

Notes

An optional text field for storing additional information about the Rigid Body. The data in the Notes field is not included when exporting the asset to a CSV file.

Minimum Markers to Boot

Sets the minimum number of markers that must be tracked and labeled in order for a Rigid Body asset, or each Skeleton bone, to be booted or first tracked.

Minimum Markers to Continue

Sets the minimum number of markers that must be tracked and labeled in order for a Rigid Body asset, or each Skeleton bone, to continue to be tracked after the initial boot.

Minimum Active Markers to Boot (Advanced Setting)

Sets the minimum number of active markers that must be tracked and labeled for Rigid Bodies to be booted or first tracked. For more information on working with Active Markers, see the pages Active Marker Tracking and IMU Sensor Fusion.

Min Alignment Count (Advanced Setting)

The minimum number of measurements required for the IMU to auto-align. A higher number may result in a better outcome in a suboptimal environment. For example, if the CinePuck isn't being detected as expected, adjusting this value may obtain better results.

Max Drift Correction (Advanced Setting)

The rate of drift correction.

This changes how heavily the optical data is weighted or trusted in calculating the drift correction. A drift correction of 1 will look much like the optical data, whereas a drift correction close to 0 will more closely match the IMU data.

Asset Scale (Advanced Setting)

Increase or decrease the size of the Rigid Body bone by scaling the asset. By default, the Asset Scale is set to 100%.

Deflection Ratio (Advanced Setting)

Allows the asset to deform more or less to accommodate markers that don't fit the model. High values will allow assets to fit onto markers that don't match the model as well.

Streaming ID

User definable ID for the selected Rigid Body. When working with capture data in the external pipeline, this value can be used to address specific Rigid Bodies in the scene.

Visuals

The following items are available in the Visuals section. Properties are Standard unless noted otherwise.

Rigid body properties: Visuals section.

Bone Major Axis (Advanced Setting)

Set the axis with which the bone should be aligned. The coordinate at the end of the bone is expected to be on this axis.

Default Bone Length (Advanced Setting)

Set the offset (in mm) from the bone to the end effector, along the major axis, for bones that do not have child bones.

Bone Diameter (Advanced Setting)

Set the diameter of the bone (in mm).

Label

Display the Rigid Body name in the 3D Perspective View. When selected, a small label in the same color as the Rigid Body will appear over the centroid.

IMU State

Display a label with the status of the Rigid Body's IMU in the 3D Perspective View: IMU Working [Optical] %. If the asset Label is enabled, the IMU state is added after the asset name.

• The Optical status indicates whether the Minimum Markers to Continue threshold has been met (Optical), exceed (Good Optical) or is missing. (no optical).

• The % status denotes the amount of IMU packets that an IMU Tag is successfully delivering for every 100 frames.

Visual

Display the marker sticks and bone constraint lines in the 3D Perspective View.

Color

Set the color of the selected Rigid Body in the 3D Perspective View. Click the box to bring up the color picker:

Choosing a color for a Rigid Body.

Bones

Display a visual of the bone, or pivot point, of the Rigid Body in the 3D Viewport. The shape of the bone indicates whether the asset is solved or unsolved.

The bone of an unsolved Rigid Body.

The bone of a solved Rigid Body.

Bones Color

Set the color of the bone in the 3D Perspective View. By default, the bone uses the same color as the Rigid Body asset.

Bone Orientation (Advanced Setting)

Display the Rigid Body's local coordinate axes. This option can be useful in visualizing the orientation of the Rigid Body, and for setting orientation offsets. The setting is enabled in the images above.

Bone Position History

Show the history of the Rigid Body’s position in the Perspective view. When enabled, the option to set the history length becomes available.

Position history setting enabled on a Rigid Body.

Bone Degrees of Freedom (Advanced Setting)

Display degrees of freedom, position and orientation, for each bone pivot.

Marker Constraints

Show the Marker Constraints as transparent spheres on the Rigid Body. Marker Constraints are the expected marker locations according to the Rigid Body solve.

Marker to Constraint Lines (Advanced Setting)

Show lines between labeled Rigid Body markers and corresponding expected marker locations. This helps to visualize the offset distance between actual marker locations and the Marker Constraints.

Bone to Constraint Line (Advanced Setting)

Display a dotted line to connect each Marker Constraint to the Rigid Body bone pivot.

Opacity

Sets the opacity of an attached object. An OBJ file typically comes with a corresponding MTL file which defines its properties, and the transparency of the object is defined within these MTL files. The Opacity value under the Rigid Body properties rescales the loaded property. In other words, you can set the transparency in the MTL file and rescale it using the Opacity property in Motive.

Geometry (Advanced Setting)

Geometry Options for Rigid Bodies.

Attach a valid geometric model to the rigid body to display in the the 3D Viewport. Sphere, box, cylinder, and bone segment shapes are built-in; to use your own geometric model, select Custom Model. This will open the Attached Geometry field.

Attached Geometry

The Attached Geometry field becomes available whenever Custom Model is selected for the Rigid Body geometry.

Attach a Custom Geometry Model.

Click the folder to the right of the field to browse to the OBJ or FBX file to replace the Rigid Body. Properties configured in the corresponding MTL files alongside the OBJ file will be loaded as well.

Geometry Settings

Whenever a geometric model is attached, settings to adjust the scale, location, and orientation (Pitch, Yaw, and Roll) are available.

Geometry Settings in the Properties Pane.

Geometry Tips and Examples

A OBJ file of a basketball attached to a Rigid Body.

If you are exporting an OBJ file from Maya, make sure the Ambient Color setting is set to white upon export. If this color is set to black, it will remove textures when the Rigid Body is deselected.

Common Material Attributes in Maya with Ambient Color selected.

Attached Geometry models with Ambient color set to Black (left) or White (right).

Bones (Advanced Setting)

The Bone is the pivot point of a Rigid Body. Unlike Skeletons or Trained Markersets, Rigid Bodies are comprised of a single bone.

Bone Properties for a Rigid Body.

Parent

The Parent bone is the first bone in a Bone Chain, as used in Skeleton and Trained Markerset assets.

Children

A Child bone connects to the parent bone in a Bone Chain, as used in Skeleton and Trained Markerset assets. For Rigid Bodies, Motive displays one of the asset's marker labels.

Segment Type

Used for Skeleton and Trained Markerset assets to identify bone segments. For Rigid Bodies, this value is set to None.

Rotation Order

Euler angle rotation order used for calculating the bone hierarchy.

Rotation Offset

Enter values along one of the axis to reorient the Rigid Body coordinate axis.

Translation Offset

Enter values along one of the axis to move the Rigid Body pivot point.

Smoothing and Damping

Smoothing

Apply double exponential smoothing to translation and rotation of the Rigid Body. Increasing this setting may help smooth out noise in the Rigid Body tracking, but excessive smoothing can introduce latency. The default value is 0 (disabled).

Forward Prediction

Compensate for system latency when tracking the corresponding Rigid Body by predicting its movement into the future. Please note that using higher values may impact the tracking stability. The default value is 0 (disabled).

Translation Damping (Advanced)

When needed, you can damp down translational tracking of a Rigid Body bone on the selected axis.

Rotation Damping (Advanced)

You can also damp down rotational tracking of a Rigid Body.

Rotation Damping Axis (Advanced)

When using Rotation Damping, select whether to apply changes to a selected axis or to all.

IMU Properties

Active devices such as CinePucks and Pucks are often equipped with an Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) that increases the accuracy of tracking when fused with the rigid body. To learn more about pairing IMUs to Rigid Bodies, read the IMU Sensor Fusion page.

To view properties related to the IMU, select the Active Tag paired to the Rigid Body in the Devices pane.

Properties Pane for an Active Tag (IMU) paired to a Rigid Body.

Uplink ID

The Uplink ID is a sequential number assigned to the Tag or Puck when pairing it to a Base Station. This number is unique to each device attached to the Base Station. It is the second component of the Active Tag name in the Devices Pane.

RF Channel

The Radio frequency communication channel used to communicate with the Base Station. This is the first component of the Active Tag name in the Devices Pane.

IMU properties are read-only in Motive.

All Tags/Pucks are shipped pre-configured for every set of devices in the same order, with no Label overlap.

The cases when you would need to reconfigure the active components are:

• When you have purchased new Tags/Pucks to add to a system from a previous order.

• When there is a need to change the RF communication channel to avoid interference.

Use the Active Batch Programmer if you need to update any of these properties.