Using multiple Kinect cameras

How to set up and use multiple Microsoft Kinect cameras for bilateral capture in Velogic Studio

Microsoft Kinect cameras have always had an inbuilt limitation: it's only possible to attach a single Kinect camera to Windows at one time.

When we developed Velogic Studio 4 (released early 2024), one of the major enhancements was the ability to use multiple Femto Mega cameras simultaneously, for full bilateral capture.

Although simultaneous bilateral capture isn't possible with the Microsoft Kinect camera (due to the Windows limitation), it is now possible to use multiple Kinect cameras to capture both sides of a rider, without needing to rotate the rider.

It's not simultaneous, but it's still a better workflow than physically rotating the rider on the platform. Here's how it works:

Setup Process

1. Enable Multiple Camera Mode In Step 1 of Velogic Studio, look for this option at the bottom of the Kinect configuration section:

2. Configure First Camera By default, that option will be off, but when you turn it on, you will see some differences in the configuration panel:

   • The Kinect camera now has a unique "name". This is initially set to the unique internal serial number from the camera, but you can click "Rename" to rename it to something more appropriate, e.g. "Right" or "Left"

   • There's a "Remove" button, which you can use to remove this camera.

3. Add Second Camera If you now unplug that Kinect camera, and plug in a different camera, you'll see two configuration panels, one for each camera:

4. Rename the Second Camera You should rename the second camera too for easier identification.

Capture Workflow

Now that Velogic Studio knows about both cameras, you can complete a capture with each camera, and Velogic Studio will give the captured videos different names, according to the names of the cameras.

Merging Captures

When you have completed two captures, e.g. one with the left and one with the right camera, you can mouse-over the thumbnail of the second capture, and click the "Actions" button:

... and then choose "Merge with previous" from the dropdown options:

Velogic Studio will merge together the 2 captures, and you'll then have a single capture with both Right and Left videos and metrics.