John Carmack, the mythical developer, now working for Oculus, gave to the community a VR video player dedicated to play original ZCAM K1 video files. The aim of this project is to measure how bad your video pipeline is by looking at the source and comparing with what you’ve done to the video quality after cropping, compressing, and so on…
Here’s the way to use it for non developer creators.
install adb
Go to Google Android website and download the ADB software. For Mac user, install HomeBrew, a complete unix environment that helps user to manage the installation of Unix / Linux software.
Open Terminal and type:
ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"
Install Adb from HomeBrew
brew cask install android-platform-tools
You can test your install by typing
adb help
Now, from your smartphone, connect to your Oculus Go through bluetooth, and go to parameters. Activate the developer mode, otherwise you’ll never get access to your Oculus.
Install the player in Oculus Go
First, connect the Oculus Go to a USB port and in the terminal window type:
adb devices
You should see your Oculus listed by its ID. If a « unauthorized » word appears, then put your Oculus Go and give permission.
You may have to redo the USB connection and the adb devices command. You may also have to restart your Oculus, unplug the USB, retry…
Now, in the terminal type
adb install
and drag and drop on the Terminal window the apk file that you’ve downloaded here.
You should see something like
adb install /path/path/leftright-release.apk
Then press return and the apk file should be install.
Install the video files
Rename the first video files from the K1 as « right.mov » (the one that gets in the name 000 and the other file « left.mov ». Note : if you recorded your scene upside down, left is right and right is left…
I thought I had to use the Android File Transfer App to copy the file but I could not find the sdcard John Carmack is talking about. I’ve made some Google search to discover that the sdcard folder is in the /mnt/sdcard path. This path can not be reach by the Android File Transfer App. You have to use ADB again.
So, to copy the file, type in the Terminal window :
adb push
then drag and drop the first video file. You should get something like :
adb push /Volumes/G-RAID/__VR/_VR180/201809091501/ZCAM0035_1214/right.MOV
add a space and type :
/mnt/sdcard
The line should look like :
adb push /Volumes/G-RAID/__VR/_VR180/201809091501/ZCAM0035_1214/right.MOV /mnt/sdcard
Press return and the file will be uploaded. Repeat the process for the second video file and you’ve done the job !
I’ve look to my rush with this method, and I must confess it is very interesting to look at the original files. I could see the strands of hair of the actor, that I’ve never seen in my compressed, tweaked movie.