All software releases

We are pleased to announce the release of Pupil Core software v3.5!

Download the latest bundle (scroll down to the end of the release notes and see Assets).

Please feel free to get in touch with feedback and questions via the #pupil channel on Discord! 😄

Overview

In Pupil v3.5, we cleaned up log messages, improved software stability, fixations are now cached between Pupil Player sessions, and we have fine tuned 3d pupil confidence.

Pupil v3.5 is the first release that supports the new macOS Monterey (with a small caveat). Read more below.

New

• Recording-specific annotation hotkeys

• Add option to filter out low-confidence values in raw data export

• Add option to disable world video recording

• macOS Monterey support

Improved

• Reduced number of user-facing log messages

• Export-in-progress file-name suffixes

• Windows: Handle exceptions during driver installation gracefully

• Windows: Option to skip automatic driver installation

• Windows: Create start menu entries and desktop shortcuts for all users on install

• Add Euler angles to headpose tracker result

• Normalize IMU pitch/roll values to [-180, 180] degrees

• Confidence adjustment for pye3d results

• Cache post-hoc fixation detector results

• Documentation

New

Recording-specific annotation hotkeys - #2170

Until now, the keyboard-shortcut setup for annotations was stored in Pupil Player's session settings. These were reset if you updated Pupil Core software to a new version.

Starting with this version, annotation keyboard shortcuts will be stored persistently within the recording.

The definitions are stored in <recording dir>/offline_data/annotation_definitions.json with the format:

{
    "version": 1,
    "definitions": {
        "<label>": "<hotkey>"
    }
}

This file can be shared between recordings.

When Pupil Player is opened, it will attempt to load the annotation definitions from the recording-specific file. If the file is not found or is invalid, Pupil Player will fallback to the session settings which contain the last known annotation definitions.

Add option to filter out low-confidence values in raw data export - #2210

Pupil Core software assigns "confidence" values to its pupil detections and gaze estimations. They indicate the quality of the measurement. For visualization and some analysis Plugins, Pupil Player hides gaze data below the "Minimum data confidence" threshold (adjustable in the general settings menu).

Prior to this release, the raw data exporter plugin exported all data, independently of its confidence. New users, therefore, often wonder why their exported data looks noisier than what they have seen in Pupil Player.

Starting with this release, users will have the option to filter out low-confidence data (i.e. below the "Minimum data confidence" threshold) in the export. The option can be enabled in the raw data exporter's menu.

Add option to disable world video recording - #2169

If you are not interested in recording the scene video, you can now disable the scene video recording in the Recorder menu of Pupil Capture's world window.

macOS Monterey support

Due to new technical limitations, Pupil Capture and Pupil Service need to be started with administrator privileges to get access to the video camera feeds. To do that, copy the applications into your /Applications folder and run the corresponding command from the terminal:

• Pupil Capture: sudo /Applications/Pupil\ Capture.app/Contents/MacOS/pupil_capture

• Pupil Service: sudo /Applications/Pupil\ Service.app/Contents/MacOS/pupil_service

Note: The terminal will prompt you for your administrator password. It will not preview any typed keys. Simply hit enter once the password has been typed.

Note: When recording with administrator privileges, the resulting folder inherits admin file permissions. Pupil Player will detect these and ask you for the administrator password to reset the file permissions. This will be only necessary once per recording.

Improved

Export-in-progress file-name suffixes - #2167, #2186

Exporting video can take a long time. Pupil Player displays the progress as a growing circle around the menu icon while writing the result incrementally to disk. Specifically, it writes the result directly to the final export location. While the export is ongoing, the video file is invalid but still available to the user. This can lead to users opening the video before it has finished exporting and then encountering playback issues.

Starting with this release, Pupil Core software changes the video exports to include a .writing file name suffix during the export. This prevents other applications from recognizing the partially exported video file as complete. Once the export is done, the suffix is removed and other applications are able to recognize the file type as video.

Reduced number of user-facing log messages - #2190

Over the years, Pupil Capture's functionality has grown and with it the number of user-facing log messages. They can be overwhelming to the point where important log messages are overlooked or ignored. For this release, we have reviewed the log messages that are being displayed in the UI during typical actions, e.g. calibration and recordings, and have reduced them significantly.

Windows: Handle exceptions during driver installation gracefully - #2173

Previously, errors during the driver installation could cause the software to crash. Now, errors will be logged to the log file and the user will be asked to install the drivers manually.

Windows: Option to skip automatic driver installation - #2207

Using the -skip-driv or --skip-driver-installation flags, one can now launch Pupil Capture and Pupil Service without running the automatic driver installation on Windows. This can be helpful to speed up the start up time or to avoid unwanted driver installations.

Windows: Create start menu entries and desktop shortcuts for all users on install - #2166

Pupil Core software is installed to C:\Program Files (x86)\Pupil-Labs by default. This directory should be accessible by all users but the start menu entry and desktop shortcut are only installed for the current user. Starting with this release, the installer will create start menu entries and desktop shortcuts for all users on install.

Add Euler angles to headpose tracker result - #2175

Next to camera poses as Rodrigues' rotation vectors, the headpose tracker now also exports the camera orientation in Euler angles.

We also fixed a typo in the exported file name.

- head_pose_tacker_model.csv

+ head_pose_tracker_model.csv

Normalize IMU pitch/roll values to [-180, 180] - #2171

Orientation values exported by the IMU Timeline plugin will now be normalized to a range of [-180, 180] degrees.

Confidence adjustment for pye3d results - #2195

In some cases, pye3d was overestimating the confidence of its pupil detections. These were visible as noisy gaze estimations in the Pupil Core applications. This release includes an updated version of pye3d with adjusted confidence estimations. As a result, the gaze signal should look more stable during lower confidence situations, e.g. while squinting or looking down. For more information, see the Developer notes below.

Cache post-hoc fixation detector results - #2194

Post-hoc fixation detector results no longer need to be recalculated if you close and reopen a recording. Pupil Player stores the results together with the used configuration (version of the gaze data and fixation detection parameters) within the recording directory. The cached data will be restored if the Player configuration matches the configuration stored on disk. If it does not match, Player will recalculate the fixations to avoid inconsistencies.

Documentation

We have improved our documentation in several places:

• Pupillometry best practices - pupil-docs#453

• Blink detection - pupil-docs#463

• Pupil Core API - pupil-docs#455

Fixed

• Fixed typo in exported headpose tracker files - #2185

• Fix confidence graphs in Pupil Player for pre-2.0 recordings - #2191

• Use correct socket API to retrieve local IP address for Service - #2201

• Fix loading 200 Hz gaze data in Pupil Invisible recordings - #2204

• Fix loading short audio streams - #2206

Known issues

• Windows: Connecting remotely to Pupil Remote on Pupil Service does not work in some cases

• Pupil Groups: Users have reported issues with Pupil Groups connectivity when running Pupil Capture on different devices.

We are investigating these issues and will try to resolve them with an update as soon as possible.

Developer notes

Dependencies updates

Python dependencies can be updated using pip and the requirements.txt file:

python -m pip install --upgrade pip wheel
pip install -r requirements.txt

pye3d v0.2.0 and v0.3.0

Version 0.2.0 of pye3d has lowered 3d-search-result confidence by 40%. When the confidence of the input 2d pupil datum is lower than a specific threshold (0.7), pye3d attempts to reconstruct the 2d pupil ellipse based on its existing 3d eye model. We noticed that the confidence for these results was systematically overestimated given the actual detection result quality and have therefore adjusted the overall confidence assignment for them. See pye3d-detector#36 for reference.

Version 0.3.0 uses a new serialization format for the refractionizer parameters but is otherwise functionally equivalent to version 0.2.0.

pyglui v1.31.0

This new version of pyglui introduces support for multi-line thumb and icon labels.

Example:

from pyglui import ui
context = {"state": False}
ui.Icon(
    "state",
    context,
    label="Multi\nLine",
    label_offset_size=-10,  # smaller font
    label_offset_x=0,  # no horizontal adjustments
    label_offset_y=-10,  # move label upwards
    label_line_height=0.8,  # reduce line height
)

zeromq-pyre >= v0.3.4

Starting with version v0.3.4, zeromq-pyre is able to handle cases gracefully where it is not able to access any network interfaces. See #2187 for reference.

Plugin API

Easy plugin icon customization - #2196

Plugins can now overwrite the following class attributes to customize the menu icon:

• icon_pos_delta: relative positioning

• icon_size_delta: relative font resizing

• icon_line_height (multi-line icons only): line distance

Requires pyglui v1.31.0 or higher

Real-time Network API

Add surf_to_dist_img_trans and dist_img_to_surf_trans to surface events #2168

These two homographies are necessary to transform points from the surface coordinate system to the 2d image space of the scene camera, and vice versa. They have been available as part of the surface location exports in Pupil Player. With this release, they also become available to other plugins in Pupil Capture or via its Network API.

Example plugin that access the new homographies in real-time:

import numpy as np
from plugin import Plugin
class Example(Plugin):
    def recent_events(self, events):
        # access surfaces or fallback to empty list if not available
        surfaces = events.get("surfaces", [])
        for surface in surfaces:
            # access raw homography data, a list of lists
            homography = surface["surf_to_dist_img_trans"]
            # convert to a matrix
            homography = np.array(homography)
            # use homography, e.g. printing it
            print(f"{surface['name']}: {homography}")

Downloads

To open the RAR-archive on Windows, you will need to use decompression software, such as WinRAR or 7-Zip (both are available for free).

Supported operating systems

• macOS Mojave 10.14, macOS Catalina 10.15, macOS Big Sur 11

• macOS Monterey 12 requires administrator privileges to access the video cameras

• Ubuntu 16.04 or newer

• Windows 10

Checksums

$ shasum -a 256 pupil_v3.5*
41428173c33d07171bb7bf8f0c83b7debfabb66a1dfc7530d1ae302be70ccc9c  pupil_v3.5-1-g1cdbe38_windows_x64.msi.rar
608aceaf4bf450254812b3fcaf8ea553450fcf2d626ae9c2ed0404348918d6ad  pupil_v3.5-7-g651931ba_macos_x64.dmg
786feb5e937a68a21821ab6b6d86be915bcbb7c5e24c11664dbf8a95e5fcb8cc  pupil_v3.5-8-g0c019f6_linux_x64.zip

We are pleased to announce the release of Pupil Core software v3.4!

Download the latest bundle (scroll down to the end of the release notes and see Assets).

Please feel free to get in touch with feedback and questions via the #pupil channel on Discord! 😄

Overview

Pupil v3.4 introduces a new color scheme for pupil detection algorithms, improved gaze-estimation stability for frozen eye models, and a new IMU visualization and export plugin for Pupil Invisible recordings within Pupil Player.

New

• Dynamic pye3d model confidence

• Pupil detection color scheme

• Added IMU Timeline plugin

Improved

• Gaze-estimation stability with frozen eye models

• Annotation log message

• Prevent log flood in Surface Tracker related to finding homographies

• Support upgrading legacy recordings

New

Dynamic pye3d model confidence

Pupil Core software version v3.4 ships the new pye3d version 0.1.1.

In the previous versions of pye3d model_confidence was fixed to a value of 1.0. Starting with version 0.1.0, pye3d assigns different model_confidence values based on the long-term model's parameters. Specifically, model_confidence is set to 1.0 by default and set to 0.1 if at least one model output exceeds its physiologically reasonable range. If the ranges are exceeded, it is likely that the model is either not fit well or the 2d input ellipse was a false detection.

The assumed physiological bounds are:

• phi: [-80, 80] degrees

• theta: [-80, 80] degrees

• pupil diameter: [1.0, 9.0] mm

• eyeball center x: [-10, 10] mm

• eyeball center y: [-10, 10] mm

• eyeball center z: [20, 75] mm

Phi and theta ranges are relative to the eye camera's optical axis. The eye ball center ranges are defined relative to the origin of the eye camera's 3d coordinate system.

The model_confidence will be set to 0.0 if the gaze direction cannot be calculated.

Pupil detection color scheme

The new pupil detection color scheme makes use of the dynamic model confidence values by visualizing within-bounds and out-of-bounds models in different colors.

Color legend:

• #FAC800: Pupil ellipse (2d)

• #F92500: Pupil ellipse (3d)

• #0777FA: Long-term model outline (within-bounds)

• #80E0FF: Long-term model outline (out-of-bounds)

Note: Even though the detected pupil ellipses fit the pupil well on the right-side picture, the model is outside of the physiological ranges defined above. This can lead to errors in gaze-direction and pupil-size estimates. You can improve such a model by looking into different directions.

While the 3d debug window is opened, pye3d also visualizes the short- and ultra-long-term model outlines:

• #FFB876: Short-term model outline

• #FF5C16: Ultra-long-term model outline

Added IMU Timeline plugin - #2151

This is a new plugin designed to visualize and export IMU data available in Pupil Invisible recordings.

In addition to the raw angular velocity and linear acceleration, the plugin also uses Madgwick's algorithm to estimate pitch and roll.

To export the data, the plugin must be enabled and a raw data export must be triggered. Once the export is complete, there should be a imu_timeline.csv file with the following columns

Improved

Improve gaze-estimation stability with frozen eye models

Freezing the eye models is the best way to reduce noisy data when in a controlled environment. Prior to this release, freezing the eye model only affected eye ball center and pupil diameter measurements. Starting with this version, freezing the eye model also stabilizes gaze direction estimates.

In order to adapt to slippage, pye3d estimates eyeball positions on different time scales. These serve specific downstream purposes. By default, the short-term model, which integrates only the most recent pupil observations, is used for calculating raw gaze-direction estimates.

In highly controlled environments with few eye movements (e.g. subject uses head rest and is asked to fixate a static target), the most recent pupil observations might not be sufficient to build a stable short-term model. If this is the case, the gaze direction varies more than one would expect given the controlled environment.Starting in pye3d version 0.1.0, the gaze direction will be inferred from the long-term model if it is frozen.

Freezing the eye model is only recommended in controlled environments as this prevents the model from adapting to slippage. In turn, it is able to provide very stable data.

Improve annotation log message - #2148

When creating a new annotation, the log message will no longer show the Pupil Timestamp. Instead, Pupil Capture will show how old the annotation is, while Pupil Player will show the frame index of the world video.

This change should help avoid the confusion associated with displaying Pupil Timestamp.

Prevent log flood in Surface Tracker related to finding homographies - #2150

Previously, failing to locate a surface because of missing homographies would print an error message in the main window. In some cases, this would result in a flood of error logs.

This change ensures that failures of such type are only issued once, and are written to the log file directly.

Support upgrading legacy recordings - #2161

Pupil Core software version v1.16 is no longer necessary to upgrade deprecated recording formats. Instead, Pupil v3.4 performs all necessary upgrades by itself. This release also includes a bug fix for an issue with pre v0.7.4 recordings.

In v1.16, recordings made with Pupil Capture v1.2 or earlier, andPupil Mobile r0.22.x or earlier have been deprecated due to the fact that these recordings are missing meta information that is required for the upgrade to the Pupil Player Recording Format 2.0. For details see "Missing Meta Information" in the v1.16 release notes.

Fixed

• Use UTF-8 decoding for known UTF-8 encoded text files - #2146

• Update circle drawing to display correctly on Apple Silicon devices - #2147

• Fix crash on surface tracker export if filling the marker cache is not complete - #2157

• Fix surface tracker marker export to use export range - #2158

Developer notes

Dependencies updates

Python dependencies can be updated using pip and the requirements.txt file:

python -m pip install --upgrade pip wheel
pip install -r requirements.txt

pyglui v1.30.0

This new version of pyglui includes the menu icon for the new IMU timeline plugin as well as the new Color_Legend UI element.

from pyglui import ui
color_rgb_red = (1.0, 0.0, 0.0)
label = "red color label"
ui.Color_Legend(color_rgb_red, label)

pye3d v0.1.1

This version improves gaze-estimation stability for frozen eye models. For details see above and the pye3d changelog.

Downloads

To open the RAR-archive on Windows, you will need to use decompression software, such as WinRAR or 7-Zip (both are available for free).

Supported operating systems

• Windows 10

• Ubuntu 16.04+

• macOS Mojave 10.14+

• macOS Monterey 12 is not supported by this release

We are pleased to announce the release of Pupil Core software v3.3!

Download the latest bundle (scroll down to the end of the release notes and see Assets).

Please feel free to get in touch with feedback and questions via the #pupil channel on Discord! 😄

Overview

Pupil v3.3 focuses on improving software usability, stability and performance. We have made improvements to how product-specific plugins are loaded in Pupil Player, updated keyboard shortcuts, and fixed several stability issues. Additionally, the surface tracker now exports marker detection results.

Note: Prior to this release,diameter_3d data for all Pupil Core v3 recordings did not have corneal refraction applied. See pye3d v0.0.7 notes below for updates and post-hoc fixes.

Improved

pye3d v0.0.7

This release comes with our latest pye3d version including the following improvements

• Performance improvements - #27

• Simplification of Conic parameter calculation - #26

• Correctly apply corneal-refraction correction to diameter_3d result - #28

All pye3d versions prior to 0.0.7 do not correctly apply corneal refraction to the diameter_3d field. To check if you are affected by this bug, take a look at the method column of your pupil_positions.csv export.

You have two options to get correctly calculated pupil size data:

1. Use the circle_3d_radius values and multiply them by 2, or

2. Re-run the post-hoc pupil detection in Pupil Player v3.3 or later

Marker detection export - #2140

The Surface Tracker plugin requires fiducial markers for defining and tracking areas of interest. Until now, the detection result of these was only stored as an intermediate result. With this release, the data is also stored as a CSV file next to other surface-tracking related exports.

The data is exported to surfaces/marker_detections.csv.

Improve surface detection consistency - #2139

Surfaces can now be defined as long as one or more markers are detected in the scene video. Previously, this was only sufficient in some cases -- usually, at least two markers were needed.

Note: Surface tracking works best if you use multiple markers spread-out over the area of interest to define and track your surface. The surface position export files contains information about how many markers were detected for each surface position. You can use this information as an estimation of the tracking stability.

Product-specific plugin loading in Pupil Player, part 2 - #2125

We continue work on finetuning the list of enabled plugins for Pupil Invisible recordings.

Starting with this release we have removed the “Pupil from recording” option, as there is no pupillometry data to load from Pupil Invisible recordings. Pupil Player will no longer generate an empty pupil_positions.csv file after export.

Keyboard shortcuts update - #2129

The default annotation keyboard shortcut was changed to x in both Pupil Capture and Pupil Player to avoid collision with other plugin shortcuts.

We've posted tables of keyboard shortcuts for Pupil Capture and Pupil Player below. You can find these tables in our Capture and Player documentation.

Fixed

• Fixed HMD calibration crashing Pupil Service - #2120

• Fixed Pupil Groups serialization issue - #2124

• Fixed toggling pupil detection on and off - #2126

• Fixed calibration area calculation errors - #2128

• Fixed video source replacement in eye process - #2131

• Fixed gaze visualization on Apple Silicon computers - #2132

• Fixed Pupil Invisible timestamp update procedure precision loss - #2134

• Made pye3d plugin's debug visualization colors consistent - #2136

• Fixed validation crash when not enough reference data is collected - #2137

• Fixed a crash when using Time Sync on macOS - #2138

Developer notes

Dependencies updates

Python dependencies can be updated using pip and the requirements.txt file:

python -m pip install --upgrade pip wheel
pip install -r requirements.txt

We have specifically updated the version requirement for pye3d.

Downloads

To open the RAR-archive on Windows, you will need to use decompression software, such as WinRAR or 7-Zip (both are available for free).