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Creating and Processing Intrinsics

We provide 4K and HD demo intrinsics to streamline your initial setup and allow you to begin recording immediately. While these are useful for testing, we strongly advise creating your own lens intrinsics for any long-term or permanent setup.

A camera profile in Genesis defines the camera intrinsics (focal length, principal point, and distortion). You can either:

  1. Process a new intrinsics file using the Genesis application.
  2. Import an existing intrinsics file (YAML)

Record a Checkerboard & Process within Genesis

This option walks through capturing intrinsic calibration footage, importing video recordings into Genesis and processing your intrinsics. 

1. Preparing the checkerboard

Note: Accurate intrinsics depend heavily on a high-quality calibration target.

  • Image: A1.zip

  • Material: Print the provided checkerboard pattern with matt-over-laminate on an A1 aluminium honeycomb or aluminium composite board.

    • The board must remain perfectly flat. Any bending or warping will reduce calibration accuracy.

  • Printing: Print at 100% scale (do not use scale to fit).

  • Finish: Use a matte finish to prevent glare.

After printing, verify the squares are 80x80mm with a ruler to confirm accurate scale.

Screenshot 2026-02-16 143529-1

2. Capturing the intrinsics videos for each camera

Each camera requires its own intrinsics checkerboard video.

 

Key Principles

  • Move Slowly: Smooth motion improves corner detection.

  • Take Close-Ups (Very Important):
      • Bring the checkerboard as close as possible to the edges of the image, without losing visibility of any of the checker intersection
      • Ensure the checkerboard remains at a moderate distance from the camera. It’s important that the checkerboard doesn’t get too close. This could result in the image losing focus, resulting in unusable or distorted data
      • We want to prioritise coverage and distance when performing the calibration. Below, we recommend the optimal ways to position the checkerboard for the most successful intrinsic calibration.

coverage (2)

  • Keep the Board Tilted:

    • Aim for ~45° tilt, ideally between 30° and 70°.

    • Frames where the board is flat and far away provide little useful data.

       

image (3)

  • Corner Visibility:

    • All inner corners must be visible for a frame to be used.
    • If any inner corner is occluded or outside the frame, that frame is ignored.
    • A few missed frames are normal and not an issue.

  • Full Image Coverage:

    • Aim to capture inner corners across the entire image plane, including near all edges.

       

image (5)

  • Orientation Variety

    • Rotate the board around all axes.

    • Avoid capturing only front-on parallel views.

       

Peek 2024-02-23 10-58

  • Avoid Motion Blur:

    • Blurry frames cause incorrect corner detection.
    • Increase lighting and/or camera framerate if needed.

Note: If uncertain about the accuracy of a captured pose, it's advisable to repeat the pose within the same video recording. There's no need to restart the recording from the beginning; more data is better and the frames without detected board will be ignored.

3. Capturing Intrinsics in Peel Capture

For a detailed guide on configuring Peel Capture, refer to this article:

Configuring the Peel Capture Project

Single Camera Capture in Peel Capture

  1. Go to File > New Shoot to create a new shoot.
  2. Navigate to the Devices tab in the bottom-right panel of the UI.
    1. Click the + icon and select Move AI from the New Device dropdown.
    2. Name your cameras, we recommend naming your master camera Cam1, followed by sequential names for each subordinate camera in your setup.
  3. Click Manage All Cams to open the camera settings for all connected cameras.
    1. Ensure the following settings are identical across all cameras: VFR, Project FPS, Anti Flicker, Resolution, Codec, and Playback FPS.
    2. Set the Device Role to Single.
  4. Set the shot name , the take number will increment automatically each time you record.
    1. For this example, use Cam01_Intrinsic (Camera 1 will be recorded individually in this example)
  5. In the Devices tab, untick all cameras except an single camera. (e.g Cam1)

Screenshot from 2026-04-01 12-16-24 (1)

  1. Click Record
    1. End the recording once you have completed the Intrinsic capture.
  2. Repeat steps 5 to 7 for all remaining cameras once you have captured all intrinsic recordings for each camera.
  3. After capturing the intrinsic recordings for all cameras, navigate to the menu and select Click Publish > Collect Files
    1. Toggle each camera to ensure all checkboxes are active before proceeding.
    2. Click Get Files to extract the files from the camera.
    3. Click Browse Files to view the extracted files in the folder once complete.

4. Processing the Intrinsics in Genesis

  1. Click Import takes from Folder
  2. Click Browse PeelCapture Project and select the folder directory of your Peel Capture shoot.
  3. Select Import on the specific Intrinsic takes.
  4. Select the Intrinsic take and verify that the take type is correctly set to Intrinsic.
  5. Click Process
    1. This will take between 10-20 minutes to process successfully.

Screenshot 2026-03-31 161851

  1. After successful processing, use the toggle settings to view or hide the Keypoint Detection and Coverage Overlay indicators(This can be found in the tool bar above the video playback).These controls are located in the central toolbar, positioned directly above the video playback window.
    1. For an intrinsic calibration to be successful we would recommend atleast 90% coverage of the grid. 
  2. Following a successful intrinsic calibration, you may proceed with capturing your extrinsic calibration.

Screenshot 2026-03-31 164758