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pix_opencv is a computer vision library for Puredata and Gem. It's free and open-source and it uses OpenCV. It is based on work by Yves Degoyon and Lluis Gomez i Bigorda.

1. Prepare you machine

You need to have puredata and Gem installed on your system. And you need to know where they are…

You also need a compiling toolchain, e.g. GCC on Linux/Mac or Microsoft Visual C++ on Windows.

2. Get the sources :

2.1 Get the latest release

You can download a source tarball here : https://github.com/avilleret/pix_opencv/releases.

2.2 Get the latest sources

The is a pix_opencv folder in the externals folder of the Puredata SVN repository. This is the primary version of pix_opencv but as it is quite hard to maintain this version, I decided to fork it in Githud. Thus the latest sources are here : https://github.com/avilleret/pix_opencv You can clone it :

git clone https://github.com/avilleret/pix_opencv

or fork it, or even download a snapshot.

The SVN repository will be updated on each release.

3. Get opencv :

Ubuntu/Linux

The easiest way to get it is to install it from the repository : sudo apt-get install libopencv-*

Mac OSX :

The easiest way is to get from some packaging repository like Macports, fink or homebrew. with fink :

sudo fink install opencv-dev

with macport :

sudo port install opencv

with homebrew :

brew install opencv

Windows :

Download the binary release on opencv.org You can follow the quickstart guide on opencv.org to setup environment variables.

4. Build the Sources :

Ubuntu/Linux & MacOSX

Go to the fresh created folder, i.e. « pix_opencv ». If you cloned the git repo, you first have to run ./autogen.sh. Then run those commands :

cd pix_opencv
./configure
make

If you see something like « can’t find m_pd.h », you need to tweak pd’s path with this command : configure --with-pd=/path/to/pd If you see something like « can’t find Base/GemPixObj.h », you need to tweak Gem’s path with this command : configure --with-gem=/path/to/gem You can combine options like : configure --with-pd=/path/to/pd --with-gem=/path/to/gem To see more option, run configure --help.

On Mac OSX, depending on how pd and Gem are installed, you may have to add some options to ./configure. For example, on my MacBookPro under 10.9 I configure with this line :

./configure --with-pd=/Applications/Pd-extended.app/Contents/Resources/include/pdextended/ --with-gem=/Applications/Pd-extended.app/Contents/Resources/include/Gem/ CXXFLAGS="-arch i386" LDFLAGS="-arch i386"

The -arch i386 flag is needed since my OSX is 64bit whereas my Pdextended in 32bit. Also I have to manually point to pd and Gem sources.

Then you can install the package in the pd/extra directory with sudo make install.

Windows

You need Visual C++ (at least the free express edition) to build pix_opencv on Windows. There is a solution in build/vs2010 folder. It was made with Visual C++ Express 2010 and surely need some tweaks before producing any DLL. You need to change the include and the library paths. The include must contain the following :

• puredata include (pd-extended) or src (vanilla) folder : path\to\pd\src or path\to\pd-extended\include
• Gem include folder : path\to\Gem
• OpenCV include path, wich is ususally $(OPENCV_DIR)....\include if you setup OPENCV_DIR according to Windows quickstart guide on opencv.org.

5. Optional

5.1 Build the FaceTracker lib

From the pix_opencv directory :

  git submodule init
  git submodule update
  cd FaceTrakcer
  make 

Then re-run ./configure and make to add pix_opencv_facetracker.

5.2 Add non-free features support

Some OpenCV feature are non-free, this mean the licence doesn't allow packaging for these. Anyway, you can use them but you have to build OpenCV library yourself. Refer to opencv website to learn how to build it. Then you can re-run ./configure and make to add non-free feature support.

Currently, only pix_opencv_surf is affected by this.

6. Packaging !! OBSOLETE !!

6.1 To make a Distribuable source tarbal :

make dist

This archive is called "pix_opencv-VERSION". This archive must contains all sources files and headers, the build mechanism, and all other files needed to build it.

6.2 To make a binary archive :

make libdir

This archive is called "pix_opencv-VERSION-TARGET". This archive must contains binary of VERSION for TARGET architecture.

7. Testing

Open the pix_opencv-help.pd patch. It shows an overview of all available externals. And this tests the creation of each external.