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Version: dev-latest

Visualization

It's so nice to see your data! MetriCal provides visualization features to help you understand exactly what's going on with your calibrations, so you're never left in the dark.

  • Visual inspection of detections during the calibration process
  • Ability to verify the spatial alignment of different sensors
  • Confirmation that your calibration procedure is capturing the right data
  • Immediate visual feedback on calibration quality

By properly setting up and using the visualization features in MetriCal, you can gain greater confidence in your calibration results and more easily troubleshoot any issues that arise during the calibration process.

Setting up Visualization with Rerun​

MetriCal uses Rerun as its visualization engine. There are two ways MetriCal interacts with Rerun:

  • Option 1: MetriCal can spawn a Rerun server and connect to it directly. This is the default behavior.
  • Option 2: MetriCal can connect to another Rerun server running elsewhere (on host, in network, etc).
For Docker

When using MetriCal via Docker, you'll need to run a separate Rerun server on your host machine.

Installing Rerun​

Install Rerun on your host machine using either pip or cargo:

# Option 1: via pip
pip install rerun-sdk==0.20

# Option 2: via cargo
cargo install rerun-cli --version ^0.20
Match Versions!

Make sure to install Rerun version 0.20 to ensure compatibility with MetriCal's current version. Rerun is a great tool, but it's still in heavy development, and there's no guarantee of backwards compatibility.

For Docker

Run Separate Rerun Server​

Before using any visualization in MetriCal, start a Rerun rendering server in a separate terminal:

rerun --memory-limit=1GB

Then, ensure your docker run command includes the host gateway configuration:

--add-host=host.docker.internal:host-gateway

This allows the Docker container to communicate with Rerun running on your host machine.

Visualization in Different Modes​

Display Mode​

Display mode is designed specifically for visualization, allowing you to see the applied results of your calibration.

metrical display [OPTIONS] $INPUT_DATA_PATH $PLEX_OR_RESULTS_PATH

Display mode visualizes the calibration results applied to your dataset in real-time, providing a quick "ocular validation" of your calibration quality. Read more about Display mode here.

Calibrate Mode​

In Calibrate mode, you can visualize the detection process and calibration data by adding the --render flag:

metrical calibrate \
    --render \
    --output-json results.json \
    $DATA $PLEX $OBJSPC

This allows you to see detections in real-time as the calibration process runs. Learn more about Calibrate mode here.

Advanced Visualization Options​

Custom Render Socket​

If you're running Rerun on a non-default port or IP address, use the --render-socket option:

metrical display --render-socket="127.0.0.1:3030" $DATA $RESULTS

By default:

  • Docker setup: host.docker.internal:9876
  • Local setup: 127.0.0.1:9876

When running Rerun from its CLI, the IP would correspond to its --bind option and the port would correspond to its --port option.

Troubleshooting Visualization​

If you're having trouble with visualization:

  1. Make sure Rerun is running and listening on the correct port
  2. Verify that you've included the --add-host=host.docker.internal:host-gateway flag when running MetriCal via Docker
  3. Check that you're using a compatible version of Rerun (v0.20)
  4. Try specifying the render socket explicitly with --render-socket