Frequently Asked Questions

Q. How is Open Monkey Studio different from other pose tracking systems?

A. Open Monkey Studio is an integrated hardware/software system designed specifically for use with rhesus macaques. A central feature is its training on a large and rich library of hand-annotated augmented macaque pose images. As such it provides more generalizability and flexibility in tracking than other systems, albeit with the limitation of only working with a single species.

Q. In what ways does tracking monkeys differ from tracking other model species?

A. Monkeys’ natural motor repertoire involves coordinated multi-limbed movement in three dimensions. Monkeys have dexterous hands and often climb, including upside-down. They have thick fur with uniform coloration and joints that are not easily visually distinguished. They are temperamentally poorly suited to marker-based tracking techniques. For these reasons, a markerless system with many cameras is the most viable solution for tracking them.

Q. How many cameras do you need?

A. Our system works best with 64 cameras. We show in our paper that while 32 cameras provides acceptable - but not optimal - tracking, going to below 32 imposes major costs on accuracy.

Q. How much data does your system generate?

A. We typically generate 4 TB/hour of raw tracking data. Processed datafiles are much smaller.

Q. How does Openmonkeystudio compare to marker-based systems?

A. We show in our manuscript that our system performs as well or better than a leading commercial marker-based system. In addition, it has several benefits over such systems such as the ability to do denser pose reconstructions.