Last night I spent 30min setting up my Tobii mappings through Opentrack following your example and tweaked things from there. I then did a 2hrs flight in the A2A Comanche and was amazed at what a difference this makes. I had pretty much given up on the Tobii after multiple attempts to tune it within MSFS. Finally I was able to achieve what I had hoped for all along and I felt that big immersion boost for the first time. Cost is a separate discussion but what this shows me is that the Tobii wasn't the issue itself but rather its what the sim will allow in terms of calibration and adjustment of the tracking axis's. MSFS 2024 really needs to add the response curve tuning and axis splitting that is available within Opentrack as the current implementation in MSFS 2020 is clearly limiting its potential. Very glad to have found this video.

Very useful informations, thank you Kurt. Excellent video !

Wow Kurt! Thanks a million for this video. I will down load Opentrack and set up as shown by you. What a difference! Thanks so much for this video!

Great Video, I have a tobii and don't use it, and I have this software but I never messed with the curve configurations you explained. I will give this another shot. Thanks for the video!

Intersting information. Testing it now and shared the video with the fine people in our Virtual Airline. Thank you for the video.

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

Thank you for the comment, and thanks for sharing it out!

Your video helped me tremendously, and the way you explained it, is what sets you apart from the rest. You have a new subscriber!

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

Wow! Thank you for that great compliment! I'm glad you enjoyed it and I hope those tips help you get things working the way you want it.

Great Video. I ended up purchasing the Beam and this video saved me a TON of time on setup and saved me some coin. Great explanation of the mapping properties. Much appreciated!

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

Happy it helped! I was really impressed with how well Beam worked. If I didn't already have the tobii I would have been happy with that.

Man you really saved my sanity with this. Thank you so much at last I can use this thing that’s been fixed to my monitor redundant for a year

@kurtvwSims

Ай бұрын

Glad I could help

Thank you so much for this tutorial. I replicated your settings and it's amazing!!!

Great info. I bought a Tobi way back and honestly have never used it for intents and purposes, all due to the things you point out. I completely agree about the price point vs. practicality. I am going to look into the things you suggest and maybe get some use out of the product. Where I do think TIR and Tobi are similar is the fact that NEITHER give you the tools you need to make them work their best out of the box. Seems like both are grab the $ and 'see ya later' on the support end.

Kurt this is a big help. Thank you.

Great video! For the first time I understand how those curves work. Also the purpose of X,Y and Z becomes clear now!

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

Happy to help! Thanks for watching.

Great information. Will make my Tobii better

Thanks for the excellent information. I have a Tobii5 and one thing that frustrated me was when you tried to pause tracking the software (MSFS) would not freeze your view but return to your "home" view. I found a piece if software caled facetracknoir that offers the same configuration capabilities as the software you demonstrated and when you paused the tracking it held the view, the sane as trakir5 did.

I've had a Tobii for about a year, and the big selling point for me was that it worked without any additional hardware (no need for the clip to your hat or headset). However I did notice many of the same issues you had, and this OpenTrack looks awesome. I also added VR to my options for flight and race simming, which is amazing and by far the most immersive option. But VR removes you from your irl environment/surroundings which is a drawback for me, and why I sometimes still sim flat screen. Looking forward to trying this out, thanks for sharing!

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

Thanks for the comment, I hope these tricks make it better. I like VR too, but it's too hard to manage for any serious flying, I use it for gliders, helis and for goofing around in military planes.. But not being able to write on a notepad is a real issue for me. I agree you can't beat VR for sim racing. But for flying I use both.

@tetley3737

3 ай бұрын

@@kurtvwSims I think the headset blending of irl surroundings and vr 3d view is in its infancy stage. But hopefully not too far off, we'll be able to view the sim through vr, while also seeing our controls and whatever else we want to see in our environment. Until then, it's nice to have options like Tobii.

Upgraded from VR to Tobi and haven't looked back, i use it in ''Star Citizen/DCS/MSFS'' and out of the box, for me its a no-brainer. Also have Trackhat/Tir5 and they both were a pain in the butt. I haven't fine tuned Tobi yet, but feel its about time. Kudos

@Hairyman13

3 ай бұрын

Genuine question as to why that’s an upgrade and not a downgrade? I would think vr is much more immersive and a better experience?

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

VR is a mixed bag. Its great for just flying around enjoying the sensation, but you can't do anything too formal with it because for instance you can't really write down a clearance if you can't see your desk... I don't think I'd call head tracking an 'upgrade' either, but I for sure understand that there are times where its better for the job.

@davewills6121

3 ай бұрын

​@@Hairyman13 YOU WOULD, yet i don't. VR is still a fiddly, tethered mess, bulky and a overly expensive. Yet, with Tobi5, ive total freedom, it works out of the box, with minimal tweaking, i can use all, and any additional peripherals, and FOR MYELF, the immersion is excellent.

Great video I had a love hate relationship with my Tobii but after watching your video it has made it so munch better to uses , Thanks . ,

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

Glad it helped!

I just picked up a Tobii straight from their EU store using the Easter discount for 237 euros, I was sad hearing the start of this video but this sounds like opentrack will make the behavior much more predictable. thanks!

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

It does, with open track it works REALLY well. I've been using mine regularly since I discovered that and it adds a lot. Its just the default MSFS implementation of the Tobii that is the problem.

This is extremely helpful! Do you think you could make a video showing your profile settings for an airliner vs general aviation? I would really appreciate it!

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

I use the same set up for all aircraft. And I do not use eye tracking at all. Just head tracking.

For the Tobii, I would ALWAYS recommend waiting for a sale, they run a 10-15% sale quite often. I bought mine on a sale. I had the TrackIR5, I also tried Opentrack and other free solutions to use with my webcam, but couldn't really tune it to a point where I was happy with it. "Beam Eye Tracker" wasnt a thing back then though. I bought the Tobii, and at first it was a little fiddly to make it work right. In MSFS I found it to be quick and easy to set up with the ingame menu, but in DCS I was fiddling around with it quite a bit to make it work the way I wanted. The eye tracking is hard to get used to, so I often turn that off, but the headtracking is working very well and I am much happier with this one, than with any of the other solutions I have tried. It is very subjective though, so what works for me, may not work for you so it isn't necessarily a product that everyone will be happy with, and the price is a bit too high to just buy it to try it out. One person may love it, while the next person thinks its junk and regrets the purchase...

@tiggertailzz

2 ай бұрын

Agreed, they seem to have sales several times a year so I wouldn't buy at the full price. The 15% off and free shipping did help to take the sting out of the pricing and I really like not having any wires or clips to deal with.

@kurtvwSims Just finding your video today and this looks to be just what I've been looking for regarding my Tobii in MSFS. Going to work on tuning it up tonight. I'm curious though, what did you do with your Tobii sensitivity settings within MSFS to work best with the OpenTrack software?

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

When using OpenTrack, the tobii settings in MSFS are ignored. All of your settings will be done in opentrack. I hope this helps you get the tobii working the way you want it!

Great video and new subscriber. A couple of questions. Do you need both the Beam Eye-Tracker and Open Track software to achieve the results that you are showing in the video if you already have a Tobii, or just Open Track? Are they any changing that you need to make in the Tobii settings in MSFS with using any of these software packages? Thank you in advance.

@KurtVW

2 ай бұрын

Thanks for the sub, and for watching! If you already have tobii, you just need opentrack. There is a second video link in the description on this one that has a little more info about that... But basically tell open track that the input is from the Tobii, and output is Freelook 2.0. In that set up you do still need the Tobii Experience software to be running as well as opentrack. If you don't have a tobii, then you can use Beam... So then open track would be set up with the input as Beam and the output as Freelook2.0. When using Tobii with Opentrack, the settings in MSFS for Tobii are ignored. All the settings are done via open track.

@dglava

2 ай бұрын

@@KurtVW Thank you very much!!

Thanks Kurt, really nice to have the fine control. I have had the Toobi for over a year and one thing I like about it is that I never have to re-centre the viewing angle. Using Opentrack I find it keeps 'forgetting' it's neutral centre point leaving the camera pointing to one side. Did you find this? And if so, did you fix it?

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

I haven't had that problem, in fact for me it was the opposite, when using tobii without the OpenTrack driver it was losing my head position all the time. I find it more stable with OpenTrack. It is worth checking your calibration in the Tobii Experience, if your 'eye' position is near the edges in the tobii experience calibration it seems to have more troubles. For instance if your Tobii has moved a little since the last calibration. You do still need to periodically calibrate in the Tobii software.

@RinoStoof

2 ай бұрын

Thanks for your reply Kurt! I have found the setting. Under 'Output", on the main screen, I had 'enable both'. When I selected 'Use TrackIR, disable Freetrack' the problem went away. Maybe putting out a double signal gets the system confused.. Anyway, thanks for your input, I like my Tobii better now 🙂.

Really good video. One question how to do keep camera on right/left view not to roll?, when I turn the view change at 30-degree angle.

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

You could use the curves to dial out any roll. But thats not a problem I've had in my setup, so not sure. But if you don't really need head roll there is no reason you couldn't just pull the right hand side of the roll curve right down to the bottom and that would lock it out entirely.

Very good Video, Kudos to you. For me, I've made the jump to VR. So I'm running a quest 3 So for a $499 entry point, getting into VR. I feel is a way better investment than wasting your money and your time on Tobii. But I say that in the context, you have beefy computer to run it on. To each there own. Since I switched to VR, I haven't looked back. When it comes to desktop aviation. Again, cheers to you and great video.

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

I also have vr, (Index) but I tend to use Vatsim pretty regularly, and haven't figured out a decent way to copy down a clearance without being able to see my hands. If you have that part solved, I want to hear about it! I use VR for casual flying all the time, but it doesn't lend itself to good KZread content, so I don't expect to show it here much. Thanks for watching! And for the compliment.

@Dionm01

2 ай бұрын

@@kurtvwSims Understood, regarding the VR and complications with Vatsim. I don't use Vatsim personally. It's just not my thing. I'm looking forward to beyond atc once it's implemented. I know there will be caveats to it with different pricing structures. But all in all, I think it's gonna be a net positive for the Microsoft flight simulator platform. And it will be compatible with MSFS 2024 as well. " The future so bright, I gotta wear shades". Cheers Dion

Great vid Kurt, I'll definitely have a look at this for use with my Tobii. My only question is, does the OpenTrack inputs take priority over the in sim settings for the Tobii or do the they sort of work on top of each other so you'd have to go set the sim sliders a certain way to prevent overlap? Hope that makes sense.

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

You run Tobii Experience as always. In open track you set the input as Tobii, and output as Freelook2.0 MSFS will be taking its input from OpenTrack, but the tobii will still show up in the MSFS devices. But you'll do all your tuning, and button mapping for the Tobii via open track (so you may need to unassign them from within MSFS). I actually recorded all that info for the video, but somehow I accidentally deleted that 30 or so seconds of video before upload and didn't notice till later. Sorry. But in short, when OpenTrack is running, it should cause MSFS to completely ignore the settings you have in the Tobii sliders. If opentrack is not running, MSFS will use whatever you've got in those tobii settings instead.

@TheWolf82WF

3 ай бұрын

@@kurtvwSims Thanks for the quick reply Kurt and thanks again for the vid. Very informative.

@peteallennh

3 ай бұрын

This is super useful. I bought a Tobii hoping for a game-changing experience, but I find that I rarely use it, because it’s too jumpy and because it doesn’t really accurately mimic what my head is doing when, as you mentioned, I am trying to do something like look around a cockpit obstruction. I am going to give this a shot. I saw in another video where the TIR allegedly tracks better in these unusual head movements, but I’m not buying anything else. I’ll just need to remember to unbind the relevant buttons in MSFS.

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

@peteallennh Glad to help, I hope you're able to get it working, feel free to ask me here if you need any help.

Excellent video. I bought a tobii about 3 months ago, and did not use it much due to exactly the reason you made this video. I will give it a try and see how it works. Kurt, what are your Tobii settings in MSFS? Default during install or did you change them as well? Thank you again.

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

Once you're using open track, it doesn't use the MSFS tobii settings anymore, so it doesn't matter. I did fiddle with them a lot in the months before I found OpenTrack, I was never happy with any settings really. But OpenTrack fixed it right up.

@mikevadnais7722

2 ай бұрын

@@kurtvwSimsThanks again, the zoom and and out on Tobii was never good for me.

Great info. I own a Tobii but have gone back to the Track IR that I’ve used for years. With Open Track can you freeze the view and have it stay where you’re looking with Tobii? Could never get that to work with Tobii software. It would always go back to the default view. I would like to find a satisfactory way to use the Tobii as I have always found having to wear a hat clip or worse with the track IR. Plus I spent good money for it. I figured if I waited long enough they would improve the experience.

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

Yes, see the PartII addenda video in the description above. Thanks for watching!

@StewCal65

2 ай бұрын

@@kurtvwSimsAwesome! Thanks.

Excelente.

I think u nailed this but my succinct explanation is with TOBII you’re paying for eye tracking which is useless in FS! I do really like my TOBII and without head tracking and single monitor I wouldn’t be simming. I hated toggling views! I definitely have to check out this open track!! Thanks!!!

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

That's almost exactly what I said in the first Tobii video, clearly we are on the same page. Thanks for watching!

I really like the camera settings you are using thanks to the opentrack software, but that alone wont be enough to have movements in game with some video camera right? I dont understand how the beam eye tracker fits in in all of this. If I buy a video camera and use opentrack software can I have the head movements like you have in the sim? Could you recommend which camera I should look for? What is the best camera for the head tracking purpose? Thanks a lot.

@kurtvwSims

Ай бұрын

If you're using a webcam, then you need some program that interprets your head/face movements - That is what Beam Eye Tracker is doing. There is another video link in the description for this video that gets into a small bit more detail about that setup, its worth checking out. Beam then talks to OpenTrack to convert everything into a signal that your flightsim can work with. So if you're not using a Tobii, you would instead use a webcam plus Beam, and Opentrack. I don't have any specific recommendation for a webcam, but generally the logitech ones are pretty good, you don't need to worry about the resolution of the camera much, anything above 720p is fine... However the folks at Beam say their software works better with higher framerates, so it might be worth finding a camera that goes 60fps.

@Izmael1310

Ай бұрын

@@kurtvwSims Thank you for claryfing this. So basically webcam>beam>open track to get these nice movements or tobii tracker>tobii software>open track. I have to admit I have second thoughts about the tobii as you mentioned price is the huge killer, eye tracking is basically unusable so the main selling point goes out of the window with 1/2 price in it. On the other hand I dont have the webcam and I think that some decent one would cost about 60-80 € and tobii on sale is for 237 €. That makes it tobii for 150 € (more or less, still a lot though).

@kurtvwSims

Ай бұрын

@@Izmael1310 For head tracking only, there is almost no difference between a webcam with beam vs Tobii. Tobii excels in low-light/no-light, because its an IR camera... That is the main difference. but in reasonably lighting, they are pretty equal.

Kurt, this brings me to another question. Is it possible to mount Tobii on the top of the monitor using Opentrack, or is it still required to have it on the bottom?

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

I would just try it and see how it behaves. In my flight rig I have a Fulcrum one yoke, so I'm VERY far from my monitor, I use a 4k tcl tv for my computer monitor and it is 42 inch, so all of this is way outside the standards of what Tobii recommends. When using FS, I am 46 inches from my monitor.. Pretty far, but its huge. What I have done is I use the self adhesive tobii magnet strip, on the bottom of the monitor and I use the other little adhesive rack thing on my yoke, so its attached to my yoke (the case of course, not the moving bits 😉 ) and much closer to where I am, as Tobii would probably prefer. When flying HOTAS type planes, I have tobii on the bottom of the monitor because I'm seated much closer when that giant yoke isn't there. Both of those configs work just fine even though Tobii doesn't 'officially' recommend it (keeping in mind I have eye tracking disabled, and am only using face tracking). I did test with it at the top of the monitor and face tracing works ok, eye tracking is worse. The reason for all that is that the angle of light on your face is different, so your eyes are harder to track. Eye tracking wants that lower angle. No matter what you do, calibrate your tobii fully via the Tobii Experience software. At the location before doing your testing. Really that calibration is the important bit. but don't be afraid to experiment... Just be aware that if you need support from Tobii they are going to say you don't have it mounted as recommended.

I remember when switching from Free Track to Open Track, and relative translation wasn't a feature yet. I hated it.

Does it have the ability to freeze the camera without recentering? Also, another issue I have with Tobii is that it doesn't have TrueView, which is another gamechanger. You translation is relative to your perspective (as IRL), not absolute. From your video, it looks like this software has an equivalent feature to TrackIR 5's "TrueView", so it looks promising. But if it has the freeze function (Tobii's GameHub has this but doesn't support MSFS unfortunately), if it has the freeze without recentering, then I'm sold.

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

There might be an option to freeze on stop, but I haven't gone digging for that yet, I agree it would be nice to have. The relative translation setting is similar to TrueView. Tobii's game hub isn't used with MSFS at all, Asobo decided to roll their own settings into MSFS (probably a mistake), and there are a lot of things they didn't do well. This is why OpenTrack becomes important for MSFS.

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

@Smasher77th I went looking for a 'freeze' type command today in OpenTrack and found it, in the options there is 'Toggle', and 'Toggle while held' -- Those options freeze tracking where you were when engaged, and pick up tracking when released. I tested this in MSFS, and it behaved the way you were hoping for... Give it a shot!

Game changer! I have Tobii and don't use it for this reason (in MSFS and DCS). I will definitely check this out! To clarify: do I need BEAM and OpenTrack?

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

If you're using the tobii you just need Open track. You start the Tobii Experience software as normal. Then open track. Once in opentrack set the input as Tobii and the output as Freelook2.0 MSFS should detect that without any further work in MSFS, although if you have keys defined to turn on and off head tracking, or to recenter you may need to clear those out and set them in OpenTrack.

@dogtaggamer1

3 ай бұрын

@@kurtvwSims will def give it a try. Will make DCS much better as well I imagine.

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

@@dogtaggamer1 I assume it might, I haven't used DCS in a long time, so I don't know for sure.

Thanks Kurt I have downloaded opentrack but i can't see my Tobii on the input list how do I get it to see the Tobii eye tracker

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

I had that part all in the video and somehow deleted it not long before uploading, sorry. You need to have the Tobii Experience installed, and running. Then in opentrack it's is toward the bottom of the Input dropdown (it appears to be alphabetical).. It appears as Tobii Eye Tracker. And you want to set the output to FreeTrack2.0 Enhanced. After that MSFS should see it with no further work. I can't post a screenshot here in comments, but here is a link to imgur of it... i.imgur.com/xQSNeKO.png

@colb6171

2 ай бұрын

@@kurtvwSims thanks Kurt you're a hero

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

Thank you! And thanks for the sub!

Can you look at for example the CDU, and pause it there?

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

In the 'addenda' video I posted yesterday it explains how to do that. You can find the link in the description on this video. But yes, you sure can.

how do you locate the MSFS.ini? Regards

@kurtvwSims

2 ай бұрын

It saves settings under those .ini file names... That MSFS one is just my personal save, you will not find that in open track by default.

@nicjackson5741

2 ай бұрын

Thank You Kurt @@kurtvwSims

When SCS who develop ATS and ETS2 added official support for Tobii back in 2019 I got the Tobii 4C, spent 200€ on it and it would never work well, only time I had it doing anything meaningful was in that GTA style hacker game, cant even recall the name of it, but it was mostly a gimmick, didnt care much. I always had problems, I used it maybe 1 - 2 hours and then it just collected dust, and at some point they throw out a "beta never to be updated" software for the 4C to make it more of a head tracker and less of an eye track, see, the 4C was mostly focused on eye tracking back then, it was not as advanced as the 5 is now, and it seems something went wrong or what ever, the 4C stopped working all together. I dont know if its dead or what happened but I cant recommend them to people... I know one other person that used a 4C for while and that one died too, this person had used it for maybe a year or so, meaning it had worked atleast. Jump ahead 2 years and I with some help manage to get Track IR 5, not quite as expensive as Tobii 5 but not that far off, after shipping I payed 255€ for the full package including the LED clip and a cap, and all I done was load up a profile from a guy called Spudknocker here on youtube and never had to touch it again. It just works, and I know it will still be working in 15 years, because its dead simple, do the same thing Tobii does for what we use it for, for me its been DCS, MSFS and truck simulator mostly, some racing and other driving games, and it just works, never need to adjust, change a setting, nothing. Heck, only time I've had some minor issues is MSFS where it wont hook to the sim and I have to restart, I had that yesterday, but thats a sim problem. People sit with 15 - 20 year old Track IR's that still works fine. These Tobii's, I dont trust them to last 2 years, especially not with the hours I put on them. The only thing that might die is the LED's and you can either repair it or get a third party one that has an off button, thats the bad thing about this, I cant disable the LED wihtout pulling the cable out, I never do, they run at low intensity and should last for a long time. People always goes, "Well, I dont have to wear some silly thing on my head... and no wires.." Well, I always wear a headset anyway, I never notice wearing the LED's, weigh nothing and I never take them off... and if you really are that bothered with it, you could create a much more compact solution or use a reflector. Atleast I know I wont have to buy a new device in 2 years for 300$... xD I got the Track IR just so I know I got something that will last and be trouble free. As with all IR solutions, even Tobii, if you got direct sunlight in to the room it can cause an issue, I luckily do not get much direct sunlight in here, only in the morning for a short period even then its not been an issue really. I got big windows but the roof and the houses next to me blocks the sun out 95% of the day for me. I'm glad to see that head tracking is getting cheaper, the prices we've seen lately are pretty steep. Also, I forgot to mention, the adjustments you do here Track IR can do as well and that is the work Spudknocker did in his profile, so glad, I would never gotten it this good! xD

Very disappointed in Tobii. There is not enough control over each movement and two of the 4 axis are combined on one slider. There is an unalterable dead zone in the yaw control. It jerks and stutters unless I force vertical sync. It is over-hyped and over-priced. Hardly ever use it as frankly custom views and a panning hat switch is better, smoother and is free.

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

You might try out the solutions I described in this video, it corrects many of those problems.

So opentrack is free. So why do you need to buy anything to track. I just use opentrack and it is great. Maybe I miss heard you

@kurtvwSims

3 ай бұрын

Seems like you misunderstood me. You are correct, you don't need to buy anything. The main point of the video was for people who already had bought the tobii and were having trouble... And that if you haven't bought the tobii, you don't need to and there are free options.

The best fix. Move into the 21st century and fly in VR, there is nonpoint un anything else. 😅