Hi! Welcome back to this Headjack 101 Crash Course; in the second part of this series, we will deep-dive into everything related to projects. We will look at creating projects and how to alter them, and lastly, how you can update them once your app is already published. After that, we will look at Headjack XR Cloud transcoding and how to use it effectively for your video, but first, we will look at Headjack Link.
Headjack Link: The easiest way to review your content stored in the Headjack CMS
A couple of years ago, we released Headjack Link to the public to mitigate the process of sideloading individual apps to devices. Headjack Link is available for all major VR headsets, mobile devices, and tablets and can be downloaded on the link here. I will often refer to Headjack Link in the coming tutorials. I would definitely advise downloading it for your device of choice to follow along with the documentation easily.
At a later stage, we will also use Headjack Cloud Build, which is the alternative for using Headjack Link, but since this is a more complex procedure and does require sideloading, we will stick with Headjack Link for now. Also, a good thing to keep in mind is that when using Headjack Link, you always use our latest tech and updates since we regularly update it to the newest software specifications. So when you transition to Headjack Cloud build later, you can rest assured that everything will look the same as in Headjack Link.
Creating a Project
One of the most powerful features of the Headjack CMS is the ability to add new content to your app without having to rebuild or update your app altogether. You simply add some new projects to your app or change an existing one, hit save, and restart the app on your device of choice to pull in the latest changes to your projects.
Now let’s have a closer look at what a project is and what building blocks it is made of. A projects consist of the following components to build a working user interface across both VR and mobile devices.
- Video title
- Video description
- 360, 180 ,or regular video
- 16×9 thumbnail
- Ambisonic Audio Track (optional)
- Category (optional)
- srt subtitle (optional)
For this example, I created a new app that needs to work for both Oculus Quest and iPhone, so I downloaded Headjack Link for both these platforms. Let’s start by creating a new project from scratch; give your project a title and video description. Now let’s begin uploading a new video, in this case, a stereoscopic 360 video. The following window will open, which prompts me to specify the video details, so our apps know how to display your video correctly. In the next part of this course, we will go into much more detail about how this XR Cloud Video Transcoding works. Still, for the sake of this tutorial, I will set it up with a high-quality transcode for both Quest 2 and Mobile, and I want to be able to download or stream the video to my devices. This video doesn’t have spatial audio, nor is it in a category so that I can leave these blank, and we also don’t have a subtitle, so I can also leave the extra settings blank.
Now that I created a new project, I also want to add two more existing projects from my library, so I selected these two by navigating to select project. I can also change the order in which they are displayed in the app, and when I am satisfied, I hit save at the top of the page to save the changes I have made to the application.
Now let’s check the result on my iPhone and Quest 2 in Headjack Link. I open up Headjack Link on my iPhone and log in with the unique app code I can find in the top right corner; voila, my content is there. Using the same login code, I can do the same on my Quest 2.
Now let’s say I am not completely satisfied with the thumbnail for this specific project, and I want to swap it out for another. I simply go back to the project, select another thumbnail, hit save, and save again for the entire app.
Restart the app on my iPhone and log in again; voila, we swapped the thumbnail. Obviously, this updating procedure works for all assets tight to a project, so this is a super effective and fast way to iterate on your content and share it with team members or clients.
Using projects in multiple apps
When dealing with extensive content libraries or multiple apps for different clients, it’s possible to use the same project in multiple apps simultaneously. You can go to Content > Projects, where you will find a list of all your projects created in the Headjack CMS.
If you change something to a project here, it will affect all apps this project is part of, so make sure you know what you are doing because this could affect live apps. To prevent unintended changes to a project, there is also a locking mechanism for all projects, so it’s easier to work with your whole production team into one account.
Project Analytics
If you select one of the projects from the list, you will also find detailed analytics for that specific project. Like Heatmap analytics for your video and the number of views a particular project generates. These analytics are collected when headsets are both on and offline, although the device needs an internet connection to sync data with the CMS when it has run offline mode for some time.
So now you know how projects work in the Headjack CMS and how you can view them on your device of choice; we can focus on the video image quality. In the next part of this course, I will explain how our XR Video Cloud Transcoding Pipeline Works and how it can save you a lot of time and headaches if you need to distribute to various headsets or multiple apps.