Tracker (video analysis software)
Tracker is a video analysis and modeling tool built on the Open Source Physics Java code library. It is an open-source software program designed for use in physics education and distributed under the GNU General Public License.
In the context of physics education, video analysis means tracking the motions of objects in videos to obtain their 2-D position-time data and associated physical quantities such as velocity, acceleration, momentum and energy. Computerized video analysis has been used widely in physics education since the 1990s.
By contrast, video modeling involves defining a theoretical model and drawing it as an animation directly on a video and was introduced only in 2009. Tracker has a built-in dynamic model builder to define particles that move according to Newton's laws. External models built with spreadsheets, Easy Java Simulations or other modeling program can also be used.
Tracker also has a line profile tool for measuring light spectra and other optical phenomena.
Tracker 1.0 was distributed on disc at the 2003 Summer Meeting of the American Association of Physics Teachers. The current version, 5.1, was released in 2019.
