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CaliberMengsk
Up and Coming
October 29, 2013

VR Gloves (my project)

Hey everyone,

I know I've had my vr glove project under my projects for a while, but recently I've been having more free time and actually got started working on it the last week or so. The idea is to use accelerometers, gyros, flex/bend sensors, potentiometers (volume knobs) and maybe a joystick, to make a highly accurate, non-laggy virtual reality glove. This first draft will be the proof of concept just to show what I mean. It uses and arduino leonardo (at least now it does), as well as the sensors mentioned above. At the moment, it's just writing all of the sensor data to a serial connection, then unity is reading that data (threaded so the game doesn't lag if it's to slow) and applying it in real time.

I wasn't sure if I should post it here yet, as I don't even have the elbow movement up and running quite yet. (Sensor is there, just I haven't built the elbow joint. This will be two plastic bars held together with a potentiometer to get how open the arm is.) but it's looking go so far, I think at least.

I still need to add the other two main fingers also, as well, the thumb has no input (first draft at least will be a joystick)

Let me know what you think! I'm hoping to get the elbow hooked up properly soon to be able to make a basic demo.

Here's the two videos I've made so far. Nothing spectacular, but still.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--cOVZdpkWM - First video. Arduino Duemilinove (6 analog inputs), only one accelerometer and two flex sensors
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=um3JUnARQQQ - Second video. Arudino Leonardo (12 analog inputs), two accelerometers, two flex sensors, and a potentiometer for elbow.

To Do List:
Craft elbow plastics and attach potentiometer and tilt sensor to it.
Add in other two flex sensors.
Create mount for thumbstick.
Add in thumbstick.
Make full demo project including picking up stuff as well as detailed actions (opening doors, windows, flushing toilet, things like that.)

EDIT:
All video links:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--cOVZdpkWM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=um3JUnARQQQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c18tycYrDak
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=282HJJANcio
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r15LuC7TD20
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzMh7GttqXY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmXeFKzs-HQ

    92 replies

    Show previous replies
    CaliberMengskAuthor
    Up and Coming
    April 3, 2014
    Those gloves, as you can expect anyone to say, are impressive. Can you find a price though? I can't see any on their site, and only prices I could find are a post on the MTBS forums saying a single glove is around £16k ($26531.20 USD). Even if they dropped the price by half... Heck, even if they only charged 10%, that's still massively expensive. These are intended specifically for motion tracking for things like movies, and don't have the intention to ever be on the regular consumer market.

    My goal is to be cheap. If I can, I have a goal of trying to get it around $100 retail... for both gloves (probably wired), so it's definitely cheaper. Problem is, companies making these kinds of things aren't targeting mass market. They are targeting only large corporations like the film industry. My goal would be mass market. Trying to keep the price cheap, while still making enough to continue better development.

    EDIT:
    You can also expect that glove to be much more expensive in actual material costs. It says it uses 12 sensors per hand, meaning two tilt sensors per finger. That means higher cost, also means the wrist orientation and elbow bending and such is all ik, and has a possibility of being inaccurate to things that aren't the fingers themselves.
    Current Project: Virtual Reality Glove project
    Davideus
    Up and Coming
    April 3, 2014
    I'm also can't find exact price on igs gloves but it's true that it'll be in very expensive range... btw on that MTBS forum topic i observed interesting video about gloves with electromagnetic tracker.... maybe will be better if you use em field?

    http://polhemus.com/applications/electromagnetics/
    http://polhemus.com/case-study/detail/development-of-a-motion-capture-system-for-a-hand-using-a-magnetic-three-di/

    32 receivers at the rate of 240Hz !!! OMG
    spatial resolution 0.0038 mm
    angle resolution 0.0012deg
    virtually no latency--at less than 4ms


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