[Florian] wants to browse the web like an internet cowboy from a cyberpunk novel. Unfortunately, VR controllers are great for games but really incapacitate a hand for typing. A new input method was needed, one that would free his fingers for typing, but still give his hands detailed input into the virtual world.
Since VR goggles have… hopefully… already reached peak ridiculousness, his first idea was to glue a Leap Motion controller to the front of it. It couldn’t look any sillier after all. The Leap controller was designed to track hands, and when combined with the IMU built into the VR contraption, did a pretty good job of putting his hands into the world. Unfortunately, the primary gesture used for a “click” was only registering 80% of the time.
The gesture in question is a pinching motion, pushing the thumb and middle finger together. He couldn’t involve a big button without incapacitating his hands for typing. It took a few iterations, but he arrived at a compact ring design with a momentary switch on it. This is connected to an Arduino on his wrist, but was out of the way enough to allow him to type.
It’s yet another development marching us to usable VR. We personally can’t wait until we can use some technology straight out of Stephenson or Gibson novel.
Any way to get rid of the asian character and international university project spaming on hack.io?
I always thought that an obvious solution to this is conductive pads on the pads of fingers and thumb, which could be touched together in different combinations.
this one’s kind of old, but check this out : http://people.csail.mit.edu/rywang/hand/
i’d like to see this implemented in part with a pixy cam using blob tracking
Wait for the next LeapMotion, which (according to a load of YT vids) is pmuch made for the application of adding it to a VR headset, it has faster and more precise tracking, and the software apparently is better at dealing with occluded hands/fingers.
Personally im waiting for decent gloves that fully track all finger motion, knowing this will prolly take another 5-10 years, id rather just wait for that. Im just not a fan of the LeapMotion in general (wooptiedoo IR cam & some software, HYPE!!) and unlike most, i do realize that with that approach your losing tracking the moment your hands go out of view of the hmd/glued-on-sensor, wich would obviously suck.
So yea, gimme full on gloves if you want me to get excited for VR hand tracking, else ill just stick with the motion controllers.
Pinc VRs Indiegogo funded rings are shipping next week. guess he couldn’t wait. Although this is much simpler without the optical tracking LEDs and required software to get the smartphone camera to track them.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/pinch-vr#/