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Socoder -> On Topic -> P5 Glove in Blitz W/ Custom Improved Drivers |
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| Thu, 11 Dec 2008, 18:22 | |
Mog
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Recently, I purchased the remaining stock in EssentialReality, always having been a technology dork and easily swooned by new ideas. This entitled me to their key product: The P5 Dataglove, an IR Bend Sensor tracking glove with sensors in each finger.  The first thought when I laid eyes on one of these is: Oh crap, Nintendo made another power glove. I didn't have much hope for it. We've seen IR gloves before, they're horrible, go insane, and are generally uncontrollable. Let's backtrack: I found one of these about 2 years ago for cheap, and as i said, it was taken with a grain of salt, but oh well, it was $20 used. Strapping it on and popping in the disk, I was ready to chuck it against the wall at a moments notice. The drivers that came with it immediately sprang into action, turning on the mouse mode and making a mockery of my efforts. I was about to cry... Well, I didn't give up, I had a glimmer of hope. Yes! The drivers included the actual source, so you can actually poke around with improving this odd piece of tech. I began scouring countless groups trying to improve, and many of them had various filters to reduce the jitter effect caused by the sensors being offset by your natural shakiness. My solution was using a hermite curve ontop of what was known as The Kalman Filter, to further smooth out the strange spikes in acceleration. By gathering data across multiple frames, the new tracking drivers are able to build a logical guess of how fast your hand is moving through interpolation between each frame. There was hope yet. So back to recent times: I bought a large quantity of these little devices, keen on developing multiple glove applications and furthering my understanding of IR trackers (and hopefully somehow training them for other applications). Today, I made a small video of my progress thus far, using an updated version of the old Blitz3D userlib for the P5 to control a cube in various ways. If you watch, I bend individual fingers to produce a different function: Thumb controls the Absolute X axis Index finger controls the Absolute Z axis Middle finger controls the Absolute Y axis Pinky finger controls the color of the cube Mind you, this is still work in progress, and you may notice the freakout at the beginning of the video when it is initialized - that is the drivers building the curve for prediction, which I compensate by doing a rotations test. Let me know what you guys think, and if i should continue on this. View on YouTube -=-=- I am Busy Mongoose - My Website Dev PC: AMD 8150-FX, 16gb Ram, GeForce GTX 680 2gb Current Project: Pyroxene 
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| Thu, 11 Dec 2008, 18:33 | |
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Mog
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Tikihead: i got them for really inexpensive... 10 dollars a peice at 15 units. I plan to improve them and sell them for around 25-30 dollars US.
-=-=- I am Busy Mongoose - My Website Dev PC: AMD 8150-FX, 16gb Ram, GeForce GTX 680 2gb Current Project: Pyroxene
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| Thu, 11 Dec 2008, 19:59 | |
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Mog
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I don't expect to make money on them - I just think they're nifty and want to see the technology go somewhere. I hadn't tinkered with it in ages due to the crappy old drivers, but when i saw the chance to get so many of them, it inspired me to continue to try and develop on these gloves. The video really doesn't do any justice for what they're capable of, and I don't really think they're 'play with once and forget' gimmicks.
-=-=- I am Busy Mongoose - My Website Dev PC: AMD 8150-FX, 16gb Ram, GeForce GTX 680 2gb Current Project: Pyroxene
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| Thu, 11 Dec 2008, 20:14 | |
JL235
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If it's programmable (in an advanced keyboard/mouse kinda way) and good for usage with a computer in general then I might be tempted to purchase one. I like the idea of it.
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| Thu, 11 Dec 2008, 20:45 | |
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Mog
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The first time I played with it, it was mostly to play with GlovePIE (google this program! it's heaps useful for ANYTHING that deals with input, or better yet: check out https://carl.kenner.googlepages.com/glovepie_download) since you can assign different inputs to emulate others. For example, you can assign MIDI keys to each finger of the P5 where when you move them about, it triggers them... or better yet, you can tie mouse X and Y to the gloves 'bounding radius' and use it to control your cursor and other things. If any of you guys are interested, I'd be more than happy to sell one for as much as i paid for it just because it would be great to see new ideas flow into it.
-=-=- I am Busy Mongoose - My Website Dev PC: AMD 8150-FX, 16gb Ram, GeForce GTX 680 2gb Current Project: Pyroxene
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| Thu, 11 Dec 2008, 22:25 | |
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JL235
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Why not make some videos of usage. I'd like to see it used with games, but also generic things like FireFox, desktop, Windows Media Player and so on. Through setting buttons, how well does it interact with the desktop? Also how big is it on your arm? Specifically if I'm wearing it can I still use a mouse or keyboard? |
| Fri, 12 Dec 2008, 03:44 | |
Jayenkai
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As I read posts 1-4 I found myself thinking of GlovePie.. Then you mentioned it, so no need to bring that up! This has pretty much the same overall abilities as a Wiimote, so it's kinda handy, but if I were honest.. I'd prefer a Wiimote in my hand than a glove on it! Still, I'm sure you could come up with something.. .. ? -=-=- ''Load, Next List!''
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| Fri, 12 Dec 2008, 05:38 | |
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Mog
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Yes but if you think about it, the WiiMote and Sensor bar combo is around 45 dollars, even more if you can't happen across a good deal. One of these gloves goes for a meager 30 dollars US now, but I will say, does not have any gyros or other sorts of attachments (nunchuk / speaker / etc ). I may get a WiiMote and try my hand (sic..) and ambidexterity, using the two devices in tandem. @JL: It's overall pretty small. It takes some adjustment to get it on your fingers just right, but it's pretty weightless (4.5g) and I can type fine with it. One complaint is to never use its built in hardware mouse function, as typing will only be interrupted with random insane clicks, but with PIE, You can make it where if you're in a certain box (EG: around your keyboard), it won't do certain things - hence the name 'Programmable input emulator'. Desktop usage, I dare say, will never be outside the realm of the mouse. Call me cocky, but even those who claim the wiimote is intuitive for desktop usage is full of it (i'd challenge anyone any day to a clicking contest with a mouse vs. a wiimote or glove  ). As for other apps, it integrates pretty well for google earth, if you're into giving a presentation. A clenched fist allows you to spin the earth, while as your index finger held out allows you to zoom in and out by adjusting the Z axis of your hand (like in my video).I'll make a video of the general usage instead of me playing with a cube. -=-=- I am Busy Mongoose - My Website Dev PC: AMD 8150-FX, 16gb Ram, GeForce GTX 680 2gb Current Project: Pyroxene
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| Mon, 15 Dec 2008, 16:51 | |
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mindstorm8191 |
I remember this from a few years ago. I didn't think of it much then, as it would cost money just to have before developing, and then it might not work too well (and as you say, it is normally very jerky). I'd like to see what you can make of it. 
-=-=- Vesuvius web game
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