Home made Track IR

[Hielor]

These have a limited utility in that you are limited to the POV of the screen. And "collie hatting" left and right disrupts the emersive quality you are trying to obtain.

You can buy stereoscopic head mounted displays for around $200 that have motion trackers built into them that work much better an allow you to do everything a head tracker does (and you don't have to look out of the corner of your eyes to see the screen).

The displays resolution and color aren't as good as regular flat panels (yet) but for emmersion, they are much better.

Just thought I would throw that out there in case someone wanted an option other than a screen that would wiggle around a little. :tiphat:

Have you actually *used* the TrackIR?

The screen doesn't "wiggle around a little." You have full range of view, 180 degrees horizontally and 90 vertically, with only small movements of your head. I have glasses, so can't really look out of the corner of my eye, but I don't have a problem using the TrackIR, I never need to turn my head that much. It's much, much more immersive than using the joystick hat switch.

With a 22 inch monitor, I'm doing this at 1680x1050. With your little VR goggles you're running at what, 640x480 (x2, but still, not enough to read small displays in the virtual cockpit). Plus, the VR goggles available on the market now have extremely flaky head tracking, far worse than a TrackIR.

Really, you can't beat the TrackIR for flight sims. It's more immersive than having multiple monitors (and since FSX doesn't support simultaneously moving more than one view, I traded a dual-monitor setup for a single monitor with TrackIR.

 

[JamesG]

I was just providing an alternative solution. To each their own.

BTW- Visux VR920s have 10x8 (but it looks more like 8x6), and the head tracking is very smooth once you get it calibrated and tuned to the application.

Like I said, some people will prefer head tracking a fixed monitor and some will like HMDs.

 

[Donamy]

I think this would be great, used with my Cupola addon.:tiphat:

 

[Coolhand]

the glasses always sound like pure eyestrain to me... whether they work really well or not, it can't be good for your eyes to focus on a large monitor for hours on end, let alone tiny little monitors hung just a few cm from your cornea.

besides this thread is about homemade systems.. and you can't make one of those at home... not easily, and not more cheaply than buying one anyway. maybe you could try unfolding a nintendo DS and strapping it to your head along with an array of laser pointers or something.

anyway, getting back OT.

I think i might end up getting:

a wiimote - for its 100fps camera, not far shy of the 120fps that track IR employs - can be obtained pretty cheap - £15 maybe

a bluetooth dongle, so my pc can talk to the wiimote you can get really cheap ones but i might splash out a whole 2 pounds on one of the nicer ones.

and the usual three IR led's to make the stylish headgear.

along with freetrack 2, it should work well. I'm enthused as i've heard things about various, devious 3rd party software whos names we shall not utter, which can bypass some of the locked out track ir code used in some of these newer games.

 

[tl8]

I have my cheap webcam ($5 from ebay). A basic test with a remote control seems to work (It is a bright dot on the camera). I think I need to make a good Filter. I will be ordering my IR LEDs from Farnell, they are wide angle and high power.

Coolhand, Farnell also has a UK outlet if you want these LEDs

 

[Coolhand]

thanks, but i'll try my local maplin next time i'm near... though they are somewhat overpriced. you need i think 100ma. for your filter i'm sure i read that you can use the end of a roll of good old fashioned photographic tape, remember that stuff? just stick it over the lens and it blocks everything the cam can see, apart from IR

 

[TSPenguin]

For IR blocking I only had a 5 1/2 inch floppy handy and that block too much for my cam.
But that is not a problem at all! I run it now at ~1/10000s exposure and tweaked a few post processing sliders as well, and even in direct sunlight it only pics up the 3 LEDs.

 

[tl8]

What sliders?

 

[TSPenguin]

I set the saturation to 0 and the the contrast to maximum. From there I adjusted Brightness and Gamma to give me a steady picture of my points.
The picture is so good that I don't have to use the post processing of FreeTrack at all.
Good = Picture is completely black except for my IR points.