DIY Head Tracker For A Tenner

NeilF

NeilF
Shorn said:
Hi folks,

I _think_ the Starport services issue is linked to the auto-correct. A week or so ago I did some tests as I was getting a bit peeved with the issue of resetting every time I came out of starport services to find the view massively skewed left or right (yes, yes, I know - small problems take on a disproportionately large significance when they are pretty much the only problem!!!)

I believe when in starport services my head turned slightly to the left or right (e.g. when in commodity market I was looking a bit more to the left, reading through the items while making a choice, or in outfitting looking slightly to the right while viewing the available upgrades) just by the position of the items onscreen, and there is no obvious central point of reference.

When I made a conscious effort to keep my head position "locked" to the centre of the screen the skew on exit was reduced significantly, sometimes gone completely.

When out of the the starport screen I could "force" it to autoadjust sometimes, looking slightly left or right and could see the screen move the opposite way. But sometimes I couldn't get it to shift at all (that may very well have been my inability to find the central point to look slightly away from, as once the view has moved there is again no central reference point!)

Just a bit of information really, if anyone wants to try and replicate or if it helps alleviate someone else's peevishness :)

I have to say my "bit peeved" is about the only issue I've had with this fantastic tool, 1st world problems 'n all that.....

Shorn
Click to expand...

This afternoon, I had repeated problems with my headlook going a good 20-30 degrees off. It was when vertical/lateral thrusting around enemies etc. I wonder if there is a tendancy at these times to look at the enemy craft (which you are leading/trailing to some degree - ie: it's too the left/right of center) rather than the center of the screen, which it left/right of center, thus the code to self center can drift true center off?

EDIT: And the same again this evening under the same condition - Lat/Hoz thrust attacking from the side. View ends up off center :(
 
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Noxia

N
Ok, so I'm there then. I've left it calibrating for about 30m now. It settled down to 0.02 in the end.
 
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CaptainSodom

CaptainSodom
NeilF said:
This afternoon, I had repeated problems with my headlook going a good 20-30 degrees off. It was when vertical/lateral thrusting around enemies etc. I wonder if there is a tendancy at these times to look at the enemy craft (which you are leading/trailing to some degree - ie: it's too the left/right of center) rather than the center of the screen, which it left/right of center, thus the code to self center can drift true center off?

EDIT: And the same again this evening under the same condition - Lat/Hoz thrust attacking from the side. View ends up off center :(
Click to expand...

I've noticed the same tendency in dogfights.
 

Noxia

N
Have I done something wrong, I thought I could fly with mouse and KB and free look all the time, not toggle it so I could look and not fly my ship. If I have to click a button to be able to look and then turn it off to fly my ship it seems a bit wasted :(
 
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Tar Stone

Banned
Tar Stone
Guys - does this tracker mimic mouse input, ie, is it fast and transparent?

I'm currently using a DIY TrackIR, which lags quite badly in ED (although is fine in a couple of flight sims)

I can scroll around the cockpit using the mouse very smoothly and if this mimics the mouse input I'll buy one immediately.

Thanks :)
 

Omegahunter

Omegahunter
Tar Stone said:
Guys - does this tracker mimic mouse input, ie, is it fast and transparent?

I'm currently using a DIY TrackIR, which lags quite badly in ED (although is fine in a couple of flight sims)

I can scroll around the cockpit using the mouse very smoothly and if this mimics the mouse input I'll buy one immediately.

Thanks :)
Click to expand...

Its fast and transparent. I've been using one since Alpha, and found that I can't play the game without it. Its totally natural to me now and feels like I've lost an eye when its not working.

Also from the Lavecon 2014 event, two guys did say that it was more responsive than the TrackIR that they owned.
 

Tar Stone

Banned
Tar Stone
Omegahunter said:
Its fast and transparent. I've been using one since Alpha, and found that I can't play the game without it. Its totally natural to me now and feels like I've lost an eye when its not working.

Also from the Lavecon 2014 event, two guys did say that it was more responsive than the TrackIR that they owned.
Click to expand...


Thanks for that, just ordered the parts and PCB!
 

kile

K
And my wireless head tracker is working. :)

front.jpg


gluegun_ftw.jpg
It works a lot better than it looks. The PCB is quite big, 50x43mm, and I can't make it much small er because of the size of the battery. I picked a lithium CR123A "photo" battery after I realized that the large coin cells I wanted to use originally can't provide enough current for the circuit. AA or AAAs would be too big. And I didn't want to make a rechargeable circuit with LiIon or LiPo batteries. The PCB is stuck to the headband with gluegun goo.

The functionality is the same as with pocketmoon's 2.10 sketch. I've also made a Windows program that can be used to calibrate the tracker, select axis response functions and factors, and calculate the drift compensation. It's a very simple Win32 program, it only has one dialog, and it's very small - only 130kb and it does not need any DLLs other than the ones that come with Windows. I like my programs that way ;)

whtconfig.png
I played last night with this on my head for 2-3 hours and it works like a charm :)

I will continue testing during the next few days, but so far I'm happy :)

I've changed the project name, now it's "Wireless Head Tracker". So, I also have a new repository for the files:

https://code.google.com/p/wireless-head-tracker/

Thanks to the ED tracker team for the inspiration and opening the source code! Working on this has been great fun. I'm sure using it will be even better :)
 

Rog

Rog
kile said:
And my wireless head tracker is working. :)

front.jpg


gluegun_ftw.jpg
It works a lot better than it looks. The PCB is quite big, 50x43mm, and I can't make it much small er because of the size of the battery. I picked a lithium CR123A "photo" battery after I realized that the large coin cells I wanted to use originally can't provide enough current for the circuit. AA or AAAs would be too big. And I didn't want to make a rechargeable circuit with LiIon or LiPo batteries. The PCB is stuck to the headband with gluegun goo.

The functionality is the same as with pocketmoon's 2.10 sketch. I've also made a Windows program that can be used to calibrate the tracker, select axis response functions and factors, and calculate the drift compensation. It's a very simple Win32 program, it only has one dialog, and it's very small - only 130kb and it does not need any DLLs other than the ones that come with Windows. I like my programs that way ;)

whtconfig.png
I played last night with this on my head for 2-3 hours and it works like a charm :)

I will continue testing during the next few days, but so far I'm happy :)

I've changed the project name, now it's "Wireless Head Tracker". So, I also have a new repository for the files:

https://code.google.com/p/wireless-head-tracker/

Thanks to the ED tracker team for the inspiration and opening the source code! Working on this has been great fun. I'm sure using it will be even better :)
Click to expand...
Wow, good job! Have a +1.

Have you investigated any power saving sleep type tricks on the microcontroller?

Out of interest, what did you write the program with?
 
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PIXEL

PIXEL
kile said:
And my wireless head tracker is working. :)
Click to expand...

ooh that looks like fun - excellent job.
I've had a look through the files and can't find a schemetic or circuit diagram - is it a secret?

will be interested to hear about the battery life too (-;
 
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