Author Topic: Freelook and making a headset for it (Read 2439 times)

hubsonfire · « **Reply #15 on:** May 29, 2007, 10:35:08 PM »

Tigger, try wiring a pot in between the power supply and the split on the parallel legs.

Tigger29 · « **Reply #16 on:** May 29, 2007, 10:42:52 PM »

Yes.. I haven't thought of that.. I just downloaded the "real" drivers for the webcam.. so I'll play with the settings some more. I tried wiring a fifth LED in the parallel circuit, to drop the voltage by 1/5 instead of 1/4 and the light output was nonexistant at that point (and yes I did try reversing the polarity of the extra led just in case.. still same result).. so I'll either try the pot idea or play with different resistors. . .

This is a cool pic I snapped with the webcam.. notice the lights in front of me.. keep in mind these appear to be unpowered bulbs with the naked eye.. the camera says otherwise

pretty wild stuff.

Bad31st · « **Reply #17 on:** May 30, 2007, 01:47:12 AM »

I saw this thread as well as the other one here so I ran out and bought an inexpensive logitech web cam and have FREELOOK running in AH. It's a bit too sensitive for use in my opinion. Maybe with some additional tweaking and practice it'll be better.

In any case I'd rather use FREETRACK . So I think I'm going to get some parts in the next week or so but I'll probably need some help with what parts to buy. So far I'm planning on picking up several IR LED's some for $1.80 USD each and battery pack(thinking of one of those little 9v packs used in modeling. I'm not sure if I'll need any resistors or not. - any help in this area would be appreciated.

If anyone has put one of these together - would you mind posting some pics of what you've done and maybe a parts list?

Jenks · « **Reply #18 on:** May 30, 2007, 12:25:09 PM »

Your welcome Fugitive and No, I haven't tried to set one up yet. I may try it someday.

Trigger, if you are wiring in parallel, then all the LEDs see the same voltage, 5Volts. If you are using the USB interface that five volts may provide up to Several Amps! (So be careful you don't inadvertantly short the wires, fireworks would surely follow along with a damaged power supply.) The LEDs will be operating at thier maximum brightnesss and I expect they will burn out in short order. I would use a current limiting resistor like the one shown in the above circuit diagram. Around a 100 ohms maybe a little less, should get you near their max brightness without killing them too quickly.

About the resistor(s), they are used in conjuntion with LEDs for CURRENT LIMITING, they prevent the LEDs from overheating and burning out prematurely. You can play around with the value(s) to get the brightness you want out of the LED.

If I remember right IR LEDs require a bit more voltage across them before they will forward bias(turn on)(start to conduct)(make light) so the resistor values I have shown may need to be played with if you plan to use them.

Good luck,

Jenks

sidneylopsides · « **Reply #19 on:** May 30, 2007, 12:59:38 PM »

Tigger29, who can say Sam Fisher!

I'm going to try and make mine tonight, though my only webcam is not a cheap one so I'll see how it works without modding it.

swoose · « **Reply #20 on:** May 30, 2007, 01:13:29 PM »

I saw this and decided to try and make one. http://www.theparticle.com/hardware/irqcam/ I soldered an ir led onto the circuit board and stuck it out the front of the camera. I placed a reflective strip on a hat and use a program I got at http://www.freelook.org to see the strip. You then use the mouse view setup. You must run freelook in the background as you play AHII.I have some success but haven't fine tuned it as yet. The webcam came from ebay for about 20 buck and the leds are 1.79 from radio shack. You will have to place a resistor in series with the led and there is a calculator at http://led.linear1.org/1led.wiz. The 5 volts comes from the usb connection and can be tapped into inside the camera. Good luck!
ps. I can't get the link for the led calculator to run from the post but the address is correct and will have to be typed in.
Swoose

swoose · « **Reply #21 on:** May 30, 2007, 02:04:11 PM »

http://led.linear1.org/1led.wiz This link should work.
Swoose

wooly15 · « **Reply #22 on:** May 31, 2007, 05:19:51 PM »

Has anyone had any problems installing freetrack? When I unzip the file and double click the .exe It prompts me to select a file. No matter what file pick, it wont install correctly.

Tigger29 · « **Reply #23 on:** May 31, 2007, 07:00:27 PM »

I may have "parallel" and "series" reversed. Basically I have my LEDs wired up so on grounds to the other.. etc.. etc... like christmas lights.. if one goes out they all go out.

+5v==LED+==LED-==LED+==LED-==LED+==LED-==LED+==LED-==GROUND

Therefore, the power is split among them = 1.25v each.

Being they are rated for 1.7v max, I don't see any problems, nor any need for resistors.

I figured out how to tone down the brightness (After I actually installed drivers for the webcam, I now have the option to disable auto gain control and adjust it.. that did the trick.

Anyways.. I'm having two issues now... I keep losing the 4 LED lock intermittently while turning my head.. I think it's because the LEDs aren't pointing exactly forward.. it's kind of a rigged setup right now with the LED sockets held on with electrical tape. I need to make a bracket that mounts them perfectly forward and more securely.

The other issue is FREETRACK intermittently crashes.. 0XC0000005 error (Access violation).. if I can't figure out how to resolve this I may have to scrap the project all together. Anyways... there's not much rhyme or reason to when it decides to do it. Might happen 10 seconds after I load the program.. or 10 minutes. Might just be poorly coded . I wonder if an update is in order, or if the software is just an "on-the-side" project that is on the back burner for now.

Any ideas?

Tigger29 · « **Reply #24 on:** May 31, 2007, 07:06:12 PM »

Wooly, it was a bit tricky for me too.

Here's what you need to do. Before clicking on anything, put the freetrack folder in an easily accessible location (I put mine as C:\freetrack).

Then edit FreeTrack.reg and change this:

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\NaturalPoint\NATURALPOINT\NPClient Location]
"Path"="C:\\Program Files\\NaturalPoint\\TrackIR4\\"

Into this:

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\NaturalPoint\NATURALPOINT\NPClient Location]
"Path"="C:\freetrack"

Then edit Install.bat and change it to:

regsvr32 c:\freetrack\FreeTrackFilter.ax

Then double click on Install.bat.. then double click on FreeTrack.reg

When you run the program it may ask for a file, just double click on "NPClient.dll" and after that it should run fine.

Let me know how that works out for you.

humble · « **Reply #25 on:** May 31, 2007, 11:59:24 PM »

when I follow the freetrak link the download has an unrecognizwd file type. I got a 1,399 kb file named freetrack.7z...is this right and what is it?

Spatula · « **Reply #26 on:** June 01, 2007, 12:32:35 AM »

7z file is a zip file. do a google on 7zip. The extractor is free.

Gianlupo · « **Reply #27 on:** June 01, 2007, 02:26:12 AM »

Humble, Winrar can open those files, too.

hubsonfire · « **Reply #28 on:** June 01, 2007, 11:21:53 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by Tigger29
I may have "parallel" and "series" reversed. Basically I have my LEDs wired up so on grounds to the other.. etc.. etc... like christmas lights.. if one goes out they all go out.

+5v==LED+==LED-==LED+==LED-==LED+==LED-==LED+==LED-==GROUND

Therefore, the power is split among them = 1.25v each.

Being they are rated for 1.7v max, I don't see any problems, nor any need for resistors.

BTW, yes, that is a series layout. I don't know the amperage on the USB power lead, but cooking the LEDs would be my only concern with your setup. I have used battery packs in the past for my odd LED lighting, which don't generate enough current to be worrisome, but were I to use a constant DC source, I would probably throw a pot or small resistor in there just to keep things in check. Overcurrent is not your friend.

swoose · « **Reply #29 on:** June 01, 2007, 12:30:29 PM »

I have set up a web page to show you how I did my webcam ir led setup.
http://www.christianhopechurch.com/irtracker/tracker_album/index.htm
This should work if you substitute reflectors for the leds. You could also add more leds to the camera and it might help boost the reflectance. As you can see in the picture from the camera it seem to be plenty bright. I have only tried it with freelook and not the other program yet. Hope this helps.
As I attend a small country church I pay for and maintain our website. I borrowed a page for this write up. If you are ever in the eastern NC area (Plymouth) please come visit our church. We would love to have you.
Swoose