Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Hardware and Software => Topic started by: sidneylopsides on May 27, 2007, 01:28:22 PM
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I've seen the threads on TrackIR, and like the idea, but I've also seen the free program that is similar, Freelook (http://n.camil.chez-alice.fr/index.php) .
I'd like to try this out before I spend money, seeing as I can, but I was wondering if anyone else has made one of the head mounted LED array things?
If so, can anyone give me advice on making one? I'll nip out to Maplin's on Tuesday to get some IR LEDs, I have a web cam (a Logitech one with face tracking :p ) which should be fine.
This thread will probably turn into a how-to, it's only a simple thing to make! I think I'll be making it mounted to my headset so I don't have to wear a hat.
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Not sure if you saw this thread or not. I would love to know how you get along.
http://forums.hitechcreations.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=206422 (http://forums.hitechcreations.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=206422)
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HAHA I just dug out an old webcam I had buried in the basement. Installed FREELOOK.. put a small piece of white medical tape to the top of my headset... spent 10 seconds configuring things and I noticed my mouse cursor now follows my head movements!
I ran AH in offline mode and turned on mouse look, and it's like VR!... Now I still have some work to do.. it's still quite glitchy and a little rough (not quite ready for flight testing).. but I verified that it does, in fact, work!
I'm sure it'll track much better with LED's... but my wife is freaking out by this whole thing.. it's just wild as heck!
Now let me do some research see if it's capable of more...
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That's good to hear! I'm planning on nipping out to shops for some IR LEDs today, this is good news :D
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I sent an email to the guy that posted in that other forum post, he sent a picture for the layout of the LEDs, but nothing on how to wire it up. Its 4 leds, 4 resistors ( of unknown value), and a battery pack ( of unknown voltage). I've sent another email hoping for more clarification. If I get any more I'll post it here.
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Could you post the picture here?
The wiring is pretty easy, and if it's 4 stadard LEDs at 1.4V you should be able to get away wth no resisters if wired in series and running off 4 AA 1.5v batteries.
I actually bought 4 universal remote controls from a shop round the corner for £1 each and using the LEDs from those, it's actually cheaper than the nearest place the sells the LEDs individually!
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Tear some cheap color LEDs out of something- connect them to batteries, and any resistors you might have (or might not have). If you can see the LEDs illuminated in the cam, then you're probably ready to stick the IR LEDs in.
They're cheap, forgiving, and you're not building life support equipment here. :aok
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Yeah I was just playing around some.. ripped out some LEDS from old computer cases I have laying around... wired them into the power/ground wires off of an old USB cord I had... and got all four lit.
Tried it with FreeTrack.. got it to intermittantly find the four leds... but it was intermittant with the middle one (which was RED).. guess it didn't much like that color.
Messed around with it some more, but burned out two of them (must have too much voltage through my USB port for the LEDs) so I've given up..at least for now.
I may make a trip to Radio Shack in the next couple weeks and pick up some stuff.. I figure I can make a small circuit board and mount three of them horizontally.. then maybe a bracket sticking up for the fourth one.
I'm split on whether to use a batteries or a USB cord... the cord won't be a big deal I already have one coming up for my headset, so what's another?
This'll be pretty cool if/when I get it working.
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I'll post the picture here when I get home...... stinking work always getting in the way :D
I think USB ports are 5v so ya they may be too much, but if you added a couple of resistors to the circuit you could bleed some of that off so you don't fry the LEDs.
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(http://[img]http://www.onpoi.net/ah/pics/users/1125_1180475621_4led9vcircuitedit1.jpg)[/IMG]
This is a schematic of a circuit that should work, if you want to connect to a USB for power you could substitute a 100 ohm resistor for R1 and connect the positive side to pin 1 and the negative side to pin 4 of the cable.
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Thanks Jenks ! Have you tried this set-up out? I mean the freelook and everything?
Heres the Led positioning picture the guy sent me.
(http://webpages.charter.net/maddogjoe/led.gif)
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UPDATE:
OK so here's what I've done: (I've been busy today)
-Converted my webcam (old logitech) to IR... pretty easy really.. with a little research it was just a matter of disassembling it, removing the IR filter, and replacing it with two layers of pure black negative film (from color camera film). It works FLAWLESSLY
-I wired four IR LEDs in parallel through the USB power supply.. I figure this gives each LED 1.25v of power (they are rated 1.7v max).. they work flawlessly but I'm still afraid of burn out (turning a diode into a fryode).
My problem now is they seem almost too bright.. instead of small globes of light (such as on the freetrack website) I'm getting large globes that keep interfering with each other.. seems like no matter how I adjust the settings I can't compensate for this.. so I need a way of de-intensifying the LEDs.. maybe I'll switch things over to a series circuit and install a resistor, like in the diagram.
I'm assuming the whole "parallel vs. series" calculations work the same with LEDs as they do with bulbs (with exception of polarity) but if I'm wrong please feel free to let me know!
Any other ideas?
(Also to clarify things... "Freetrack" is the Track-IR compatible software that utilizes four points of light.. whereas "Freelook" basically ties a single point of light to mouse movement, which in turn can be used in games that utilize mouse-view mode.. but not as versatile as Freetrack)
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Do you have to use IR LEDs??
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No.. you can leave the IR filter in place in your camera.. and use normal LEDs, the problem is it's much more susceptible to background light interference... for example.. if the wife turned on a light across the room, the software may try to lock on to that instead, effectively causing you to lose your 262..and 2.7 million perkies ;)
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ah i see :)
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Tigger, try wiring a pot in between the power supply and the split on the parallel legs.
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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 ;)
(http://www.onpoi.net/ah/pics/users/1126_1180496314_irleds002.jpg)
pretty wild stuff.
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I saw this thread as well as the other one here (http://forums.hitechcreations.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=206422&perpage=25&pagenumber=1) so I ran out and bought an inexpensive logitech web cam and have FREELOOK (http://freelook.org/) 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 (http://n.camil.chez-alice.fr/index.php) . 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?
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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
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Tigger29, who can say Sam Fisher! :p
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.
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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
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http://led.linear1.org/1led.wiz This link should work.
Swoose
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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.
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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?
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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.
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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?
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7z file is a zip file. do a google on 7zip. The extractor is free.
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Humble, Winrar can open those files, too.
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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.
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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 :)
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Nice work swoose! Pics like those really help guys like me that haven't done much work like this.
Are you planning on upgrading to Freetrack or just using freelook?
as a side note in my implementation of freelook I used an unmodified logitech cam and used one of those MAG light key chain lights and taped it to the brim of a cap for testing. It worked but in the middle of testing my wife walked in and boy did she laugh...
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Nice work swoose! Pics like those really help guys like me that haven't done much work like this.
Are you planning on upgrading to Freetrack or just using freelook?
as a side note in my implementation of freelook I used an unmodified logitech cam and used one of those MAG light key chain lights and taped it to the brim of a cap for testing. It worked but in the middle of testing my wife walked in and boy did she laugh...
***edit*** sorry about the double post - don't know what happened...
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Bad, does Freelook work with an unmodified camera with light turned on, or do you have to play in the dark?
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I'm guessing but it would probably work but it would be sketchy at best...The Idea is to get the camera to "see" nothing but the light - that gives the freelook application a "point" to use as a marker and then translate to where on the screen the mouse is or moves to...
I never play with the lights on and when I play in the day my room is fairly dim as I keep the blinds closed and my window sits on the shady side of the house...
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Yes freelook works without IR-leds.. but was VERY sensitive to interference.
As far as cooking my LEDs... well they are less than $2 each and installed into LED sockets I ripped off an old computer case down in the basement.. so replacing them takes literally 2 seconds.
I also tried adding a fifth to further bring down the voltage of each.. and they wouldn't even light at that point, so I think they are already at their low end of operation voltage... I'm not worried about cooking them.
I've discovered if I point them straight forward, I have to turn the camera sensitivity way down and if I do that more than a slight movement makes it lose track of one or two of the lights, so I've discovered if I point them down about 30 degrees, I can crank the "brightness" up on the camera and get almost a full 90 degrees of head movement.
I'll probably mess with it a bit more over the weekend.
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Nice work swoose! Pics like those really help guys like me that haven't done much work like this.
Thanks. Hope they help. Let me know how it turns out.
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I finally got freetrack working with a 4 LED setup...wife shakes head and walks away in embarrasment. The only problem is that it will only do forward, back, and tilt. Is that a software limitation or a setting? It sees all four with no interfearence.
this is the LED setup:
x
X X X
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Wooly - I'm not sure if this is the case or not but I'd guess that you're LED's may be laid out wrong. Refer to the image posted by The Fugitive - notice how the each LED has a different "address in space" -
Look here (http://n.camil.chez-alice.fr/index.php) for a good picture of how the LED's are laid out - notice that the LED in the bottom center is closer to the cam/monitor than the one top center...
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Ok so I kind of have Freetrack working but how do you enable it in AH?
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Just turn on "TRACK IR" mode in I think it is View Options
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That post didn't turn out right, the top X (LED) was supposed to be above the bottom middle one but further back.
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yes?
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Actually, I did.... :p and is pretty happy with it. The "Cachya". I never got a touch to any Trackir devices :cry , so cannot compare them. But this software meets almost every imaginations of my 6DOF dream. :O Well, 5DOF in Aces High.
Setup is easy though. Print a card and stick on your hat, that's it!
Anyway Here is the link:
http://www.cachya.com
and here are demos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WP0PY2j9OM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6Ju7FV1m_w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07Pd4EbwRQ4
:aok
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Fsim, why do you say that AH has 5 DOF? Hasn't it 6?
I just bought a webcam, and tried it with Freelook... it works, but it's not satisfactory.... how about cachya? Do you need to make the room dark, or can you play with any light condition? Is it fast enough? What about FPS drop? Can it work like TrackIR on all the DOF? It's just less than 12 euros, but I'd like to know if it works, before buying it! ;)
Thanks for the answers! :)
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I just spent a little time fooling with it and from what I can tell its a total waste of time. documentation is pitiful and no actual help file or documentation beyond the website. More then likely a waste of $15 but maybe others will do better.
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Well, I tried it a bit, too, and, actually, it's working, and not too bad. The problem is this system depends too much on the condition of lightning in the room, just as Freelook if you use a strip of white paper. I guess the best try is Freetrack, with the LED array... I'll try it, even though I'm no good with electrical stuff, setting up the LEDs would be troublesome... :p
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Originally posted by humble
I just spent a little time fooling with it and from what I can tell its a total waste of time. documentation is pitiful and no actual help file or documentation beyond the website. More then likely a waste of $15 but maybe others will do better.
I got reasonable results, I'm going to try a dark room with a reflective high visibility strip or maybe UV lighting (I play in the dark anyway).
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Originally posted by Vulcan
(I play in the dark anyway).
Careful, your pale white skin may reflect the light off your monitor! :rofl
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Originally posted by Fulmar
Careful, your pale white skin may reflect the light off your monitor! :rofl
I turn my monitor off as well :)
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Originally posted by Gianlupo
Fsim, why do you say that AH has 5 DOF? Hasn't it 6?
I just bought a webcam, and tried it with Freelook... it works, but it's not satisfactory.... how about cachya? Do you need to make the room dark, or can you play with any light condition? Is it fast enough? What about FPS drop? Can it work like TrackIR on all the DOF? It's just less than 12 euros, but I'd like to know if it works, before buying it! ;)
Thanks for the answers! :)
Gianlupo, it is 5DOF because AH cannot take roll control through joystick axis. ( I couldn't find it anywhere ). Dark room is much better, and adjusting prefered contrast setting can help to screen out bright objects. Response time is acceptable, I do feel delay but not too much. There is no significant FPS drop in AHII; but in Armed-A, my FPS drops from 20 to 15. Cachya does do 6DOF, you can see the 6axes move from control panel, game option. Bad document, no help, hate this. I spend 2-3 nights to figure out how to use it. Even emailed customer service for help.
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I'm new to this game and forum (though I played AirWarrior3 a while ago). Was interested in the head tracker devices I was reading about here.
Instead of modding a regular web cam, has anyone tried using one of the ones that supposedly does "night vision"? They have infra-red LEDs built in, then you would only need reflectors I would think.
Here's a good example:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductReview.aspx?Item=N82E16826271011
Think it would work?
Boiler Down (aka Boildown)
Go Purdue!