[Guide] A relatively cheap, homebrew headtracking setup.

[ioh_]

Total cost: ~15ish dollars.

 

Requirements:

 

5$ -- 3 Infrared LEDS - amazon link

Free/1$ -- A coat hanger - your closet

1-2 worth$ -- Connection wires - local hobby store, bulk online. (10$ will get you enough for the next few years of hobbying). link to random website with em

5$ -- PSEye Webcam - amazon link

6$ for 100 -- 220k resistors - local electronics hobby store, online, amazon link (100 for 6 dollars, you only need 3.)

7$ - AA Battery pack - amazon link

 

You can also get some velcro tape at walmart for three or four bucks, I use it to attach the led clip to a hat, but it would work just as well for a headset.

 

 

 

 Basic setup: (Excuse my awful paint skills)

 

Take your coat hanger, snap parts off measured out in the same fashion as below. My top piece came out to a length of 80mm, while the bottom piece came out to ~110mm. The center piece is smaller, around 45 mm. Once cut out, tape them all together so that the measurements match as below. I used a hot glue gun to hold all the pieces together. 

 

Afterwards, wire up the LED's, (test to make sure they work!), solder (or tape) all of the connections, and tape them down with electrtical tape. Connect the positive and negative to the battery pack. To keep the battery pack from yanking the wires or anything, I put a solid piece of wire (enough to hold the battery pack) between the pack and the middle piece of coat hanger. That kept the pack from slacking and pulling on any of the wiring.

 

 

Now, be advised, I'm getting my masters in History, not electronic engineering. I had to fiddle and test everything well before I tried to tape it down / solder. The resistor I BELIEVE is placed on the negative, but it may be the positive. Test to make sure your LED works prior to finalizing any taping down or soldering. This is a purely amateur attempt, but it's easy to figure out if you just test it all beforehand.

 

You should solder all of the wiring down, but if you don't have one, (you can get them at lowes for ~10$.), you can probably get by just fine by giving enough wire, twisting the connection together, bending it in on itself, and taping it with electrical tape. That should hold just fine as long as you aren't raging and throwing stuff all over the room.

 

Here's the finished setup, attached to my hat.

 

 

If you have any questions, I'd be happy to try to answer them. You'll also need to either remove the IR filter from the webcam you are using, or (like me), grab an old set of photos you've developed, take one of the blank negatives at the end, and tape it over the camera lens. This will block out exterior light and help opentrack pick up the LED's much clearer.

 

Finally, your last tool is to download opentrack - https://github.com/opentrack/opentrack/releases

 

I've tested this setup and it works just fine for IL2 BoS, greatly enhancing the immersion with a relatively low budget. The opentrack setup is a totally different subject, and there are people much more knowledgeable than me in figuring out how to set that up. 

 

Hopefully this helps! 15 to 20$ relatively simple electrical setup. Quite a bit cheaper than the trackir systems, which I'm sure is excellent, but we don't all have that money to throw around.

 

 

Edited March 15, 2017 by oranj

[Beazil]

Bravo Oranj! I have trackir myself, and am one of those sitting on the edge of their seat for vive support, but I wanted to say thank you for your post and information. No doubt someone will benefit tremendously from your efforts. S! And well done sir.

Edited March 15, 2017 by Beazil

[IvanDolvich]

Wow, that cameras are really cheap today. Nice guide. I have built one myself according to a similar guide just not with batteries but with USB-wires.

[Leon_Portier]

@bean Cool thing, how did you come up with the resistance of the resistor, I´m a bit confused because with a battery voltage of seemingly 4,5V combined and a 100k resistor on the LED, they get only 45 micro Ampere each?

I´m thinking about something similar, but I am considering to use a 9V battery with 3 LEDs of a forward voltage of 2 Volts each and a 100 Ohm resistor.

Edited September 15, 2018 by Leon_Portier

[No_85_Gramps]

Try this link to get information for resister selection. http://www.free-track.net/english/hardware/calcled/?PHPSESSID=f3026a4d7777f0903145f433daa4792a

[Leon_Portier]

2 hours ago, Gramps said:

Try this link to get information for resister selection. http://www.free-track.net/english/hardware/calcled/?PHPSESSID=f3026a4d7777f0903145f433daa4792a

Hey thanks man! My calculations seem correct then!