Meant to be Seen

torc wrote:rfurlan nice work! i'd like to have your skillz!
I have one question: so are you using lenses that Palmer suggest to you?
How is the FOV? can you give an estimate?
Last question: if you put your eyes near the lenses do you increase the FOV or you have more distortion?

Yes, I am using the lenses suggested by Palmer (http://bit.ly/MALA4X). The FOV is very large, if I had to guess I would say it is about ~100deg vertical and ~90deg horizontal. It covers enough of my field of view that I don't feel like I am looking at a screen anymore. Putting my eyes closer to the lenses increase the FOV and Crysis 2 in SBS mode looks great even without any correction for the lens distortion.

cybereality wrote:Wow! Nice work.

Thanks Cyber!

So I've decided to jump on this bandwagon as well. I'm just going to make a low res one for a bit cheaper, I'm very likely to screw this up and I don't want to waste too much money. Plus, it's really just to tide me over until my Rift arrives.

I ordered this screen/driver board combo - http://www.ebay.com/itm/300641746468 - and various budget lenses to try out. It's only 400x480 per eye, but pretty cheap ($100 delivered) and hey I used to play Unreal on 320x240 so I'm sure it'll be fun.

I will help me learn to code for the Rift; with head-tracking, stereo rendering and pre-warping.

Chriky wrote:So I've decided to jump on this bandwagon as well. I'm just going to make a low res one for a bit cheaper, I'm very likely to screw this up and I don't want to waste too much money. Plus, it's really just to tide me over until my Rift arrives.

I ordered this screen/driver board combo - http://www.ebay.com/itm/300641746468 - and various budget lenses to try out. It's only 400x480 per eye, but pretty cheap ($100 delivered) and hey I used to play Unreal on 320x240 so I'm sure it'll be fun.

I will help me learn to code for the Rift; with head-tracking, stereo rendering and pre-warping.

That is awesome Chriky, welcome aboard!

rfurlan, Great Work.

Quick question,
I know it is much larger, but if it is all I can find or buy, can I use the screen from vitrolight with that 7 in 1 controler board that they use ? Even though the controler will be larger than yours, will it still work just the same as your LCD & control board combo ? Still be able to use 3D drivers and games set-up just like yours ?

3dvison wrote:I know it is much larger, but if it is all I can find or buy, can I use the screen from vitrolight with that 7 in 1 controler board that they use?

Absolutely! Palmer has been using that same 7-in-1 board for his prototypes. Before he was cutting it to make it smaller but the latest known prototype uses an uncut board inside a separate control box:

3dvison wrote:Even though the controler will be larger than yours, will it still work just the same as your LCD & control board combo? Still be able to use 3D drivers and games set-up just like yours?

You shouldn't have any problems, I am simply feeding a standard 720p signal with the left/right frames rendered side by side. While Crysis 2 supports this mode natively, other games would need a 3rd-party tool to generate the SBS frame.

Thanks rfurlan,

I just received my UltraOptix 7X magnifiers and tested them with the 5.6" display of my old Fujitsu UMPC and the result is great. I've tested it with this video from Cybereality :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ovf5TLiIfZ8

More details here : http://www.mtbs3d.com/phpBB/viewtopic.p ... 329#p79329

The result was not really convincing with the images from Cybereality and Emerson I found on the forum, not bad with the one from John Carmack but it doesn't stand the comparison with the video.

I was holding the screen and the magnifiers in my hands while playing the video, but now I need to build a box so it's more practical.

I'll probably receive the 5X magnifiers PalmerTech talked about in some days, but now I'm not really sure the result will be better. The only problem with the 7X was some color fringing (and the lack of warping in the video), I'll see if that can be corrected in the rendering.

I'll most probably try to experiment with head tracking next, using my PS3 eye or buying a Hillcrest or Sparkfun IMU. I'll also try to do some software experiments too, by writing a small demo or by adapting the old anaglyph stereo driver I developed for Linux.

Hi Fredz, I posted this a while ago regarding the 7x lenses:

rfurlan wrote: The diameter of the (7x) lenses limit the effective FOV. After mounting the lenses on a faceplate, the FOV is significantly narrowed because you can't get close enough to see the whole screen anymore (plus lots of pixels are wasted outside the visible area).

The 50mm suggested by Palmer are actually *much* better

rfurlan wrote:
The 50mm suggested by Palmer are actually *much* better

Giving this a go myself too - already have the screen and board from Ebay, and a Hillcrest (which I've got working correctly in a simple OpenGL demo viewing a pyramid with correct head movement, thanks to Brantlew's code for grabbing the hillcrest signal. Still awaiting the 5x lenses - have you already worked out the correct distance from the screen the lenses need to be to focus correctly?

rfurlan wrote:The diameter of the (7x) lenses limit the effective FOV. After mounting the lenses on a faceplate, the FOV is significantly narrowed because you can't get close enough to see the whole screen anymore (plus lots of pixels are wasted outside the visible area).

The 50mm suggested by Palmer are actually *much* better

Yes I've read your previous posts, but using the 7X magnifiers I can have a clear vision and see the whole half screen with each eye. I need to make a box to be able to measure the FOV, I hope it won't be reduced because of the box.

By the way the 5.6" screen I'm using is 12.3 x 7.2 cm, but since it's 1024x600 (1.7 aspect ratio, supposing square pixels) it may different from yours (1280x800 and 1.6 ar if square pixels). Could you measure it to compare ? Thanks.

sellars wrote:Giving this a go myself too - already have the screen and board from Ebay, and a Hillcrest (which I've got working correctly in a simple OpenGL demo viewing a pyramid with correct head movement, thanks to Brantlew's code for grabbing the hillcrest signal. Still awaiting the 5x lenses - have you already worked out the correct distance from the screen the lenses need to be to focus correctly?

Hi Sellars, welcome to the pack

Yes, I worked out all the distances already, everything should be perfectly aligned if you follow these schematics to build a shell using a 4mm foam-core sheet:

Download latest AutoCAD file here -> http://bit.ly/SVM7fZ (still work in progress!)
Or use the PDF version if you would like -> http://bit.ly/OCJS1g
(check the first post of this thread for step-by-step build instructions)

Just a tip.. I would pass on the Hillcrest and go straight to a Sparkfun for tracking. If you're going to do it, then do it right.

Is the Hillcrest really *that* bad. Seems OK from my limited testing. Keep in mind I have not worn it with an HMD yet, since the USB cord I have is only like 3 feet. I am waiting on a 10 foot cable so I can test the thing with my HMZ-T1. Will report back once I try it on proper, but seems OK so far.

I've inserted the magnifiers in a small cardboard mount but as was expected a lot of the FOV is lost unfortunately. The problem is mainly due to the nose which increases the minimum distance the lenses can be from the eyes, and the forehead didn't help either.

Here are some shots, but nothing really impressive :
I'll wait for the 5X magnifiers and try again with a similar mount, if that doesn't work out I'll try to make a round eyeglass frame to support the lenses. That should take care of the nose problem.

cybereality wrote:Is the Hillcrest really *that* bad. Seems OK from my limited testing. Keep in mind I have not worn it with an HMD yet, since the USB cord I have is only like 3 feet. I am waiting on a 10 foot cable so I can test the thing with my HMZ-T1. Will report back once I try it on proper, but seems OK so far.

I think it's good matched with the right sensor fusion software. The responsiveness is good and when I tried it with the Rift it worked wonderfully and of course everyone else seems happy with it in the Doom demos. But that's Carmack's software. The firmware that comes preloaded seems to have problems. They're not as evident when you're just testing it out and watching your screen, but when you view it through a head-mount the jumpiness and discontinuities are really evident. I ordered a Sparkfun which should be arriving today. I've heard nothing but good things about it, so hopefully that will make a better solution.

PS. It's funny. I hooked up my Vuzix tracker this week to test on a 9DOF before my Sparkfun arrives. I remember thinking it was a really great tracker when I got it, but Holy Cow! - it is laggy as hell! I never realized it before, but now I'm accustomed to these low latency trackers and the Vuzix seems sooo slow to me now.

Really cool Fredz!!!

brantlew wrote:

cybereality wrote:Is the Hillcrest really *that* bad. Seems OK from my limited testing. Keep in mind I have not worn it with an HMD yet, since the USB cord I have is only like 3 feet. I am waiting on a 10 foot cable so I can test the thing with my HMZ-T1. Will report back once I try it on proper, but seems OK so far.

I think it's good matched with the right sensor fusion software. The responsiveness is good and when I tried it with the Rift it worked wonderfully and of course everyone else seems happy with it in the Doom demos. But that's Carmack's software. The firmware that comes preloaded seems to have problems. They're not as evident when you're just testing it out and watching your screen, but when you view it through a head-mount the jumpiness and discontinuities are really evident. I ordered a Sparkfun which should be arriving today. I've heard nothing but good things about it, so hopefully that will make a better solution.

PS. It's funny. I hooked up my Vuzix tracker this week to test on a 9DOF before my Sparkfun arrives. I remember thinking it was a really great tracker when I got it, but Holy Cow! - it is laggy as hell! I never realized it before, but now I'm accustomed to these low latency trackers and the Vuzix seems sooo slow to me now.

That is great to know brantlew!

Has anyone tried using a Razer Hydra for tracking? I did some very limited testing and it felt pretty good, next I want to move the magnetic coils from one of the controllers to the HMD, leaving the other handheld tracker, the dual analogs and all buttons still functional.

Any thoughts on this idea?

One... very rough box later...

and yes, I don't have a thin HDMI cable yet. Nor, apparently a supplied power adapter with more than 2 foot of cable!

sellars wrote:One... very rough box later...
and yes, I don't have a thin HDMI cable yet. Nor, apparently a supplied power adapter with more than 2 foot of cable!

Looks awesome to me!

I see what you mean about the noise in the cables though - twisted them, and I'm getting a horizontal wave of noise. Might be good to see if there are replacement cables around.

I'm now looking for a good screengrab with the actual barrel warp used in the Rift too - Cyber's got some great WIP on manipulating existing games, but either my IOD is wrong (very possible!) or the warping isn't high enough yet.

Also, I'm probably going to work on getting the centre point of the camera away from the centre of each half of the screen - PalmerTech did mention this a ways back I think, and that might be causing issues.

Now to spray it black and surgically attach it to a spare pair of ski goggles, somehow.

@ rfurlan re the Hydra:

I've tried a couple of ways of disassembling the Hydra. Theres the one where you cut off the coils, connect fine wires, etc. You need a shielded cable to pull this one off. Then theres the other way of cutting stuff off the Hydra till you are left with 2 circuit boards. This way is not as good in terms of making it compact, but it seems to generate less interference than the coil removal method. If you go that path however, you have to be careful you dont break your microcable that connects both circuitboards.

I got mine going acceptably with the coil removal method, but it still has a bit of a 'jump' when I turn to a certain point (I think this is interference caused by where I attached the cable to the coils). Also, i'm having issues with my microcable again, so I can't really fix it until I've fixed that up.

I'm planning on attempting another microcable repair over the next week, and resoldering my coil so that there is the minimum of metal/wire/solder I can possible achieve. Hopefully this will resolve the 'jumping' issue.

It is fun to see how many people are into the diy rift:
http://offer.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?V ... 0319537252



My current setup looks like this:



I used cheap ski goggles and removed the spacer that normally is used to keep the googles away from your face.

The 5x lenses that Palmer suggested are great. The FOV is enormous. I can't really say how my setup will work at the end since i'm still waiting for my displays to arrive.

The sparkfun razor 9dof IMU is a neat little device but the default firmware is just for testing purposes. The update rate is low and there is no onboard filtering being executed. I plan to connect the IMU together with a Pixart sensor that i extracted from a Wiimote to my Raspberry PI / Pandaboard by using SPI/I2C. The board itself will then output a small opengl demo.

@Jotschi: Almost everyone flashes their Sparkfun with the FreeIMU AHRS firmware which is supposed to be good.

https://dev.qu.tu-berlin.de/projects/sf-razor-9dof-ahrs

Jotschi wrote:The 5x lenses that Palmer suggested are great. The FOV is enormous. I can't really say how my setup will work at the end since i'm still waiting for my displays to arrive.

Heh, nice setup ! You could still print some of the warped images found on this forum on a 120.96 x 75.6 mm sheet of paper if you want to test it before you receive your display.

I should do that also to be prepared to what it'll look like with higher resolution screens.

Dimensions taken from there :
http://www.ebay.com/itm/5-6inch-TFT-LCD ... 0734588827

Here is my baby that I threw together last night... very impressed with the immersion factor - really is amazing! I am currently using the 7xUltraOptix however should receive the 5X lenses that Palmer suggested any day. Basicaly using the Hydra for the time being.

sellars wrote:I see what you mean about the noise in the cables though - twisted them, and I'm getting a horizontal wave of noise. Might be good to see if there are replacement cables around.

I was able to eliminate all the noise on my two cables by twisting (and taping) it somewhat tightly. This is not ideal because you are not supposed to twist all the cables but only a few specific pairs. This is what a good LVDS cable is supposed to look like:

(notice the twisted pairs)

According to Wikipedia: As long as there is tight electric- and magnetic-field coupling between the two wires, LVDS reduces the generation of electromagnetic noise. This noise reduction is due to the equal and opposite current flow in the two wires creating equal and opposite electromagnetic fields that tend to cancel each other. In addition, the tightly coupled transmission wires will reduce susceptibility to electromagnetic noise interference because the noise will equally affect each wire and appear as a common-mode noise.

WiredEarp wrote:@ rfurlan re the Hydra:
I've tried a couple of ways of disassembling the Hydra. Theres the one where you cut off the coils, connect fine wires, etc. You need a shielded cable to pull this one off. Then theres the other way of cutting stuff off the Hydra till you are left with 2 circuit boards. This way is not as good in terms of making it compact, but it seems to generate less interference than the coil removal method. If you go that path however, you have to be careful you dont break your microcable that connects both circuitboards.

I got mine going acceptably with the coil removal method, but it still has a bit of a 'jump' when I turn to a certain point (I think this is interference caused by where I attached the cable to the coils). Also, i'm having issues with my microcable again, so I can't really fix it until I've fixed that up.

I'm planning on attempting another microcable repair over the next week, and resoldering my coil so that there is the minimum of metal/wire/solder I can possible achieve. Hopefully this will resolve the 'jumping' issue.

This info is very helpful WiredEarp, thank you so much for sharing!

And good luck with the repairs!

Jotschi wrote:It is fun to see how many people are into the diy rift:
http://offer.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?V ... 0319537252

It is really great isn't it? I am very excited about forming a community of HMD DIYers. Today we are building a Rift devkit, who knows what we will build tomorrow, one thing is for sure - we will always be one step head of whatever is commercially available. Before the Rift that wouldn't be as appealing since there would be not enough VR apps to justify the effort, but if enough developers decide to support the format, it will definitely be worth it.

Jotschi wrote: I used cheap ski goggles and removed the spacer that normally is used to keep the googles away from your face.

Looking good!

space123321 wrote:Here is my baby that I threw together last night... very impressed with the immersion factor - really is amazing! I am currently using the 7xUltraOptix however should receive the 5X lenses that Palmer suggested any day. Basicaly using the Hydra for the time being.

Whoa, looking real good!

As far as I can tell you are the first one to go all the way to having everything head mounted

@space123321: Nice one!

Thanks Cybereality! If you are looking for some tests done with your Oculus drivers - I am your man lol!

rfurlan wrote:Yes, I worked out all the distances already, everything should be perfectly aligned if you follow these schematics... snip

Yeah, I grabbed that – the box I built separately from foamboard before I found those plans, so I just had to use the faceplate section, but the distance between the lenses don't appear to be right (the circles for the lenses are exactly the right size, so I'm not concerned about the scale being off for the faceplate print.

This may be an issue with the source material I'm trying to use to judge the correct lens separation – what are you guys all using to test?

On a separate note, thanks for the picture of a correct LVDS cable, but the ssue with the screen we're using is that the screen end of the cable is a very flat micro connector, that there's no way of crimping into that I can see – can't just use ribbon cable for instance! (although, I suppose you could cut the existing one short and extend it with the ribbon cable <shudder at cutting the cable>. I've already twisted a lot of the cable together - it's reduced the noise, but I still get it across one particular part of the display. No big deal, compared to getting the separation right.

I'm definitely interested in how the Rift breakout box extends LVDS and power over HDMI cable to the screen however! (Because the PSU cable that comes with the screen is 2 feet long and two cables are a little annoying)

space123321 wrote:Here is my baby that I threw together last night... very impressed with the immersion factor - really is amazing! I am currently using the 7xUltraOptix however should receive the 5X lenses that Palmer suggested any day. Basicaly using the Hydra for the time being.

First I wanna say hello to everyone!; this being my first post and all! I was wondering if anyone had tried the following Bausch & Lomb 5x Aspherical lens? Is this comparable to the one recommended by Palmer? It's much cheaper & is sold direct from amazon. If it's comparable I'll order this instead! I'm starting off by just building a fov2go type device and will "graduate" to a fancier protoype one day. Thanks guys!

http://www.amazon.com/Bausch-Lomb-Aspeh ... 000M755GK/

First I wanna say hello to everyone!; this being my first post and all! I was wondering if anyone had tried the following Bausch & Lomb 5x Aspherical lens? Is this comparable to the one recommended by Palmer? It's much cheaper & is sold direct from amazon. If it's comparable I'll order this instead! I'm starting off by just building a fov2go type device and will "graduate" to a fancier protoype one day. Thanks guys!

http://www.amazon.com/Bausch-Lomb-Aspeh ... 000M755GK/

Welcome man. While that lens has the same focal length the comments suggest it has a smaller diameter (1.4 inch vs 2 inch). The smaller the diameter, the closer your eye has to get to the lens (eye-relief) to be able see the full field.

I purchased a set of the 5x aspherics Palmer recommended to rfurlan as well and can tell you from experience they work really well in this side-by-side configuration but the eye-relief is already pretty tight as it is ... so I couldn't imagine going w/ an even smaller diameter... you'd probably need to wear them like contacts.

If it's a smaller screen than the 5.6 hydis one then you might be able make em work.. otherwise I'd recommend the ones Palmer suggested.

@TheLostBrain: So how is your Rift knock-off stacking up? This project has got to be a cake-walk for you with all the knowledge and resources you have at hand. What are your impressions of the display itself and of the software available for it right now?

My HV056WX1-100 and the 7in1 board finally arrived.
Does someone know the model name for the 7in1 board that is being sold by vitrolight? I could not find any information in the web and the vitrolight website seems to be taken down by the Chinese government.

Some information about the 7in1 board:

The board itself works nicely with 5 Volts DC.
The 7in1 board has a 2x15 pin header (RM 2.0) for the LVDS connections. The nice thing about it is that you can easily build a small rig in between the LVDS cabel and the 7in1 board without touching the LVDS cable itself.
I think the NT68674.5X uses the same way of connecting the LVDS cable:
http://i.ebayimg.com/t/5-6-LCD-720p-WXG ... ~60_57.JPG

I believe the 7in1 board is the same that palmer uses for the rift standalone box.

Are there any sources for LVDS cable replacements?

Has someone already build a demo application or does someone know sources for information about opengl GLSL fragment shaders that deal with image wrapping?

sellars wrote: Yeah, I grabbed that – the box I built separately from foamboard before I found those plans, so I just had to use the faceplate section, but the distance between the lenses don't appear to be right (the circles for the lenses are exactly the right size, so I'm not concerned about the scale being off for the faceplate print.

Sorry about that, I should have mentioned that the distance between the lens is set based on my own IPD. However if you open the file on Autocad and double-click the line that connect the center of both lenses, you can enter a value that is more suitable for you

sellars wrote: This may be an issue with the source material I'm trying to use to judge the correct lens separation – what are you guys all using to test?

I am using straight SBS frames, which according to Palmer isn't ideal but it seems to work for me and my IPD.

sellars wrote: On a separate note, thanks for the picture of a correct LVDS cable, but the ssue with the screen we're using is that the screen end of the cable is a very flat micro connector, that there's no way of crimping into that I can see – can't just use ribbon cable for instance! (although, I suppose you could cut the existing one short and extend it with the ribbon cable <shudder at cutting the cable>. I've already twisted a lot of the cable together - it's reduced the noise, but I still get it across one particular part of the display. No big deal, compared to getting the separation right.

I understand now that the cables I have were poorly made, and that is why I had a noise problem. At some point I am planning to cut the cables at the board-end, twist the appropriate pairs and re-do the board-end connector.

This is what my cable originally looked like:

sellars wrote: I'm definitely interested in how the Rift breakout box extends LVDS and power over HDMI cable to the screen however! (Because the PSU cable that comes with the screen is 2 feet long and two cables are a little annoying)

Me too, if you figure it out, please share

TheLostBrain wrote: Welcome man. While that lens has the same focal length the comments suggest it has a smaller diameter (1.4 inch vs 2 inch). The smaller the diameter, the closer your eye has to get to the lens (eye-relief) to be able see the full field.

I purchased a set of the 5x aspherics Palmer recommended to rfurlan as well and can tell you from experience they work really well in this side-by-side configuration but the eye-relief is already pretty tight as it is ... so I couldn't imagine going w/ an even smaller diameter... you'd probably need to wear them like contacts.

If it's a smaller screen than the 5.6 hydis one then you might be able make em work.. otherwise I'd recommend the ones Palmer suggested.

I second TheLostBrain on this one, anything under 2 inches is probably too small. If anything, I would like to try something bigger

Jotschi wrote:My HV056WX1-100 and the 7in1 board finally arrived.
Does someone know the model name for the 7in1 board that is being sold by vitrolight? I could not find any information in the web and the vitrolight website seems to be taken down by the Chinese government.

Hi Jotschi, the model name appears to be TR550 although I wasn't able to find a spec sheet to confirm it