Nimble Sense, the hand tracking controller designed to work with head mounted displays, has surpassed its first stretch goal of $120,000, nearly doubling its base funding goal of $62,500. With only a few days left until the crowdfunding campaign closes, the team behind the mountable sensor are undoubtedly rubbing their virtual hands together in anticipation of what comes next after such a successful Kickstarter — and for backers, that means getting a few more dials to play with that could substantially widen the device’s functionality.
See Also: Nimble Sense Kickstarter Aims to Bring Time-of-Flight Depth-sensing Tech to VR on the Cheap
Nimble Sense, a device not much larger than a pack of gum, houses an IR (infrared) laser and IR depth camera that was originally designed to sense object movement at the default range of 2.3 ft (70c m), or about the distance from the DK2’s onboard sensor array to the hand of a fully extended arm.
Now that the Kickstarter campaign has eked past its stretch goal, Nimble VR is expanding the device’s functionality (without overclocking it) and opening up the camera’s settings up to make it “a hacker/developer/computer vision-friendly camera.”
To keep within a nominal operating levels however (i.e. not lighting your head on fire) they’ve opted to keep the same power settings. To accommodate this limiting factor, they’re exchanging a lower frame-rate for a longer camera exposure time which will effectively give the device a longer viewing range. The team plans on supporting three specific ranges; 2.3ft/70cm, 3.25ft/100cm, and 4.92ft/150cm — most likely pushing the little USB device’s capability to the very edge of usability.
Along with increased range, they will be supporting low level camera controls with frame rates ranging from 1Hz to 45Hz, and shutter speed controls ranging from 0.1ms to 4ms exposures, potentially allowing developers to use the depth-sensing device for a wide variety of applications not limited to its main feature of VR-centric skeletal hand tracking. It’s an effort by Nimble VR to coax potential developers into using Nimble Sense to do things like guide wheeled robots, track props, or even the user’s feet (because … feet… that’s why).
To send the Kickstarter even further into high gear, Nimble VR has added 250 more spots to their level 1 pledge tier which starts at $99 — getting you a Nimble Sense, 7ft USB cable, and A DK2 mount that cleverly utilizes the DK2’s native cable cover.
It does seem that, despite being a relative newcomer to the scene, Nimble Sense are all set to give Leap Motion a run for their money. All they need now is some sort of 3D Jam to find some killer content.
