Gravity Touch Bluetooth Glove

A glove that is used especially for VR games and a Unity3D plugin for Android that handle the communication between app and the glove are all you need to play. Arduino user Jubeso in a blog to “instructable” has precisely explained the building process of an input device for gaming that is own “Gravity Touch Bluetooth glove”. The glove is specifically designed to interact with augmented reality glasses like the Google Glass, Meta, Moverio BT or with the VR headsets like Oculus Rift, Samsung Gear VR, vrAse, Durovis Dive.

In his ten steps tutorial, which includes all codes, programming, sketches and also video are available on the blog. The glove communicate through Bluetooth with either a smartphone Android or a computer. Here only Bluetooth is reviewed not computer. It is also useful for creation of an Arduino system that must communicate through Bluetooth with you Android phone/tablet.

The glove is prepared by using various electronic parts including Arduino micro and Bluetooth Mate Silver. It is composed by a bracelet with a cardboard platform that serve as the base for the electronics part and the five fingertips touch sensors. Two layers of electronic parts are constructed on the top of the bracelet’s platform with FreeIMU along with the 5 metal film 10kΩ resistors in the first layer and Bluetooth module as well as the Arduino micro in the second layer.

The electronic schematic of the gloves is pretty simple that defines the source and amount of power needed to Arduino. It also explains the Arduino – Bluetooth Mate communication process and Arduino – FreeIMU communication process. For the touch detection, he used the fact that the resistance value of the Force Sensitive Resistor decrease at the same time the pressure applied on it increase.

After creating the two layers of bracelet, the fingertip touch device made, which is basically a resistor that changes its value when you press on it. Now when the hardware is ready, then the coding is done for testing and calibrating the FreeIMU. The latest version of FreeIMU library is available on the official website as the communication with the FreeIMU board is handled by the FreeIMU library for Arduino.

Now the Arduino code is tested to acquire the touch events generated by the fingertip touch devices. The Bluetooth on phone is enabled and the “Gravity Touch Test” app is launched. Make sure that the Arduino is powered before launching the app. Finally, the glove sends, touch and orientation information to the phone catch them.

He has provided some links and tips to build your own VR mask for less than 50$. According to him, the best solution out there is probably Durovis Dive solution, which is composed by a VR headset open hardware called OpenDive and a SDK that allows to track the orientation of phone. For detailed information visit the website.