This video captures a demonstration by Byron Mallett of using Pensato – a virtual reality interface for controlling music software and devices, using an Oculus Rift and custom VR gloves.

Here’s what Mallet has to say about the technology he’s using:

Tech Discussion:

Pensato is a virtual reality interface I’ve developed for controlling music software and devices using an Oculus Rift and custom VR gloves. Using this system, I can control instruments, trigger sound clips and manipulate effects by interacting with virtual representations of multiple sound devices. The gloves are made from modified Razer Hydra game controllers and are paired with two Teensy microcontrollers equipped with bend sensors for detecting hand my hand gestures.

This performance features a master version of Pensato running in Unity on the computer monitor to my right, which creates the visuals for the Rift and controls Ableton Live. The projector computer runs another copy of Pensato that listens to the position and orientation of the gloves, as well as the hand gesture and displays and displays a copy of my VR interface on 3 projectors. The laptop runs Ableton Live 9 and is connected to each copy of Pensato using Showtime, a framework that I developed for connecting together realtime performance software and hardware.

This work is the final compositional output for my Masters of Design Innovation: Computer Graphics at Victoria University of Wellington. All audio was captured from the performance and used to create the edited version of the vide.”

An interview with Byron Mallett about his work with Pensato is available at the Ableton site.