

Tobias Baumann is the director of game development for Perception Neuron, which is an IMU-based motion capture system. It might eventually be used as a VR input device, but Tobias acknowledges that the current price for the full system is a bit steep to be used for anything than a motion capture system at first.

The 32-sensor based full-body suit with finger-tracking runs at $1,499, and the 18-sensor full-body without fingers has an academic price of $799. The single hand version is more affordable for $100, and a two-handed option available for $200.

The Perception Neuron kickstarter more doubled their funding goal of $250k, and are getting ready to ship out their rewards within the next couple of weeks.

In the interview Tobias talks about:

The mechanics of how their wireless IMU-tracking system works and how it’s mapped to an inverse kinematic skeletal model

A bit of the history of Perception Neuron & how he first got involved

Some of the preliminary prototypes and design issues in grabbing virtual objects

Space requirements for roaming freely and cautions about Gear VR locomotion issues

The production pipeline for using Perception Neuron for motion capture and the Unity plug-in & Perception Access data capture software

Rigging considerations for getting Perception Neuron to work with motion retargeting

Hopes that it might eventually be cheaper to be used a viable VR input device

Finally, Tobias talks a bit about how he first got into VR and how he got involved with the Perception Neuron project.

Theme music: “Fatality” by Tigoolio

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