HiveTracker: UbiComp 2019

The HiveTracker is a small & affordable system for scalable and accurate 3D tracking developed over the past two years. It builds off the existing SteamVR tracking system by Valve, Inc. and together with a 9DoF inertial measurement unit (IMU), allows sub-millimetric 3D positioning at scale. We have recently presented our latest cross-platform logging and visualization interface at UbiComp 2019.

The original Lighthouse 3D tracking combines real-time readout of dozens of photosensors in a single object, requiring an expensive dedicated FPGA for the accurate readout of the timing of the external beacons. The main innovation of the HiveTracker project is to explore a miniaturization tradeoff by using less photosensors and a single inexpensive microcontroller to accurately log external beacon signals for localization. Read more about the project in the HiveTracker Hackaday page and the UbiComp extended abstract.