NOMI VR Is a Low-Cost, 3D-Printed, Arduino-Powered, SteamVR-Compatible VR Headset with Haptic Gloves
Built around the Microchip SAM3X8E, this open-hardware headset aims to make virtual reality easily accessible for hacking and tinkering.
Max Coutte's latest project aims to offer a usable, affordable, yet high-quality virtual reality platform, combining an open-hardware 3D-printable VR headset with haptic gloves: NOMI VR.
"NOMI VR Headset was made so that developers could get their hands on expensive hardware at a relatively cheap price, all they have to do is BUILD IT THEMSELVES," Coutte explains of the project. " Fully open source — hardware, software, firmware. Steam VR support. Natively displays 2K resolution at 120FPS. Compatible with Arduino. Experimental body-tracking."
"The NOMI VR Headset hardware is based on the Atmel [Microchip] SAM3X8E ARM Cortex-M3 processor and uses an MPU-6050 as its IMU [inertial measurement unit]. Alternatively, any processor that supports the Arduino Core and is connected to an MPU-6050/MPU-9250 can be used as the hardware for NOMI VR."
To encourage adoption, the custom motherboard which drives the headset is optional: Instead, the same firmware can be loaded onto an Arduino Due development board using the Aduino IDE. In either case, the components are housed in a 3D-printed headset that uses off-the-shelf lenses, foam, and a strap.
The displays, meanwhile, are also off-the-shelf — and not prescribed. "The NOMI VR Headset runs a dual-screen at 120FPS 2K, however, because of the open nature of the NOMI VR Headset you can equip it with any screen," Coutte explains. "Our screen model can be found on AliExpress, but depending on the vendor similar screens can cost from $150 to $190. You'll have to hunt and maybe wait for the right vendor at the right price to get the display for cheap (or buy in bulk)."
The software for the NOMI VR includes experimental 3D body tracking, which runs on a host machine's NVIDIA graphics processor using PyTorch and CUDA, while controller gloves with haptic feedback have been developed but not yet publicly released. The whole project is held under the GNU General Public Licence 3.
More details on building the NOMI VR headset, and the gloves when published, can be found on the project wiki; the source files, meanwhile, are available on GitHub.