Overview
These initial experiments funded by the OCADU Seed Grant explore new interactions powered by Ultra-WideBand devices. These devices allow for tracking of people and objects using radio signals over large distances. It provides advantages over camera-based systems by allowing tracking over large areas and not requiring direct line of sight. The method works by defining a device as one of two typologies : Anchor OR Tag. These experiments use P5.js as the environment for designing the interactions and the Makerfabs UWB boards for tracking. In addition to the interaction experiments this research also created a tool for calibrating the tracking environments which proved to be critical for accurate tracking.
Anchors work as fixed points in the space that measure the distance to all Tags within range and with each other. When setting up a tracking environment, these points must be assigned fixed positions to enable the triangulation calculations. Our setup connects one anchor is given different code allowing it to send all data over webSerial to programs running in P5.js. All interaction tests use 4 Anchors.
Tags are attached to objects / people / ? that you want to track. Tags are identified in the program by assigning them a specific ID number in the code. While these experiments focus on tags working as inputs to the P5.js code, they can also perform local calculations and interactions. A large number of tags can be tracked simultaneously in single environment.
Research Assistants
Aranya Khurana
Abha Patil
Juan Sulca
Resources
All example code and tools can be found in the project’s Github Page.