Using Vive with external Tracking without Lighthouses

[Timo]

Hi,

 

i want to use the Vive without the Lighthouses but with an external tracking system (Vicon Tracker). I can get the tracking data from Vicon in my Unity simulation so that i can see the simulation is moving correctly when i turn the Vive google in front of the Vicon cameras on my PC monitor.  My problem is that i cannot see that in my HTC Vive . If i disconnect the lighthouses from power or they loose tracking to the Vive google (e.g. when i turn them in another direction) while connected, the screen inside my Vive turns blue/grey. Is there a possibility to use the Vive google without the Lighthouses but with a Vicon system? Due to the project requirements it is not possible to use the lighthouses in parallel.

 

Thank you in advance!

Timo

[HackPerception]

     ,

     As far as I'm aware the SteamVR compositor needs lighthouse data in order to correctly pass video onto the Vive. The way the compositor is set up means that it needs lighthouse data to composite not only the application layer but the SteamVR layer as well (chaperones).
     You could potentially spoof the lighthouse tracking data but it's likely more trouble than it's worth. That said, I do know of some projects that have replaced the lighthouse tracking with depth cameras but I can't speak to their implementation as it is outside of our official support capacity. 

[Timo]

@David 

 

Thanks for the quick feedback. We could solve the problem by adding "forceFadeOnBadTracking" : false" in the Steam VR config file "steamvr.vrsettings". This prevents fading to bluescreen when the lighthouse tracking is not working.

 

 

[dario]

You could also use the IMU data when avoiding the lighthouse, simply read the data from the cmd line utility lighthouse_console.exe /imu /dump and adjust the HMD pose accordingly.