Razer Hydra 3D controller available but no Mac version currently

Roald Baudoux's icon

The Razer Hydra 3D controller is now available (in North America at least)

I think it has much potential as a musical controller because it's made for short distance and it is said to be very precise (1 millimeter / 1 degree). It uses a magnetic sensing system (capacitive ?). It could be a nice alternative to Kinect and Wiimote.

However it's currently PC-only. Has anyone tried it yet ?

Anthony Palomba's icon

I have been eyeing this myself. It has a much higher resolution and it's position
Is absolute as opposed to relative. Which should make it's behavior much
more consistent, much more instrument like.

edsonedge's icon

I just got mine today

Cant seem to get the midi program to work (that the provide on steam with it)

They also provide a SDK for the Hydra

If anyone with programing skills could make an OSC bridge or HID bridge, that would be awsome

I think using both the kinect and hydra could be used for all sorts of interesting things, such as instruments, digital drums, digital sculpting (jitter) and etc.

edsonedge's icon

P.s I have a kinect as well and the orientation and position tracking hydra provides knocks all other gesture controllers out of the park

mrmormon's icon

Take a look at this thread:

Sixense is beta testing an OSC bridge.

edsonedge's icon

Yeb, Ive been playing with it

a mac version will be available as well :)

seejayjames's icon

wow, I didn't even know that was out there. great to hear and verrry interesting......

wonder if [hi] sees it? or [serial]?

too bad about the wires, guess they want to keep it within the optimal 2-3 foot radius for sensing. Getting a bigger range for this would help a lot, I would definitely rather be un-tethered...

still, the accuracy and number of variables you can control looks amazing.

edsonedge's icon

Hi doesnt see it - but like mrmormon pointed out - Sixense (the company that developed the hydra) is making an OpenSoundControl bridge

So it will be real easy to use it with Max

edsonedge's icon

and btw - if I had neither and I had to choose between two gifts right now - Id rather get the hydra then a Fender stratocaster :)

mrmormon's icon

Perhaps I can revive this thread. See http://electro-music.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=45612&start=63 for an OSC program of mine. It runs at 250 Hz, giving access over port 7022 to the entire physical state of the left and right controllers. I only compiled it for Windows, but Sixense recently made Mac and Linux SDKs available (also free)!

t's icon

quote:

I can't see this thread (*"You are not authorised to read this forum"). What is the thread about?

mrmormon's icon

Sixense moved its forums to vBulletin, so either go to the electro-music link or http://sixense.com/forum/vbulletin/showthread.php?3669-Osc-1-0