In 1989, high on every big and small kid’s Christmas list was the Goddard/Davis designed Power Glove, a controller accessory for the Nintendo Entertainment System. The idea that you could control games with hand motions was incredible!

The Power Glove was an officially licensed Nintendo product made by Mattel in the US and Pax in Japan. It was designed for Abrams Gentile Entertainment (AGE) whose co-founder Martin Abrams was an original co-founder of Mego Corporation, the company that retained and managed various rights and the licensing contract for this accessory.

Early Development
Thomas Zimmerman and Jaron Lanier were also part of the Glove’s development mix but it wasn’t until Mattel brought Hal Berger and Gary Yamron on board to develop the raw technology that it became a functional product. The design was based on Zimmerman’s previous instrumented Dataglove, he built the first Power Glove prototype that demonstrated finger flex measurement and hand position tracking using a pair of ultrasonic transmitters.

Recent Developments
In 2017, global design consultancy Teague Labs modified it to become compatible with the HTC Vive VR system. They outfitted the Power Glove with a Vive motion tracker and custom-etched board that stays true to the original Power Glove design. They took a Power Glove apart, 3D scanned the interfacing plastic parts and built modified parts that hold the Vive Tracker and an Arduino Due on the glove.

After some prototyping on a breadboard, they designed a shield for the Due and etched it using the laser-cutter transfer technique. They soldered all of the components together and spraypainted the whole shield to protect the bare copper. After mounting the tracker and tweaking the code by matzmann666, the glove worked. Watch the digital hand mirroring movements of the Power Glove below and the wearer shooting lightning. Amazeballs right!

OFF the WALL

Dark Horse Digital is a two-person, bootstrapped Start Up. It began in 2013 embodying the trans-Tasman spirit of its founders: of mateship, ingenuity and endurance. Off the Wall are some fair dinkum fascinations shared with our Facebook Followers.

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