View the SteamVR open early access roadmap here

Required Materials

Software

The below software is required for this guide, except those marked as optional:

Hardware

This guide supports the following hardware options:

Gloves	Image
StretchSense Studio Gloves, Pro Studio for Xsens, Pro Studio.

XR Trackers (choose one)	Image
2x Vive Tracker 3.0
2x Tundra Tracker (includes 2x SteamVR dongles). We recommend using a Super Wireless Dongle – Tundra Labs with Tundra trackers as this only requires a single USB port.

Tracker Mount	Image
2x StretchSense Studio Optical/Universal Mounts (if using Tundra or VIVE Tracker 3.0)

VR Headsets (choose one)	Image
Vive Pro
Vive Pro 2
Valve Index (headset only)
Other SteamVR & Valve Base Station 2.0 compatible VR headset.

Other Required Hardware	Image
3-4x Valve Index Base Station 2.0 (A minimum of 3 base stations are required for optimal tracking performance)

This guide assumes you have already setup your VR headset and you have two SteamVR compatible trackers such as VIVE trackers or tundra trackers and are using the Optical/Universal mount that was shipped with your Studio Gloves.

1. SteamVR Tracker Setup

1. Follow these instructions to assign the trackers role in SteamVR so they can be detected by the StretchSense Driver.

   

   In the Steam VR settings select Manage Trackers (see below)

   

   For the Left and Right trackers set the Tracker Role set to HELD IN HAND, then set the Hand value to match the glove you have attached the tracker to. Click Close and also close SteamVR Settings.

   

2. Leave SteamVR running in the background.

2. StretchSense Driver Add-On for SteamVR

1. Go to SteamVR Settings → Startup / Shutdown → Manage SteamVR Add-Ons

2. Toggle Open Gloves OFF (if installed)

3. Run the StretchSense SteamVR App installer.

4. Go to SteamVR Settings → Startup / Shutdown → Manage SteamVR Add-Ons

5. Check stretchsense is toggled ON.

6. Restart SteamVR

3. Calibrating StretchSense Controller Emulation App

Configuring Hand Engine

1. Install Hand Engine v3.2.0-Lite

2. Open Hand Engine and go to Edit → Settings → Open SDK

3. Make sure Enabled is switched ON (should be ON by default) and that the following settings are toggled ON:

   1. Streaming Ports: 9400

   2. performer/glove/status: ON

   3. animation/rotation: ON

   4. animation/slider/all: ON

   5. animation/capacitances/all: ON

      

4. Ensure Windows Firewall has not blocked the outgoing connections on port 9400. This is used to communicate with the StretchSense Driver for SteamVR.

Configuring StretchSense SteamVR App

1. Ensure SteamVR is running.

2. Launch the StretchSense SteamVR App.

3. A message should appear, saying that the connection is successful. If it doesn’t, try restarting your PC, then follow steps 1-3.

Calibrating Glove Data

Prior to training or loading a model you must calibrate the glove. This step is currently required each time you start the StretchSense SteamVR App, even if you have already calibrated the glove in Hand Engine. These normalize the range of motion that your hand can perform and sets a baseline for any trained button models.

1. Click the left hand Calibrate button.

   

2. Move your hand to make the following gestures before the timer runs out. You may need to practice this a few times.

Example Side	Example Front	Gesture	Description
		Paddle	Start with this pose. Keep fingers together and straight.
		Reach	Splay your fingers outwards to spread them evenly. Reach as far as is comfortable.
		Reach + Thumb Curl	Splay your fingers, similar to the Reace pose. Pull your thumb in towards the center of your palm, keeping it close to the palm surface.
		Fist	Curl your fingers in to make a fist, keeping them tight against your palm, but don’t squeeze too hard. Curl your thumb over the middle of your index finger.

3. Repeat for the right hand.

4. When calibration is complete for both hands, the training and button testing columns will be visible:

   

Mounting the Trackers

Use the universal mount and position the trackers to mirror one another as pictured. Other 3D printed mounts that put the trackers in a similar position and orientation will also work.

Tundra Tracker Mounting

1. For Tundra, mount on a diagonal with the tracker USB ports pointing towards the USB port on the glove.

Left Hand	Right Hand

2. In the StretchSense SteamVR App, select Tundra from the tracker list, then restart SteamVR when prompted to automatically update the tracker offsets in the StretchSense Driver Add-On for SteamVR.

   

VIVE Tracker 3.0 Mounting

1. For HTC Vive Tracker 3.0, mount with the status led pointing away from the fingers.

2. In the StretchSense SteamVR App, select Vive from the tracker list, then restart SteamVR when prompted to automatically update the tracker offsets in the StretchSense Driver Add-On for SteamVR.

   

Training a Controller Model in StretchSense SteamVR App

For stability, we recommend training a left-hand model for locomotion / joystick controls and training the right-hand model for shooting/object interaction or toggling/activating running/jumping to allow your virtual character to move and perform actions at the same time.

Training a New Model

1. Calibrate the Left-Hand Controller and Right-Hand Controllers as described in calibrating glove data.

2. On a freshly calibrated left hand controller model, for each button on the list click Capture and perform the gestures listed under Training a Right-Hand Controller Model for Interaction.

   

Tuning a Previously Trained Model

1. Perform glove calibration for both hands.

2. Click “Load Model” and select a left-hand model using the file browser.

3. Click Recapture next to the button to capture an updated gesture. This will add more training data to the original capture to improve the button’s gesture detection and the original training data will be retained.

   

4. Repeat for the right-hand.

Training a Left-Hand Controller Model for Locomotion & Joystick Controls

We recommend configuring your in-game controls to perform forwards/backwards movement on the left hand up/down stick direction and have the left/right movement of stick control strafing. You will have greater precision by using your entire body to turn in game while using StretchSense gloves. We recommend training only 4 directions first, then training the additional directions to bring the total to 8 when you are comfortable with using the gloves. If also training other buttons on this hand these may impact how accurate the directional buttons can be.

Pose	Name	Description
	Idle	Make the horns gesture, then move your thumb straight up. This represents the centered position of joystick.
	Up	Make the horns gesture 🤘 with your thumb forward, parallel to your index finger. This is the most important gesture to have reliable as this is used for the forward direction in smooth locomotion or teleportation in SteamVR Home. Since you will make this gesture a lot, it should be comfortable to perform.
	Left	Make the horns gesture 🤘 with your thumb pulled towards the left side of your hand, away from your palm.
	Right	Make the horns gesture 🤘 with your thumb pulled towards the right side of your hand, towards your palm.
	Down	Make the horns gesture 🤘 with your thumb curled in, with your knuckle arching up and the tip pressing towards middle of your middle finger. This direction is not used often as it is a fatiguing pose for the thumb.
	Idle	Create an additional idle pose. Make a relaxed pose as pictured and move your fingers between being fully extended to a slightly relaxed curled pose. This represents no buttons being pressed.

Training a Right-Hand Controller Model for Interaction

For object interaction using controller buttons, only a subset of gestures is required. In this guide we have left out the A and B buttons and are just focusing on emulating the grip button for holding objects and trigger buttons for interacting with UI.

1. Train the below interaction gestures:

Pose	Name	Description
	Idle	Make a relaxed pose and move your fingers between being fully extended to a slightly relaxed curled pose. This represents no buttons being pressed.
	Grip	Make a finger gun pose with your thumb pointing upwards and your middle, ring and little fingers curled. Don’t squeeze too hard to avoid overdriving the glove sensors.
	RT	Point gesture with thumb pointing upwards. Fully curl in your index finger, as if you were pulling a real trigger. Avoid squeezing your index finger too hard as it will make it harder to repeat the gesture. Currently when using the StretchSense SteamVR App, activating RT will cause the grip button to deactivate. To work around this, you will need to adjust the SteamVR controller bindings to change the grip button to be a Toggle Button. To use this, grab the object once to pin it to your hand, then use RT to activate the held object.
	Menu	Touch your little finger to your thumb, with your thumb resting on the middle part of your little finger. Keep your other fingers extended. This gesture activates the SteamVR Dashboard. Train it so it can be pressed accurately. You may need to go back and train the idle pose again to stop it accidentally triggering.
	A Button / Primary Button	Touch your middle finger to your thumb, with your thumb resting on the middle part of your middle finger. Keep your other fingers extended.
	B Button / Secondary Button	Touch your ring finger to your thumb, with your thumb resting on the middle part of your ring finger. Keep your other fingers extended.

2. Repeat the Idle pose to compensate for any outlying data introduced with the other buttons. You may need to repeat these gestures until all gestures can be performed without the button activation state flickering on/off or between buttons or idle.

Exporting a Model

Once you have trained a model for a hand:

1. Click Export Model

2. For each hand you will be prompted to select a location on disk to save the current model for that hand as a DAT file.

3. Give the model a descriptive name (e.g Left Hand D-Pad Trigger) to help remember what buttons the model is trained on when loading it next time.

5. Running SteamVR Games

1. Start SteamVR and wait for the SteamVR status window to appear. The two StretchSense logos will appear when the StretchSense Driver Add-On has loaded:

   

2. Open the Companion App.

3. Perform the calibration for both hands.

   

4. Click Load Model to load a compatible model from disk for your game and the correct settings will be automatically applied.

5. Check the buttons on screen highlight white when making the appropriate gesture.

   

6. Turn on your Tundra or Vive Trackers.

7. Check the gloves are detected in the SteamVR status window, indicated by two filled StretchSense logos.

   

8. Start your SteamVR compatible game.

9. Check your in-game hands track correctly.

If you need to restart SteamVR during your play session, click the Reset Connections button in the SteamVR App. Re-connections to Hand Engine are automatic if you need to restart Hand Engine for any reason (make sure to select the gloves in Hand Engine again when you restart).

Validate SteamVR is receiving emulated controller button presses by going to SteamVR → Settings → Controllers → Test Controller