Way back in 2012, I wrote about Microchip MGC3130 3D Gesture Controller with “GestIC technology” which allows you to make gesture up to 15cm from the surface and at lower power in order to control devices in a new way. At the time, the chip was said to sell for $2.26 in large quantities, and the evaluation kits went for $169 and up. I’m writing about MGC3130 about 5 years later, as Seeed Studio has started taking pre-orders for a $25.89 Flick HAT board based on the solution, and designed for Raspberry Pi boards, or other boards with a compatible 40-pin “GPIO” header featuring an I2C interface.
Flick HAT 3D Tracking & Gesture HAT specifications & features:
- Chip – Microchip MGC3130 3D Tracking and Gesture Controller
- Tracking / Gesture Features
- 3D tracking
- Gesture sensing up to 15cm: Swipe (east to west, west to east, north to south, south to north), tap and double tap (center, east, west, north, south), airwheel (clockwise, anti-clockwise)
- Touch and Tap sensing (center, east, west, north, south)
- Position rate – 200 positions / second
- Spatial resolution – up to 150 dpi
- Host Communication Interface – I2C
- Header – 40-pin header compatible with Raspberry Pi B+, Pi 2 model B, Pi 3, and others.
- Dimensions – 6.5 x 5.6 x 0.5 cm
- Temperature Range – -20 to +85
- Certifications – CE and FCC
The Flick HAT comes with 8 plastic bolts, 4 plastic spacers, 3 stickers, and two info cards. The board can be hidden inside a non conductive case (plastic, wood, etc..) although the range could further be decreased. Source code and demos can be found on Pi Supply’s Github account.
More details and other 3D tracking board can be found on Pi Supply’s Flick page, and in case you wonder about the LED HAT used in the demo it’s called “Raspberry Pi Sense HAT“.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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