Evolution Of The Frame
2025/06/25, Mark
Scepter is eventually going to be about the size of an Xbox. You’ll be able to pull it off a shelf and put it on the kitchen table when it’s time to game. You’ll be able to throw it in your backpack and take it to your friend’s house.
But it isn’t that small yet. It’s still a prototype, so this is expected, but we are making steady progress. Here’s a look back over the past few months of design iterations on the frame (or physical body) of the device.
Design Iteration 0: Gantry
Two steel bars (leftover from a welding project), propped up on a bookshelf and a built-in shelf
Laser projector (meant for dance clubs and larger venues) balanced on top
Cheap webcams
Plenty of duct tape
This was a quick and dirty proof of concept. I hit my head on the gantry multiple times.
Design Iteration 1: Wooden Periscope
Two square mirrors
3D-printed connectors
Wooden frame, sloppily cut and screwed together
Laser scanner sits on table
Improved camera (not visible in this picture)
This was at least conceivably portable, although the mirror setup had a smaller addressable play-area, and caught self-shadows from the wooden frame. It was nice not having to duck underneath the gantry.
Design Iteration 2: Aluminum Periscope
80/20 rail instead of wood
More deliberate alignment of mirrors
Aluminum rail is much easier to work with than wood, especially in an apartment. Despite tweaking the mirror angles, I knew at this point that I would still have to do something to increase the addressable play-area. Curved mirrors was one possibility, but I wanted something simpler before going down that path.
Design Iteration 3: Aluminum Dog
3D-printed laser mount
Looks kind of like a dog
This was a short-lived one. The footprint was way too big. This laser scanner is over 10 lbs with unevenly distributed weight, which made me hesitate to just put it on a tripod…
Design Iteration 4: Tripods
3D-printed laser mount
Heavy-duty tripod
Camera on a separate tripod (not pictured)
This had a smaller footprint and was generally nice and simple, but there was a bit too much wobble, and the plastic mount eventually cracked and broke from the weight of the laser.
We could’ve gone with a mount made from metal, or with a smaller laser scanner, or with a heavier-duty tripod. There are tradeoffs with each of these.
Design Iteration 5: Angled-Mount Tripod
3D-printed laser mount that lets the tripod joint stay in it’s neutral position
Reduced wobble and shear on the plastic
I don’t have a picture of this one. It was extremely short-lived, but it did lead us to…
Zoe with the v6 frame
Design Iteration 6: Angled-Mount Rail
3D-printed angled laser mount
At this point you still couldn’t play a full game of anything on the device, just bits and pieces. There were a lot of software issues, like the reliability of model tracking. Still, we could start to get glimpses of a cohesive experience. We were getting ready to start doing demos.
Design Iteration 7: Ultra-Short Throw Multi-View (USTMV)
Traditional (non-laser-scanning) projector
Custom shaders to handle contrast and warping issues
Two cameras for improved model tracking
We had been talking for a while about the tradeoffs between laser-scanners and traditional projectors. Briefly: laser scanners are brighter, and projectors are faster and less regulated.
The path of least resistance right now is with traditional projectors, but we are still pursuing a design branch that uses lasers. I’m very excited to talk more about that in the future.
Mark, Zoe, and Kapi with the v8 frame
Design Iteration 8: USTMV On A Stool
Wider-fov cameras
A stepstool from Ace Hardware
This was the first device that we demo’ed. Because of how we were doing the on-table menus at that point, we had to get an extra 10 inches or so of elevation. A truly elegant solution.
Design Iteration 9: USTMV Scorpion
Better camera positioning
We also had improved camera handling on the software side, and no longer needed the extra height from the step stool.
Design Iteration 10: Pink Scorpion
3D-printed scorpion mount for further-improved camera positioning
3D-printed LIDAR mount
This brings us up to the present. With further-improved camera positioning and the additional use of LIDAR, the model tracking and the on-table menus feel much better than they did a month ago.
As we continue to make improvements on the software side, we expect the frame to continue to get smaller. In particular, some tracking-system improvements currently in the works will probably obviate the scorpion-style mount, and give us a more compact silhouette.
