A bezel that
remembers where it has been.
Clip it to the Quest 3 controller or the Steam Frame controller. Swing your arm. The same persistence-of-vision logic the studio’s photographic rigs use, miniaturised onto the thing already in your hand.
What this is: a small programmable LED ring that paints in the air outside the headset and inside it, synchronised by angle, not by clock.
The studio rigs angular-sync against a Hall-effect sensor and a magnet on the chuck — the rig writes the next column when the rotation says to, not when the clock says to. The bezel applies the same architecture to a controller you already own. A ring of addressable LEDs around the tracking ring, a small Teensy-class microcontroller in the clip body, an IMU for the angle, a battery for the evening. On the camera side it’s a long-exposure light-painting rig you can hold in one hand. On the headset side, the controller’s cameras see the ring and feed the mirrored gesture into the WebXR scene — the same trace you painted outside the headset is the trace you see inside it. The mechanical work and the headset-SDK plumbing are the load-bearing parts I’m still finishing. Pre-orders fund the controller-mount mechanical work and the headset-SDK plumbing that finish the build.
- You want a single-handed POV LED rig for light-painting photography that doesn’t require a dedicated poi practice to use.
- You’re a WebXR developer who wants a physical input that paints the same gesture inside and outside the headset.
- You teach immersive media or movement and you want a demonstrable bridge from camera-side practice to headset-side practice.
- When does it ship?
- Honestly, I don’t know yet. The interest list is what decides whether the first batch happens this year or next. The electronics side is settled — same Teensy + FastLED + Hall-effect line the studio rigs run; the controller-mount mechanical and the headset-SDK side are the parts still on the bench. Interest-list signups get the honest answer at the point I have one.
- Does it work without a headset?
- Yes. The camera-side use case is a complete product: clip it to a controller you happen to own, hold the shutter open, paint. The headset-side mirrored gesture is the second pass; you don’t need WebXR to make a photograph with the bezel.
- Will it work on my (insert headset)?
- Quest 3 and Steam Frame at first batch. Both of those expose controller-mounted cameras that the headset can see, which is what the mirrored-gesture trick needs. Other headsets are a maybe and depend on whether their SDKs expose the same surface; I won’t promise until I’ve tested.
Interest list open.
First-batch pre-order target: £249 per bezel (Quest 3 or Steam Frame), £449 for a matched pair, both inclusive of UK shipping and a small spares pack. No money taken on signup; the interest list decides batch size, batch decides ship date. Signup via /contact?intent=bezel.
- VR POV controllers — the product — the long-form argument for the bezel as a line the studio takes seriously.
- Sellotape and Tilt Brush — the origin story of the controller-mounted LED idea.
- Why I build my own rigs — the architectural argument for angular sync over clock sync.
- The stack — Teensy, FastLED, Hall-effect, Quest 3, Steam Frame, WebXR, all named.
- Services — see the full commercial surface, every service in one place.