Hacking Kinect might get you access to an audible air guitar, but Stephane Berscot can do you one better — tweaking the pitch of a tangible axe via Leap Motion’s virtual work space. Berscot configured a Leap tweak his guitar’s pitch based on the instrument’s position over the device. That’s not all, either, the makeshift MIDI controller also functions as a keyboard equalizer and a set of functional air drums. Combining all three tricks together scored Berscot a pretty mean demo track, but it’s apparently a lot harder than it looks. “It wasn’t easy to play drums with it,” he said, explaining how he had to detect beats based tracking the upward and downward velocity of the drumstick. “My method is pretty basic and still needs some work.” Even so, the demo definitely shows the device’s potential. Skip on past the break to see Berscot kick out the jams.
A German eye-tracking company by the name of SensoMotoric Instruments (SMI) have built what they claim are the first pair of 3D glasses with full eye-tracking capabilities. They call the technology ActiveEye, and it combines eye tracking with 3D in order to give users the most realistic experience while using the glasses.
The glasses also have “6D” head tracking, along with the 3D eye tracking. The company partnered up with Volfoni to bring the 3D portion to the glasses, which feature active shutter technology that you see in a lot of advanced 3D glasses today. The 6D head tracking is there to detect gazes whenever the user turn their head to point toward an object.
The glasses offer real-time gaze streaming in world coordinates by measuring the position and orientation of the user’s head within a defined space. The glasses are simply worn like a normal pair of glasses, and the eye tracking is made possible by two small cameras on the outer rim of the glasses while another camera records the field of view from the user’s perspective. The three orbs on each side allow for the 6D head tracking, and they’re detachable for easy storage.
While the Oculus Rift was a big hit at CES a few weeks ago, it’s going to have some stiff competition sooner or later once virtual reality starts taking off. The eye tracking system from SMI supports Microsoft’s Kinect, so it can already be used with technology that people already have. However, there’s no word on availability or pricing for SMI’s 3D glasses.
Leap Motion‘s ultra-precise Controller will launch at Best Buy exclusively, the company has announced, with pre-orders of the motion-tracking dongle kicking off in February. Set to go on sale both in Best Buy stores and through the retailer’s site – in addition to Leap Motion’s own preorders – the 3-inch long gadget hooks up to your computer via USB, and can track the movements of up to ten individual fingers around it.
In fact, Leap Motion’s technology can not only track ten fingers, but with an accuracy of up to 1/100th of a millimeter. There’s no visible delay in the tracking either, the company says, thanks to a 290fps capture rate, and the area of sensitivity covers 150-degrees.
Of course, hardware is only half of the equation, and so Leap Motion has been working on cultivating the developer scene so that there’s sufficient software to make owning the controller itself worthwhile. 12,000 free developer units have already been seeded, with applications in gaming, computer-aided design, augmented reality, and more.
Leap Motion walkthrough:
Earlier this month, Leap Motion announced a deal with ASUS to instill select future PCs from the company with integrated motion-control tracking. This new deal with Best Buy will mean even those without a new ASUS PC will be able to join in, though the retailer will only be the exclusive North American sales partner.
Those outside of the US and Canada can order direct from the manufacturer, with the controller varying in price depending on your country. In the US, it’s $69.99 before shipping; for a UK delivery, for instance, that rises to $83.99 before shipping. Deliveries are expected early this year.
Leap Motion has been working hard the past several months to get its gesture control technology in the hands of developers. It’s doing a great job so far, and it looks like all that hard work will pay off, because the company just partnered up with ASUS to bring the Kinect-like technology to the desktop.
ASUS will be bundling Leap’s motion control technology with select notebooks and desktops that will ship later this year, including the company’s all-in-one PCs and high-end notebooks. The Leap Motion app store will also come pre-installed on all of the qualified computers, and since ASUS will be shipping the products internationally, it will mark Leap’s international debut.
If you’re not sure what the heck Leap Motion does exactly, we’ll give you a quick refresher. The company’s motion-tracking technology has a 150-degree field of view that tracks individual hands and all 10 fingers at 290 frames per second in order to provide ultra precise motion controls. It also offers 200x more accuracy than Microsoft’s Kinect, which already has its many drawbacks anyway.
Obviously, this new tech will encourage users to ditch the traditional keyboard and mouse interface in favor of a Minority Report-esque interface, but depending on how well ASUS implements the technology, we can’t imagine that it’d be hard to pry keyboards and mice out of diehard fans. Prices for the motion-control-equipped computers haven’t yet been discussed, but ASUS promises the new PC’s will be available around the world later this year.
Over the last few years, there has been a significant uptick in the number of products for tracking hand motion for controlling video games and computers. Almost all the technology we’ve seen for motion tracking so far has relied on external devices that are placed away from the user, such as the Microsoft Kinect. Researchers from Microsoft, Newcastle University’s Culture Lab, and the Greek Foundation for Research & Technology have teamed up to create a device that’s able to accurately track hand motions while being worn on the wrist.
A wrist-worn device is interesting because it eliminates the need to be able to place an external sensor at a distance far enough from the user to be able to accurately track hand and body movements. For instance, the Kinect sensor needs a relatively large room for accurate tracking. The wrist-worn device that the researchers created attaches to the user’s wrist like a bracelet.
The device has a number of components, including an array of infrared sensors and more directly attached to the user’s wrist. The sensor is able to track precise hand motions. As the demonstration video below shows, the device allows users to move their hand through the air to control a computer or other system with precision.
The researchers say that their ultimate goal is to be able to reduce the systems size down to that of a wristwatch. The researchers hope when the device is sized like a watch, users will be able to wear it at all times allowing them to interact with computers and other systems without having to reach for controllers or keyboards. There’s no indication at this time of when this technology might come to market.
Over the last few years, there has been a significant uptick in the number of products for tracking hand motion for controlling video games and computers. Almost all the technology we’ve seen for motion tracking so far has relied on external devices that are placed away from the user, such as the Microsoft Kinect. Researchers from Microsoft, Newcastle University’s Culture Lab, and the Greek Foundation for Research & Technology have teamed up to create a device that’s able to accurately track hand motions while being worn on the wrist.
A wrist-worn device is interesting because it eliminates the need to be able to place an external sensor at a distance far enough from the user to be able to accurately track hand and body movements. For instance, the Kinect sensor needs a relatively large room for accurate tracking. The wrist-worn device that the researchers created attaches to the user’s wrist like a bracelet.
The device has a number of components, including an array of infrared sensors and more directly attached to the user’s wrist. The sensor is able to track precise hand motions. As the demonstration video below shows, the device allows users to move their hand through the air to control a computer or other system with precision.
The researchers say that their ultimate goal is to be able to reduce the systems size down to that of a wristwatch. The researchers hope when the device is sized like a watch, users will be able to wear it at all times allowing them to interact with computers and other systems without having to reach for controllers or keyboards. There’s no indication at this time of when this technology might come to market.
The Wii Introduced the masses to motion-based gaming. The Kinect took things one step further and all but eliminated controllers. Microsoft’s latest innovation, an infrared tracker which is worn on the wrist, could make gaming and UI controls even more immersive than before. More »
Microsoft’s Kinect sensor has proven to be quite versatile and accurate, but in the end’s it’s only one motion sensor. A company called Yost Engineering Inc. or YEI recently showed off how multiple motion sensors can be used in videogames, enabling real-time motion capture and virtual reality.
YEI makes what it calls the 3-Space Sensor, a wireless motion sensor with a gyroscope, accelerometer and compass as well as advanced processing and algorithms to process the motion data it captures. Using 17 3-Space Sensors and 3 dongles, the company was able to demo a real-time motion capture session using the Unreal Development Kit, as well as a virtual reality demo that shows how motion capture can increase immersion.
Dance Dance Revolution 2050 is going to be hilarious. Seriously though this could work well with the Oculus Rift.
Since we last heard about Mosoro’s Lego-brick sized Bluetooth LE modules, they’ve changed their names, picked up another member and are now making their way to iOS app developers. The 3D-Motion’s got an accelerometer, gyroscope and magnetometer, while the Enviro measures temperature, humidity and barometric pressure. New to the team is Proximity, useful for triggering location-based apps and tracking motion for creating alerts. All three rechargeable Bluetooth low energy sensors have “shake-to-wake” support, an RGB “glow-cap” for notifications and a humble programmable button. They are expected to hit retail in fall 2012, but “VIP” app developers can grab them now, as well as the SDK which simplifies iOS Bluetooth integration. Got the ideas and inclination to become one of Mosoro’s “rock star app-developer partners?” Then go sign up on the website and see if you make the VIP grade.
Second Story isn’t content to leave window shoppers guessing at whether or not they can afford that dress or buy it in mauve. A new project at the creative studio uses the combination of a Kinect for Windows sensor with a Planar LookThru transparent LCD enclosure to provide an augmented reality overlay for whatever passers-by see inside the box. The Microsoft peripheral’s face detection keeps the perspective accurate and (hopefully) entrances would-be customers. Coming from an outlet that specializes in bringing this sort of work to corporate clients, the potential for retail use is more than a little obvious, but not exclusive: the creators imagine it also applying to art galleries, museums and anywhere else that some context would come in handy. If it becomes a practical reality, we’re looking forward to Second Story’s project dissuading us from the occasional impulse luxury purchase.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
