[info] [metaverse] Whole-body game sensor/controllers

[Eugen Leitl]

----- Forwarded message from "Hughes, James J." <James.Hughes at trincoll.edu> -----

From: "Hughes, James J." <James.Hughes at trincoll.edu>
Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2008 08:56:37 -0500
To: For H+/technoprogressives in virtual worlds <metaverse at ieet.org>
Subject: [metaverse] Whole-body game sensor/controllers
Reply-To: For H+/technoprogressives in virtual worlds <metaverse at ieet.org>


http://www.technologyreview.com/Wire/20045/?nlid=800

Technology Review - Published by MIT
Wednesday, January 09, 2008

Forget the Wii -- next wave of gadgets sense the whole body

By Associated Press

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- Nintendo Corp.'s Wii game console is a breakout hit in
large part because users control the play by waving around a
motion-sensing wireless controller.

Many new gadgets are taking the idea of such an intuitive interface
several steps further. Soon, you may be able to control computers,
television sets, even cell phones with hand gestures alone.

In one demonstration by 3DV Systems at the International Consumer
Electronics Show here this week, users stood in front of a large screen
and controlled a Windows computer with hand gestures: thumb left to go
left, index finger right to go right, victory sign for Enter.

JVC, also known as Victor Company of Japan Ltd., demonstrated a
prototype TV with controls based on the same idea: gestures and sounds
like snaps and claps turn the set on or off, control volume or change
the channel.

The prospect of never again having to search the sofa for a remote is
sure to be welcome in many homes, but the traditional fight over the
remote could become worse: imagine two kids engaged in a sign-language
duel to control the set, with the picture and sound changing frantically
to keep up.

In another demo, when a 3DV employee did boxing motions an avatar on the
screen in front of him mimicked the movement of his entire upper body --
quite a step up from the boxing game of the Wii, which only senses the
movement of the controllers.

A particularly popular Wii game is bowling, where the user swings the
remote as if it were a ball. Two phones that hit the Japanese market in
May include bowling games that work the same way, but without the Wii:
Swing the whole cell phone and you launch the ball down the lane shown
on the screen.

The motion-sensing technology in those phones comes from GestureTek, a
Sunnyvale, Calif., company. While the Wii's remote uses a combination of
tiny mechanical springs and a camera to sense motion, GestureTek uses
only cameras -- quite conveniently, since most cell phones and quite a
few laptops already come with cameras.

GestureTek's technology is already found on some Verizon Wireless cell
phones, which contain a game were the user can roll a ball through a
maze by tilting the phone. Another application is the EyeToy for Sony
Corp.'s PlayStation 2, which lets you play simple games by moving in
front of the camera.

The technology isn't just for fun: it can be healthy too. Francis
MacDougall, GestureTek's chief technology officer, said the company has
run studies of stroke patients playing a snowboarding game by moving in
front of a camera and found it improved their balance. Wiis also have
been used for physical therapy.

To take these relatively simple applications further, GestureTek and 3DV
are looking at adding a third dimension: depth. A regular camera
produces a two-dimensional picture. Two cameras together can sense how
far away an object is, just like two eyes enable humans to perceive
depth.

''We think the interactivity of all this stuff improves with depth,''
said MacDougall. ''You can use that in very novel ways compared to
2-D.''

MacDougall demonstrated a prototype of the Airpoint, a foot-long bar
with an upward-facing camera at either end. When MacDougall held his
finger above it, it sensed the finger's angle and position, letting him
control a cursor on the computer screen by pointing.

''We see it initially as a gimmicky business-presentation type device,
but you could see it built into the corners of a laptop,'' MacDougall
said. That approach would compete with touchscreen, but the Airpoint has
something extra going for it: no fingerprints on the screen.

Reactrix Inc. makes commercial displays that you may have seen in
movie-theater lobbies: an image projected on the floor that reacts to
people walking on it. For instance, one of its Sprint ads let passers-by
kick a football.

At the show, Reactrix demonstrated a depth-sensing system consisting of
a display with a sensor and camera array above it. The system can sense
and react to people up to 15 feet away waving at or pointing to objects
on the screen. It will be on the market for commercial clients this
summer.

3DV has another and quite exotic way of sensing depth, that works with a
single camera. The lens is surrounded by a ring of diodes emitting
pulses of invisible infrared light, up to 60 per second. The light
bounces off whoever is standing in front of the camera, and the camera
measures when it comes back. Light reflected by closer objects returns
faster.

''When light hits your nose, it gets back quicker than the light that
hits your cheek,'' said 3DV spokesman Rich Flier.

3DV plans to make its camera available to consumers by the end of the
year, for less than $200, but it's lacking a big-name manufacturer to
build it into screens or bundle it with game consoles.

''We want people to play with the camera and develop applications,''
Flier said. ''We hope to see licensees pick it up.''
Copyright Technology Review 2008.

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