Vuzix Smart Glasses M100
Sixense MakeVR 3D Immersive Design tools demo
Dual-Eye Augmented Reality Goggles Recognise Faces, Gestures
Product of an experiment by the R&D department at Brilliantservice, a Japan-based app development house, the Viking operating system takes a different approach to wearable computing, relying on gesture controls and projecting a 720p image into both eyes at once. Brilliantservice threw together from off-the-shelf parts just for testing purposes, and use the Viking OS to draw a painting, open apps and even match names with people’s faces just by looking at them. Written in Objective C, Viking relies on gesture controls as its primary form of input. As hand is held out in front of face, the cameras on top of the nose bridge recorded movements and you are able to see a graphical avatar of your hand projected on the heads-up display.
All up a very interesting mashup of current tech as a proof of concept. Products combined are Vuzix STAR 1200XL glasses ($4,999), a generic RGB camera and a PMD CamBoard nano depth camera to make the demo headset we used. However, Brilliantservice has no plans to market and sell its own AR goggles. Instead, the company is looking to partner with a hardware developer who can work with the company to design and manufacture a much more attractive headset that uses the Viking OS.
http://www.brilliantservice.co.jp/viking/viking-pamphlet.pdf
Ringbow – Natural User Interface accessory for touch screens
Ringbow is designed to enhance the experience of touch screen gaming. Since touch screens are controlled with fingers, a finger-worn tool, specifically a ring, is the natural choice for complementing them. Operating Ringbow in conjunction with using a touch device enables countless new features and a much more efficient user experience.
Operating the ring with your thumb while using your finger to touch a device provides capabilities and layers of functionality that are simply not available in today’s technologies. Ringbow multiplies the functionality of your finger together with allowing simultaneous actions.
Cubee – interactive VR cube
Cubee is an interactive cubic fish tank VR display system that enables viewing from around all the screens. Its perspective-corrected rendering and real-time physics simulation establish a Natural User Interface (NUI) interaction metaphor of having real objects inside a physical box that a user can manupulate.
pCubee is a “personal” Cubee display that is light and compact enough to be held in one hand. We are building Cubees of different sizes for different applications.
Microsoft’s Kinect used to transforms movements into sound
A Natural User Interface (NUI) for professional sound design had to happen sooner or later. The 28-year-old Chris Vik began tinkering with the technology a little more than a year ago after being inspired by YouTube videos of art projects based on the Kinect.
”I actually traded in my Xbox to get the Kinect. The guy at the store was very confused until I explained I had seen a bunch of videos on the internet and I planned to spend a lot of time working out how to tinker with it.”
By the end of last year he had completed his Kinectar software and made it available as a free download on his website.
kinectar.org/download
He says the technology lets musicians engage with audiences in new ways.
Augmented Reality – Docomo 3D Live Communications System
Docomo 3D Live Communication System lets you experience virtual worlds in augmented reality AR. The system lends it self to AR glasses as a natural user interface for future developments.
Tactile haptic surface layer for touch screens
Tactus announces next-gen mobile tactile tech at SID Display Week 2012 in Boston.
Tactus Technology has created a tactile layer component that generates a haptic user interface (UI) with real physical buttons, guidelines, and shapes which rise out of the surface from any touchscreen. Their aim is to incorporate their technology into interfaces for the home, car, business, industry, military, etc. The overlay adapts to button location, shape and size and will be released mid 2013.
Ron Cobb’s views on the future
Today I interviewed Ron Cobb (Alien, Aliens, Back to the Future, Last Star Fighter, Star Wars, etc.) and Syd Mead (2010, Tron, Blade Runner, Aliens, etc.) for GreenlightSummit.com Web Conference. After the session Ron wanted to continue the discussion with his thoughts on how the future is perceived from a vantage point of now or the past and that the future is probably much less recognisable if we were to actually time travel from now to some point in the future.
Ron and I would love to continue this discussion with Syd and many others.
My NUI research is based on the near future as you have seen from my blog and looking further out becomes far more fragmented and random for prediction as you will hear more about from Ron.
The Leap in Natural User Interface NUI
Leap is a cool new Natural User Interface to interact with computers. It’s more accurate than a mouse, as reliable as a keyboard and more sensitive than a touchscreen. It will allow control of computers in three dimensions with your natural hand and finger movements.