The Verge - Kinect hacks, research, and alternative uses

Precognitive robot knows you need help before you do

2013-05-29T10:04:05Z

A new robot developed by researchers at Cornell University isn't only capable of assisting you with tasks, it can accurately predict when you might need a hand. Armed with a Kinect sensor, the robot — developed by Ashutosh Saxena and his team of computer scientists — utilizes a dataset of 120 videos to analyze and understand your movements. It can then help you perform certain tasks including making a meal, stacking or arranging objects, or taking your medicine.

To detect your actions, researchers use complex algorithms to detect skeletal movements that are assigned to a sub-activity, which include reaching, moving, pouring, eating, and drinking. Activities are associated with the objects around you, allowing the robot to assess...

Microsoft working with US military to create Kinect-powered physical therapy system

2012-12-18T21:05:35Z

If all goes as planned, Microsoft's Kinect motion sensor camera will be used to help provide physical therapy for injured soldiers and veterans. According to Defense News, the company is working with the Air Force and the Army’s Communications-Electronics Research, Development, and Engineering Center to create a therapy system that utilizes the camera, a standard PC, and off-the-shelf software. Kinect offers an extremely affordable and effective tool for tracking body movements, and therapy software, such as ReMotion360, is already being used for physical rehabilitation.

Due to the low cost of the device — Kinect for Windows can be purchased for $249.99 — and the minimal upkeep involved with the setup, the program would allow...

Watch this: Kinect-powered motion capture mimics your facial movements in real time

2012-11-18T01:08:06Z

Faceshift is a new motion capture utility that does an impressive job of replicating facial movements with barely any noticeable delay. The technology relies on Microsoft's ever-capable Kinect camera to pull in the 3D data it needs to mirror your expressions, though Faceshift's creators have done an admirable job refining the device's face recognition capabilities. Seeing even the most slight movements replicated by an on-screen avatar brings to mind the top-notch motion capture we've seen in the video game industry in recent years, led most notably by LA Noire.

And gaming is an area where Faceshift could present new opportunities to developers. An SDK targeted at animators and game creators has been released, though it wouldn't...

Watch this: mechanical ceiling mimics the feeling of being underwater

2012-11-01T15:59:54Z

The surface of a lake or river is an iconic part of the natural world, but a mechanical version has its own kind of beauty. For his installation Underwater, artist David Bowen mapped real-time wave patterns by putting a Kinect above the water and setting it to capture the water's surface as a plane. That information was then sent to hundreds of motors, which controlled the web above. The result, shown last month at Interieur 2012 in Belgium, is a rippling ceiling that captures the feeling of looking up while being underwater. Bowen's work often focuses on the disconnect between nature and machines, but he says he's increasingly finding that "maybe that contrast is not necessarily as black and white as we might perceive."

MIT researchers equip real-time mapping system with Kinect sensor

2012-09-26T17:37:48Z

Navigating through unknown territory is a challenge in and of itself, especially in the case of search and rescue missions — and guiding others while doing so increases the difficulty even further. To assist in these situations, researchers at MIT have built a prototype wearable mapping system that can wirelessly transfer data in real-time, as reported by MIT News. Using a "stripped-down" Kinect sensor and a laser rangefinder, the unit scans the area around the wearer in a 270-degree arc to create a map that can be viewed remotely, as seen in the video below.

While travelling, wearers can indicate points of interest on the map, compensating for potential scanning inaccuracies caused by natural human movement. The unit is also...

British researchers build battery-powered, Wi-Fi-enabled Kinect sensor

2012-09-17T12:27:30Z

Researchers at the University of Bristol in the UK have managed to free Microsoft's popular Kinect depth sensor from the constraints of wired use, building a self-contained unit which runs on battery power and uses Wi-Fi for communication. Created as part of the Patina project, the device contains a Gumstix single-board Linux computer for interfacing with the sensor, and produces results which can be outputted to mobile devices — the demonstration video below shows information being displayed on a Samsung Galaxy Nexus.

According to an explanatory blog post, the unit only makes use of the camera part of Microsoft's product, with much of the processing being handled by a homemade circuit board. Still, the researchers have published...

Stroke victim sends email through homemade Kinect interface

2012-09-10T07:38:39Z

Blogger Chad Ruble has created an innovative, gesture-powered interface for his aphasia-suffering mother, using Microsoft's Kinect accessory to help her send simple emails. Writing in a blog post, Ruble explains how his mother, Lindy, has experienced difficulties reading and writing since suffering a stroke twelve years ago — wanting to help her bridge the "keyboard gap" which prevents many disabled people from interacting with computers, he created a system based on emoticons, allowing her to select both an emotion and a level of intensity, represented by signal strength bars.

When a message is sent, it is translated into text, with most of the information being transmitted through the subject line: "Lindy feels very happy." The...

Watch this: Kinect-powered robot follows visitors at London gallery

2012-08-30T09:26:33Z

The BBC has published a short video report on Fearful Symmetry, an art installation which ran at London's Tate Modern gallery earlier this month. Conceived by British artist Ruairi Glynn, the installation involved the use of a large robot which traversed a darkened room using a ceiling-mounted rail — with the aid of three of Microsoft's Kinect sensors, it interacted with visitors, responding to their movements with a number of pre-programmed actions. As the visitors interviewed in the video note, one of the most disconcerting aspects of the robot is its apparently "organic" movement — controlled partly by a set of algorithms and partly by a team behind the scenes, it acts with an eerie mix of human curiosity and robotic...