Kinect for Windows Can See You Up Close

[Aprilgold]

You know what also works great with computers? Keyboard controls and a Mouse!

Yeah, but it could make a cool toy, at least.

Then you realize you have to stand up at your computer desk to use it, and it may or may not work at all.

Only reason I would get this is so I can make a mod to where you have to play minecraft like its a full motion game. You walk by raising your legs, as if walking in place. To switch weapons you use you items you use your left hand and point at the item in particular, open inventory is to swipe your left hand right across the screen to open your inventory, same as selecting a item from the bar, then swiping it in the same way again. With your right hand you push out to use your item on one thing, and moving your right hand moves the camera.

Running in place sprints.

 

[sleeky01]

Because nothing says "Professional Office Environment" like seeing office workers flailing their arms like deranged chickens to enter data into Excel.

Seriously though, what functionality could Kinect add that the touch screens of my offices new computers can't?

By the same token, why would your offices require touch screens?

 

[Cenequus]

Because nothing says "Professional Office Environment" like seeing office workers flailing their arms like deranged chickens to enter data into Excel.

Seriously though, what functionality could Kinect add that the touch screens of my offices new computers can't?

Well that's exactly what Microsoft is doing,giving incentives to people to develop for it. Also what's with the "flailing hands to enter data" couldn't you just like talk? Or if you insist on typing I don't think it would be that hard to develop an "invisible" keyboard since it says how good the accuracy is now(20 inches).

Yeah. Lets all spend 200 bucks on fucking Kinect and another 200 on a table that can generate an invisible keyboard that offers no touch feedback.

Oh no, wait, thats a terrible fucking idea. My cheap plastic Microsoft keyboard gets the job done better than anything else, and I am willing to bet that Kinect and virtual keyboards wont be doing it better any time soon.

I am reminded of that old story in which the US spends thousands of dollars trying to develop an ink pen that works in space while the russians just used a pencil.

OT: Im not going to rule out the possibility of something cool coming out, but Kinect in an office or school environment? No. Bad idea. Anyone who has spent even a minute in the most empty and calm office knows that having all workers blabbering at their computer rather than just type is a bad idea. As for schools, we already have touch screen boards that are hooked up to PCs! At least most first world countries we do! Why in Gods name should we use some stupid piece of shit that costs loads of money when the only actual improvement is that the teacher can now drag things across the screen from the other side of the classroom (providing all 20-30 children present at that time miraculously freeze and hold perfectly still so poor old Kinect doesnt get confused) instead of just actually touching the screen or moving a mouse?

You missed my whole point,I was sure making 2 crude examples but i'm neither a software nor hardware developer so I can't imagine what smart people came up with. Also the way you imagine kinect now and what could be in 5-10 years is like comparing a Pentium 1 with a Pentium 4 10 years later. The point is development and Microsoft seem to be doing just that by actually helping those that have good ideas and skills to actually do it.

As for how I see this into a near future: well atleast for my PC for example it will be just the monitor with extra "stuff" inside and no other hardware.Since bigger and bigger monitors seem to be the fad something like kinect seems more appropiate than touch screen. Also laying in bed pressing invisible buttons.

But beside the stupid stuff I can imagine,all their doing is giving people not only the freedom to work on a newish technology but also the money.What's wrong about that?

 

[alandavidson]

I'm excited to see what comes of this. Sure, the Kinect isn't the greatest thing in the world right now, but with time and companies like Microsoft willing to back people who want to make it better and do some pretty amazing things with it, it will get better and be viable force in technology.

 

[UnderCoverGuest]

You know what I'd use a Kinect for on my computer?

Motion-capture work. I could finally make animations in my own living-room, send them to my buddy who could rig them, and together we could make a host of mods for Skyrim that expand the viceral pummeling that--

Just kidding, didn't really mean to bring "that topic" up here. But there are a lot of technical uses for this kind of motion-tracking technology other than dancing like a freak in the kitchen trying to tell your kinect to send a signal to your computer to inform Winamp to play the next song in your playlist.

 

[octafish]

You know what I'd use a Kinect for on my computer?

Motion-capture work. I could finally make animations in my own living-room, send them to my buddy who could rig them, and together we could make a host of mods for Skyrim that expand the viceral pummeling that--

Just kidding, didn't really mean to bring "that topic" up here. But there are a lot of technical uses for this kind of motion-tracking technology other than dancing like a freak in the kitchen trying to tell your kinect to send a signal to your computer to inform Winamp to play the next song in your playlist.

Yeah, mo-cap seems to hold the most potential. Remember those kinect minecraft hacks with 3d models, and animations?

 

[Strazdas]

so a completely useless and terrible idea becomes even more useless and terrible. what a shock!

 

[Spud of Doom]

This is good. They've always had some weak support for PC devs but they are doing what they need to be doing here to bring it up to a good level.

 

[Sampler]

Could be good for presentations, to initiate changes in the power point slides (start vids, next slide, kick-off an animation).

Though I guess you'd have trouble distinguishing commands from natural gesticulations.

 

[Roxor]

From the sounds of it, 3D digitisation is about to get a lot more accessible. Link a few kinects to a PC and cobble together some software to combine the data from them and you could turn real objects into 3D models for use in your game.

 

[tahrey]

Was it really necessary to convert the centimetres to inches like that? If you can't understand metric by now, go hide under a rock

(Yeah I know it's hypocritical as I do that all the time, but shit, it's pretty easy to go use google's built in conversion engine, or just try to remember there's approx 2.5cm to the inch)

*grabs tape measure* as I sit here at my dual monitor setup, I'm 45cm from the main one and 60 from the secondary. So it would involve sitting slightly further away than I'm strictly comfortable with - or really have space for, even on a none-too-cramped desk - but it's within the realm of practicality for motion control.

However, really, at this distance I can reach out and touch the surface of both monitors without much difficulty - not stretching my arm or leaning forwards. It needs a proper fisheye lens on it so it can deal with gestures made at very nearly point-blank range. Say as little as 10cm / 4in...

 

[Scars Unseen]

This might be a good replacement for my TrackIR. It would be nice to have something for 6DoF head tracking that doesn't require me to wear a hat with reflectors.

 

[Jowe]

I am reminded of that old story in which the US spends thousands of dollars trying to develop an ink pen that works in space while the russians just used a pencil.

By the way this story is false, using a pencil in space is a very bad idea, it splinters and graphite is conductive, so it can cause all sorts of chaos. Secondly the pen that was developed to work in space was made by a guy called peter fisher, and all space missions use his pens till this day.
Thought for the day or something.