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Kinect for Windows 1.5 released with facial movement tracking

by Mark Tyson on 22 May 2012, 00:06

Tags: Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qabgy5

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Microsoft today announced the availability of Kinect runtime and SDK version 1.5 on their Kinect for Windows blog. The new version of the software for Windows Kinect users/developers has a number of significant enhancements especially concerning nearby, desk bound Kinect users.

Headlining improvements are:

  • Kinect Studio for developers which allows recording and play back of Kinect data, streamlining development and testing time
  • The face tracking SDK which allows real time tracking of facial features and their movements. Also this includes head position tracking
  • Seated skeletal tracking, ignoring the leg and hip joints. This also works when the user is standing, useful, for example when the user is presenting, standing behind a podium
  • Skeletal tracking in near mode (including seated skeletal near mode). Good for computer users at their desks
  • Performance improvements
  • Enabling of avatar animation
  • Four new languages for speech recognition; French, Spanish, Italian and Japanese
  • More code examples to aid developers
  • A set of guidelines to help developers make natural user interfaces

The Microsoft blog at Technet says there will be more news next week and some videos of new applications using the version 1.5 enhancements. The new videos will probably appear in the Kinect for Windows gallery here showing what Kinect Accelerator teams are doing with the hardware/software.

 

 

The near mode and facial tracking improvements will be a definite boost to Kinect for Windows users, it’s good to see them and we are looking forward to see how the new features will be used in the application sneak peeks next week. Also 12 weeks from now the accelerator teams (11 developer teams chosen from over 500 applicants) will have their final demo days to show what they have come up with.



HEXUS Forums :: 2 Comments

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I've got to wonder whether any of this capability will be making it's way into Windows 8? Reasoning for this is the obvious point that since Windows 8 is really designed for touch, adding Kinect into the mix would be a way for folks to access that part of the UI without needing to replace their monitor with a touch-enabled version. Plus it'd be a way to allow folks with multi-monitor setups (I'm not one of them) to also be able to use the new UI “better”.

And it's not as if Kinect is a ridiculous price - I'm sure I've seen “2nd user” ones locally for around the £40 mark.
Skeletal tracking in near mode (including seated skeletal near mode). Good for computer users at their desks
Any chance of getting that feature in “proper” (i.e. XBox) Kinect - it'd be nice not to have to be 6ft+ away to be able to use the gestures.
crossy
I've got to wonder whether any of this capability will be making it's way into Windows 8? Reasoning for this is the obvious point that since Windows 8 is really designed for touch, adding Kinect into the mix would be a way for folks to access that part of the UI without needing to replace their monitor with a touch-enabled version. Plus it'd be a way to allow folks with multi-monitor setups (I'm not one of them) to also be able to use the new UI “better”.

And it's not as if Kinect is a ridiculous price - I'm sure I've seen “2nd user” ones locally for around the £40 mark.

Any chance of getting that feature in “proper” (i.e. XBox) Kinect - it'd be nice not to have to be 6ft+ away to be able to use the gestures.
Meanwhile LeapMotion's “200x more accurate” $70 version gets all the headlines:
http://www.techradar.com/news/computing/leap-motion-launches-worlds-most-accurate-3d-motion-control-device-1081365

They have a very nice video of it, here http://youtu.be/_d6KuiuteIA

but whether its fake or not is open to question,
especially with their wildly silly accuracy claims:
“accurate to 1/100 of a millimeter”
which is thinner than a human hair ;)

http://live.leapmotion.com/about/