Wii Headtracking Creates 3D Window Display

Johnny Chung Lee is the PhD student from Carnegie Mellon University who has been rocking Nintendo fanboy hearts pretty hard by making the Wiimote do some spectacular feats. We first saw him track his fingertips on the screen for a "Minority Report" type of interface. Then he created an interactive whiteboard. Now, he’s managed to create a headtracking simulation through the Wiimote, creating an amazing 3D window on the world.

The mod requires you to wear the sensor bar (or any IR-emitting headband, Lee makes some sweet goggles) and place the Wiimote by the screen (it’s hooked up to a laptop with a TV-out for this demonstration). Essentially, your head becomes the mouse peeking through a 3D room, and the gameplay implications would be incredible.

Anyone else thinking that Nintendo should pay this guy whatever he wants to make some awesome games? Or, you know, Sony and Microsoft could always grab him up, too. These ideas just use the Wiimote’s IR—technology that isn’t exactly cutting edge stuff.

Robot Film Crew Knows What Sports Fans Like

SPORTS fans need never miss a match again, thanks to software that could automatically film games and so allow broadcasters to cover them more cheaply by losing camera crew.

Dubbed the Autonomous Production of Images based on Distributed and Intelligent Sensing (APIDIS), the system combines the video stream from several cameras, says Christophe De Vleeschouwer at the Catholic University of Louvain (UCL), in Belgium.

Tracking a ball across various video streams is relatively easy, says De Vleeschouwer, but viewers also want to see what the players are up to. So APIDIS aims for a shot of the action that is a compromise between focusing on the ball and wider views of the pitch by tracking the ball and players simultaneously, calculating which camera captures the most detail (Computer Vision and Image Understanding, DOI: 10.1016/j.cviu.2010.01.005).

APIDIS can be tailored to viewers’ demands, says De Vleeschouwer, by giving preference to shots containing particular players, for example. It has been tested on several basketball matches, a game chosen because of its fast pace. The resulting footage was good enough to attract interest from the US sport broadcaster ESPN, claims De Vleeschouwer.

APIDIS could also be useful for surveillance, when it could track groups of people on CCTV networks, says De Vleeschouwer.

Barbie Video Girl Features A Built-In Camcorder

Besides pursuing a career as a computer engineer, it seems Barbie is also considering espionage as a side gig. The Barbie Video Girl Doll, which was just unveiled at Toy Fair, features a video camera ‘hidden’ in Barbie’s necklace that can capture up to 30 minutes of footage. But what’s more disturbing is the LCD display fused to her back that allows you to play back those videos.

Now I know Mattel has never been that concerned with anatomical correctness in the Barbie line, but I’m pretty sure they’re taking some real creative licenses here. There’s also a USB port hidden somewhere on the doll, not exactly sure where, that allows the videos to be downloaded to a PC and/or uploaded and edited on Barbie.com. The whole idea just seems kind of creepy to me, probably even more so if there was a Ken version, but don’t let me stop you from picking one up in July when they’ll be available for about $50.

Ten technologies that will rock 2010

Now that the aughts are behind us, we can start the new decade with a bang. So many new technologies are ready to make a big impact this year. Some of them will be brand new, but many have been gestating and are now ready to hatch. If there is any theme here it is the mobile Web. As I think through the top ten technologies that will rock 2010, more than half of them are mobile. But those technologies are tied to advances in the overall Web as well.

Below is TechCrunch’s list of the ten technologies that will leave the biggest marks on 2010:

1. The Tablet: It’s the most anticipated product of the year.  The mythical tablet computer (which everyone seems to be working on).  There are beautiful Android tablets, concept tablets, and, of course, the one tablet which could define the category, the Apple Tablet.  Or iSlate or whatever it’s called.  If Steve Jobs is not working on a tablet, he’d better come up with one because  anything else will be a huge disappointment.Why do we need yet another computer in between a laptop and an iPhone?  We won’t really know until we have it.  But the answer lies in the fact that increasingly the Web is all you need.  As all of our apps and data and social lives move to the Web, the Tablet is the incarnation of the Web in device form, stripped down to its essentials.  It will also be a superior e-reader for digital books, newspapers, and magazines, and a portable Web TV.
2. Geo: The combination of GPS chips in mobile phones, social networks, and increasingly innovative mobile apps means that geolocation is increasingly becoming a necessary feature for any killer app.  I’m not just talking about social broadcasting apps like Foursquare and Gowalla.  The advent of Geo APIs from Twitter , SimpleGeo, and hopefully Facebook will change the game by adding rich layers of geo-related data to all sorts of apps.  Twitter just recently launched its own Geo API for Twitter apps and acquired Mixer Labs, which created the GeoAPI.
3. Realtime Search: After licensing realtime data streams from Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and others, Google and Bing are quickly ramping up their realtime search.  But realtime search is still treated as a silo, and is not regularly surfaced in the main search results page.  In 2010, I expect that to change as the search engines learn for what types of searches it makes sense to show Tweets and other realtime updates.  In the meantime, a gaggle of realtime search startups such as Collecta, OneRiot, and Topsy will continue to push the ball forward on the realtime search experience.  Realtime search will also become a form of navigation, especially on Twitter and Facebook.  The key will be to combine realtime search with realtime filters so that people are delivered not only the most recent information but the most relevant and authoritative as well.
4. Chrome OS: In November, Google gave the world a sneak peek at its Chrome operating system, which is expected to be released later this year.  The Chrome OS is Google’s most direct attack on Windows with an OS built from the ground up to run Web apps fast and furious.  Already a Google is rumored to be working on a Chrome Netbook which will show the world what is possible with it a “Web OS.” It sounds like it would be perfect for Tablet computers also (see above).  Chrome is a risky bet for Google, but it is also potentially disruptive.
5. HTML5: The Web is built on HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) and the next version which has been taking form for a while is HTML5.  Already browsers such as Firefox and Google’s Chrome (the browser, not the OS) are HTML5-friendly.  Once HTML5 becomes more widespread across the Web, it will reduce the need for Flash or Silverlight plug-ins to view videos, animations, or other rich applications.  They will all just be Web-native.  HTML5 also supports offline data storage, drag-and-drop, and other features which can make Web apps act more like desktop apps.  A lot of Websites will be putting HTML5 under the hood in 2010.
6. Mobile Video: With video cameras integrated into the latest iPhone 3GS and other Web phones, live video streaming apps are becoming more commonplace—both streaming from phones and to them.  As mobile data networks beef up their 3G bandwidth and even start to tiptoe into true broadband with 4G (which Verizon is heading towards with its next-gen LTE network), mobile video usage will take off.
7. Augmented Reality: One of the coolest ways to use the camera lens on a mobile phone is with the increasing array of augmented reality apps.  They add a layer of data to reality by placing everything from photos to Tweets to business listings directly on top of the live live image captured by the camera.  Tonchidot’s Sekai Camera, Layar, GraffitiGeo and even Yelp are examples of augmented reality apps.
8. Mobile Transactions: As mobile phones become full-fledged computers, they can be used for mobile commerce also.  One area poised to take off in 2010 are mobile payments and transactions.  Twitter founder Jack Dorsey’s latest startup Square turns the iPhone into a credit card reader.  Verifone has its competing product, as does Mophie.  The idea is that any mobile phone can become a point of sale, and those mobile transactions can tie into back-end accounting, CRM, and other enterprise systems.
9. Android: Last year saw the launch of nearly two dozen Android-powered phones, including the Verizon Droid.  In a few days, Google’s Nexus One will launch as the first Android phone which can be unlocked from any given carrier (it is launching with T-Mobile). Android is Google’s answer to the iPhone, and as it reaches critical mass across multiple carriers and handsets it is becoming increasingly attractive to developers.  There are already more than 10,000 apps on Android, next year there will be even more.  And other devices running on the mobile OS are launching as well.
10. Social CRM: We’ve seen the rise of Twitter and Facebook as social communication tools.  This year, those modes of realtime communication will find their way deeper into the enterprise.  Salesforce.com is set to launch Chatter, it’s realtime stream of enterprise data which interfaces with Twitter and Facebook and turn them into business tools. Startups like Yammer and Bantam Live are also making business more social.

via TechCrunch

Avatar: yes, it changed everything after all

A review from Gizmodo…

Put simply, Avatar is the most visually fantastic film I’ve ever seen. It will be hailed as the groundbreaking 3D release of its time while setting a new standard by which all blockbusters are measured. Yes, it’s that good.

I’m not going to talk about plot (or that I thought to myself, Dances with Wolves in space more than once). I’m not going to talk about dialog or pacing (or that the limited narration was totally unnecessary). There are other reviews, more reviewy type reviews, that have all that covered. I’m not going to spoil anything, either. Heck, I’m not even going to talk about Avatar…not just yet.

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Japanese researchers develop see-through goldfish

TOKYO (AFP) – First came see-through frogs. Now Japanese researchers have succeeded in producing goldfish whose beating hearts can be seen through translucent scales and skin.

The transparent creatures are part of efforts to reduce the need for dissections, which have become increasingly controversial, particularly in schools.

“You can see a live heart and other organs because the scales and skin have no pigments,” said Yutaka Tamaru, an associate professor in the department of life science at Mie University.

“You don’t have to cut it open. You can see a tiny brain above the goldfish’s black eyes.”

The joint team of researchers at Mie University and Nagoya University in central Japan produced the “ryukin” goldfish by picking mutant hatchery goldfish with pale skin and breeding them together.

“Having a pale colour is a disadvantage for goldfish in an aquarium but it’s good to see how organs sit in a body three-dimensionally,” Tamaru told AFP.

The fish are expected to live up to roughly 20 years and could grow as long as 25 centimetres (10 inches) and weigh more than two kilograms (five pounds), much bigger than other fish used in experiments, such as zebrafish and Japanese medaka, Tamaru said.

“As this goldfish grows bigger, you can watch its whole life,” he said.

Meanwhile another group of researchers who announced in 2007 they had developed see-through frogs said they planned to start selling the four-legged creatures, whose skin is transparent from the tadpole stage.

“We are making progress in their mass-production. They are likely to be put on the market next year,” said Masayuki Sumida, professor at the Institute for Amphibian Biology of Hiroshima University.

Sumida said see-through tadpoles and adult frogs would be available in the first half of next year in Japan for laboratories and schools and as pets, with a price tag expected to be below 10,000 yen (110 dollars) each.

He also wants to sell the creature abroad.

Animal rights activists have pressed for humane alternatives to dissections, such as using computer simulations.

Sumida’s team produced the creature from rare mutants of the Japanese brown frog, or Rena japonica, whose backs are usually ochre or brown. Two kinds of recessive genes have been known to cause the frog to be pale.

While goldfish are easier to keep, frogs are higher forms of life and therefore preferable for experiments, Sumida said.

5 reasons 3-D video will come to our living rooms

Let’s face it, there are some skeptics out there when it comes to 3-D.  Some point to competing standards, others to the kitsch factor, and almost all point to the glasses. But not everyone’s a hater. In fact, Sony and Panasonic see the technology as a savior for their living room business. So will 3-D make it in the home?  Chances are it will, and here are five reasons why:

1. 3-D will become a standard feature. TV makers will put a premium price on anything 3-D in the next few years (much as they did with HD), as Alfred Poor points out in his new 3DTV report at GigaOM Pro (subscription required); but over time, the technology will become just another standard feature. Chances are in five years we’ll see $799 50-inch 3-D TVs from Vizio at Costco.

2. Invasion of the 3-D movie theaters. 3-D movies are bringing in higher per-screen revenues than their 2-D counterparts, and by the end of this year there should be 7,000 3-D screens worldwide. Hollywood has caught 3-D fever, and it’s logical to think the big focus on 3-D in the theater will migrate over time to the living room.

3. Those crazy gamers. Gamers have been enjoying crude 3-D effects since Wolfenstein 3-D, and more and more are being pulled into a new dimension with the latest 3-D technology.  Sony has stated that existing game catalogs will be 3-D upgradeable through software, which could build the library of content quickly and justify the cost of accessories such as glasses.

4. Cheap glasses. While active shutter glasses would set you back at least 50 bones today, prices will fall through the floor once they’re manufactured at scale.  Think four-packs at Wal-Mart for $25 in about five years.

5. Kids. 3-D’s secret weapon, really. I have to wonder how many 3-D skeptics are child-less. Just as tens of millions of parents came down with Wii tennis elbow in recent years, so will they be donning 3-D glasses in the future.

3-D in the home will continue to be a source of both skepticism and excitement in the coming years. But make no mistake, as both the DVD and HDTV gravy trains continue to slow to a crawl, TV makers and Hollywood are seeing an extra dimension.

See the original article at GigaOm.

Trend Tracker sees emerging Twitter trends

Finding the hot conversation keeps getting easier, but predicting what the next big trend will be continues to be a crapshoot. Palm and Federated Media have teamed up to create a new tool called Trend Tracker that does its best to figure out, what in fact the next top trend will be by analyzing items that are gathering buzz.

The system is a mix of tools that can help spot popular URLs and trending topics before they hit it big. But it’s more about organizing that data in a simple-to-parse format.

Included are the current top 30 trending topics on Twitter, which can be stacked up against each other to see what’s pulling in the highest percentage of tweets. Each trend is represented over a 24-hour time line, where you can see how each particular trend has gone up or down in popularity.

But 24 hours doesn’t tell the full story, which is why the tool will soon expand to keep an archive that covers the last 10 or 30 days.

Along with the top 30 trends, Trend Tracker includes a “Pre Trend Watch” which tracks five up-and-coming trends that are about to break into the top 10 based on their velocity–the speed in which tweets on that particular topic are gaining in popularity. These are also marked in the trend archive with a little blue flag.

When I was looking at the tool last week, one of the most interesting things this picked up on was the cyclical nature of trending. Words like “sleep” and “night” picked up speed and prominence depending on the time of day. Using Trend Tracker’s frequency graph, you’re able to look at the last 24 hours, and see what time of day they began to rise or fall in use–that’s not something you can see through Twitter proper.

To add to that, there’s also a map layer that shows you an animated view of where tweets in any particular trend originated. Again, in the case of “sleep” and “night” you could play back an entire day of activity and see a huge cluster of when the word or phrase gained its prominence.

For most people I’m guessing Trend Tracker will be something they play with a few times and forget, but there’s some real value here over Twitter’s own trend highlighting offerings. If you want to see when and where something originated, as well as how popular it was at any given time of day, this offers both sets of data and in a very easy to use format; you don’t even need to do any detective work in Twitter’s search engine to find that out.

See the original article at CNET News.

Play some classic Nintendo (NES) games in Javascript

The idea that somebody could program a Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) emulator completely in Javascript just blows my mind.

For those that don’t know, Javascript is a language of sorts that’s built into your browser. It’s usually used for doing such mundane tasks as button roll-overs, making simple screen transitions, verifying that you entered a valid e-mail address, etc. I don’t think that using it as a full-blown processor environment was ever part of the original conception.

You’ll want to use Google Chrome for this – competitor browsers aren’t quite fast enough to play this yet.

Yeah, there’s no sound on this emulator but for a quick arcade fix it’s pretty good. There are lots of other ways to play games like this, just use Google or Bing to find them.

Try the emulator here.

Google urges Web adoption of vector graphics

Some seeds for overhauling Web browser graphics were planted more than a decade ago, and Google believes now is the time for them to bear fruit.

The company is hosting the SVG Open 2009 conference that begins Friday to dig into a standard called Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) that can bring the technology to the Web. With growing support from browser makers, an appetite for vector graphics among Web programmers, and new work under way to make SVG a routine part of the Web, the technology has its best chance in years at becoming mainstream.

New Web programming standards are hard to nurture, but they do arrive, said Brad Neuberg, a Google programmer and speaker at the conference.

"First they’re ignored, then they’re hyped, then they’re written off for dead, then they start getting real work done," Neuberg said.

Vector graphics describe imagery mathematically with lines, curves, shapes, and color values rather than the grid of colored pixels used by bitmapped file formats such as JPEG or GIF widely used on the Web today. Where appropriate, such as with corporate logos but not photographs, vector graphics bring smaller file sizes and better resizing flexibility. That’s good for faster downloads and use on varying screen sizes.

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