Whole-Body Gaming

The massive success of the Nintendo Wii proved the appeal of motion-controlled gaming. Now Softkinetic, a company based in Belgium, is working to let video-game players use a wider range of more-natural movements to control the on-screen action. Softkinetic's software is meant to work with depth-sensing cameras, which can be used to determine a player's body position and motions. "You don't need a controller in your hand," says CEO Michel Tombroff. "You don't need to wear a special outfit. You just come in front of the camera in your living room, and you start playing by moving your entire body."

Softkinetic's technology started out as research at the University of Brussels, in Belgium, aimed at exploring the user interfaces made possible by stereoscopic cameras, which sense depth by using two input sources, in much the way that the human brain perceives depth by comparing data from two eyes.

Tombroff says that the new cameras sense depth by using infrared light in one of two ways. First, the camera might send out infrared light and receive the reflections of that light off objects in a room. The sending and receiving information can be compared to determine details of position and depth around the camera. Alternatively, the camera could project a grid of infrared light onto a room, and calculate the positions of objects based on how the grid is distorted.

Source: technologyreview.comAdded: 8 May 2008