Interactive Puppet Prototype with hacked Kinect

"A quick installation prototype Emily and I hooked up with the libfreenect Kinect drivers and ofxKinect. The system is doing skeleton tracking on the arm and determining where the shoulder, elbow, and wrist is, using it to control the movement and posture of the giant funky bird!

Speed project - made in a day using openFrameworks and libFreenect.

Concept and Production by Design I/O
Emily Gobeille - Theo Watson
design-io.com

3D depth camera for arm tracking, courtesy of Microsoft and the open source / diy community :)

If you're interested in making projects with the Kinect and openFrameworks check out the addon as it progresses on the OF forums. openframeworks.cc/​forum/​viewtopic.php?­p=24948#p24948

Also keep an eye on the libfreenect GitHub for latest updates to the driver - github.com/​OpenKinect/​libfreenect/​"

Original video: http://vimeo.com/16985224

• Category

  Science & Technology

[yawn2000]

Hi I'm sure you mean no harm but I would appreciate it that you don't just take my vimeo video and upload it to YouTube. I think its nice that you have made a site to archive the efforts but re-uploading existing YouTube and Vimeo videos to your own account denies the ability for the people making the work to see the feedback and comments to their work.

All the best,

Theo Watson

[tristkiss]

These hackers are just awesome! So many times I've heard haters talk about the limitations of Kinect, and again and again these folks are proving just how incredible this tech is! This is one the BEST demos I've seen, plus it's so darn cute and proves the Kinect can track subtle movements. Hope MS & Game Devs are taking notes!

Keep 'em coming! ^_^

[vistigioful]

Tutorial?

[Holland Modz]

Dammmmmn that's cool

[acampos0114]

Fake the bird has delayed actions

[Albert L.]

Hacking a Microsoft Kinect ... with a Mac???? THE HELL WHERE YOU THINKING???

[jayce1983]

The next step is to track the shapes and display the appropriate animal, multiple characters.. and then have some voice modulators that can alter once voice from the mic to mimic a particular character. These could then be interactive stories one could tell to their children at great distances.. like a bedtime story.

[Phearo Guille]

Augmented reality glasses(Shows the stuff)+Kinects above and below(to judge the distance of stuff and your movement)= amazing

[joshig1983]

The delays are permanently kinected to kinect.

[Dryftburn]

Isn't that the same guy who made Raving Rabids for Kinect?

[subtenk0]

how is it hacked? I thought M$ made is open source..

[mortaloldguy]

Not impress with this at all. Look at that lag time!