king talk

Everybody knows Pong – one of the earliest arcade video games which is simply based on the elementary idea of tennis. We decided to take this concept one step further, so Phil wrote a nice color tracker, which is capable of tracking two different hues. In this case it recognizes two different socks put over the hands of each competitor. We were using a installation made of white corrugated fiberboard found in the leftovers from Atzinger Verpackungs GmbH in Munich. The tracking cam is a second hand PS2 eye toy camera which we bought for 14,99 EUR at gamestop store just around the corner.

The well-known software we were using is processing, a programming language and integrated development environment (IDE) built for the electronic arts and visual design communities. We had to build the prototype both quickly and cheaply, so it was more important to be functionally efficient rather than aesthetically perfect. In the end the whole assembly cost us 15 EUR and took just an afternoon to build.

This pong game is in fact a mashup of the results of our 24h toyhacking session which took place on Friday, and the week-long SHARE project from Yannick Assogba  (MIT Media Lab / Sociable Media Group)

Perfect combination: a card magician and augmented reality (done with openFrameworks)

via Joshua Davis

Heading back to the KING TALK post last week about the increase of Augmented Reality interactive videos appearing everywhere, i thought i would show the extent of how AR is achieving by presenting another video of a nifty example of AR use.

The video below shows an open-source AR game being used to tilt and interact a game character in a cube like surrounding. The cubes control a link system that lets you walk through the integrated AR surroundings of each room by connection of the Cubes. The game is created and produced by Julian Oliver and is titled »Levelhead«. Currently the game is only available on Debian GNU/Linux and has not yet been developed as a installer program.

Its a really cool idea that enables great value to come out of current interaction design via AR compatibilities and explores what can be achieved with this fascinating controlled interactive data substance. More information can be found at: http://julianoliver.com/levelhead

Augmented reality currently is the hip kid on the schoolyard that every other kid wants to be friends with. We’ve seen GEs Smart Grid and MINIs »Always Open« campaign. Both were nice to look at, but of limited value, as the only possible interaction was moving and rotating a virtual object.

But now, baseball trading cards vendor Topps has released a game that takes all the action right on your desk! You control a baseball player with your keyboard and see him wandering, pitching and striking in the real world (well, in an image of the real world that is being displayed on your computer screen, but anyway).

via NYT and theLager

First impression: Why is that woman drawing a butt at 0:04?

Second impression: Alright, it’s a dog.

In Microsofts perspective, in the future everything will have a touch surface (even the air), we will be constantly tracked and augmented reality is the way to go. Nothing staggeringly new there, but it’s all nicely comped into a convenient package, which makes it a good overview over the current tech trends.

Here’s the official website and some more information (where you can also find a longer version of the video.

via Computerlove