Microsoft's new lens tracks your face, steers 3D images to your eyes (video)
By Sean Hollister 
posted June 14th 2010 7:17AM
posted June 14th 2010 7:17AM
posted June 14th 2010 7:17AM
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I really hope they don't pull a Courier on this one. Microsoft does seem to have some interesting projects, I am glad to see this giant wake up.
@carlosol
I have to agree and hope they don't shelf this like Courier. I am still getting over that. An obvious iPad killer and yet Microsoft threw that into the wind, and continue to let us suffer the onslaught of Apple news in almost all e-magazines!
@darkmax
I can probably tell you already that this is not something Microsoft will make and sell, simply because they are not a screen manufacturer, my guess is that the technology will be broken down to apear in other products and maybe patenteda and lisensed to other companies.
@carlosol
What is it with people thinking Microsoft just flushed Courier right before release ?
There were no working prototypes and the actual device was probably canceled because it would cost $2000 to make right now.
This tech with Project Natal is going to be the future you can only have advanced interaction with computers once they learn to watch and read us.
@fourthletter "once they learn to watch and read us" - oh thats creepy!
@fourthletter ive actually already seen tech like this in action, it used a natal-esque camera system to put you right in the middle of a 3d story environment. its pretty incredible but limited as far as a 360 perspective would go, otherwise its incredible and if a handful of students could get it to work so well im interested to see what MSFT could do with it
@carlosol They may well shelve it, but that's not the point.
Lionhead are a great example of people who make awesome tech demos (check out "The Room") that never get released as proper games. The reason they do it is research, to find out what works in a game and what doesn't. Sometimes things get panned because they're not technically feasible in a large scale video game or they simply aren't good enough, there are a myriad more reasons. But, and it's a big but, just because something isn't released, it doesn't mean that the technology will be used elsewhere. Things from tech demos seep forwards into public releases and the same is with Microsoft.
Even if this doesn't see the light of day, it shows they're innovating and it's possible we'll see it crop up further down the line - perhaps in an Xbox somewhere.
@Whiternoise *won't, not will
Microsoft is #1. they do a lot in all fields and they are best at most if not all!
@mjenabi Microsoft is good at research and i love their products but they really NEED TO PUSH THIS TO MARKET LIKE ALL THEIR OTHER EXPERIMENTs
Thanks for submitting this? I sent this in only a few hours ago!
@mrmckeb thank you for submitting this
Already sounds better than everything they've done that people have been applauding. That said, I'm not a big WP7 supporter unless they max out on Xbox Live and gaming, which it thus far have little indication of doing (though developers do have an edge in developing cross-platform, which isn't the case for Android and which is a disadvantage for Apple). I'll see what they do in the first 1-2 years with WP7 in the marketplace and then decide if I want to jump in, this, I want up there with a 3DS.
@juanvaldez
Little hope of them going all on on xbox for the phone?
MS Opens their check book to high profile iPhone game devs to port
http://wmpoweruser.com/?p=17076
MS creates a mobile game studio for WP7
http://wmpoweruser.com/?p=17068
It seems like they are putting a lot of effort to leverage their xBox brand on the phone by bringing in simplier games (first link) to more complex ones normally developed by larger game development firms (second link).
Targeted advertising!
Your "critical angle" is pretty basic physics.
But yeah this is cool
@tekn04 Then you do it.
@SskyNnet Ha yeah I'm not saying the way they use it is basic, I just find it funny that the post has quotation marks around it, as if it's some unwieldly thing - it's high school science. I realise now I sounded a bit douchey
and I bet I still do
*stops talking*
Just again proves Microsoft has some of the best engineers and worst decision makers.
@Aurailious... Amen to that
The engineers come up with names like Project Natal, Avalon, Indigo, Longhorn, Photon, Acrylic, Sparkle, Quartz, and Astoria.
The guys up the chain then rename them to "Kinect", "Window Presentation Foundation", "Windows Communication Foundation", "Windows Vista", "Windows Phone 7", "Expression Design", "Expression Blend", "Expression Web", and "ADO.NET Data Services". Boring!
Bill Gates, philanthropist extraordinaire.
Steve Jobs, evil tech dictator.
Talk about role reversal.
I knew Johny Chung Lee must be up to something after he joined Microsoft
John Locke plays Xbox?
I'm tired of Microsoft R&E articles. Fact is, even the good stuff never makes it onto the assembly line.
@steel
I take it you've never worked in a department that does research or proof of concepts. Most never make it. That's why you have departments like this to experiment and try out new things.
In MS's case a lot of what they demo does make it. Something like Surface made it out - it just hasn't been adopted widely.
This is the innovator we want to see!
Nice this is going to look awesome
Logitech's cameras have been doing this for almost 2 years now.
@name777 really? logitech's single-lens cameras can track my eyes in 3D space and display a 3D image to that location?
no, they cannot.
@name777 they suck! i got a camera for my client who happened to be black, and in a dim room it would track me but not see him! he looked at me and said thanks for getting me an effin racist camera!
Oh no, my eyes are bleeding. haaaaaaaaa.
This sounds promising. I expect it to take a few years to get the kinks worked out, but unlike the stupid shutter glasses, this sounds like a winning technology long term.
I still think once manufacturers switch to passive polarized glasses instead of active shutter 3D will take off, but this new thing MS has come up with may eventually be the replacement for passive polarized.
finally I can browse porn while my wife watch Grace Anatomy
@mex I'm pretty sure Grace Anatomy is porn, because there is no TV show with that name.
While this may employ some new teachnology, the idea of tracking users to continuously adjust a glassesless 3D screen is NOT new.
"SeeReal develops technology that is licensed to display manufacturers, including several variants of a tracked autostereoscopic display..."
Makes me wonder if this is actually SeeReal's tech licensed to MS...
"...the display knows where the users are and provides appropriate information only to those regions in space where individual eyes are located. This is enabled by a real-time tracking system based on a pair of stereo cameras, a DSP with proprietary code, and a synchronizing hardware to sync an active light source and the information display providing the left and right views..."
(from http://www.seereal.com/en/autostereoscopy/papers/EI08%206803-24%20Web.pdf)
the fact that it's 3yrs now since the iPhone and microsoft hasn't responded, it's a clear sign of lack of vision in Redmond. Meanwhile, Google continues to chip away.
@AndroidFanBoy
Spot on. MS has been nothing.
Let's see ... Windows 7. Bing. Windows Mobile 6.1/6.5. WP7. Zune HD. Office 2007, 2010. Natal. etc, etc.
I think one could reasonably argue that WP7 changed more than any other other mobile OS in the past 3 years. Just go compare 6.1 to WP7. Then compare the OS for the iPhone 1G to iPhone 4G. Or even the early releases of Android (1.5) to Froyo. MS has clearly changed more than either of those OS's. It remains to be seen whether WP7 will be a success but to suggest that they haven't been doing anything is just wrong.
@bjsguess "I think one could reasonably argue that WP7 changed more than any other other mobile OS in the past 3 years. Just go compare 6.1 to WP7. Then compare the OS for the iPhone 1G to iPhone 4G. Or even the early releases of Android (1.5) to Froyo."
The big question is: would MS come with windows phone 7 like it is now (the biggest change since 6.1) if the iPhone OS and android never existed? Because with windows phone 7 they are catching up and not creating something new or innovative.
I wonder if Fraunhofer has some patents on this. As it was what they did show off on Cebit.
I hope this at a price not exorbitant by the end of the year in Argentina
no one get the sarcasm??
Umm the red shirt and baldness of that guy in the pic look a lot like Captain Jean Luc Picard.
what do you mean uses far fetched? hello! have you ever tried to watch porn in the office?!