openFrameworks
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Google Street View goes retro with unofficial ASCII treatment
Nostalgia is a powerful force. It's driven some to search Google through a Bulletin Board System-like interface or, in the case of programmer Peter Nitsch, it's compelled him to graft ASCII art onto the physical world. Simply plug an address into his project's website and you'll be able to pan through an ASCII facsimile of a real-world Street View vista. Leveraging WebGL and Javascript, the system samples the search giant's images and generates text art using the appropriate characters and hues. Nitsch's fondness for retro visualizations don't end there, however, he also created a system that superimposes a gaggle of characters in the wake of a physical paintbrush using a Kinect and a projector. Built as a plugin for the openFrameworks toolkit, the code relies on a GPU for the real-time image conversion and is freely available for tinkering. Hit the source link below to see the modified Street View in action or head past the break for a video of the ASCII painting. For some of the technical nitty-gritty, tap the more coverage link.
Receipt Racer makes printing fun, wastes more paper than you ever thought possible (video)
Sure, you could use your printer to spit out spreadsheets, but how about hooking up a DualShock 3 to play it like a video game? That's exactly what Joshua Noble and the undef duo did during a workshop related to OFFF last week, and the result is stunning (if not hilarious). The trio coded a game in openFrameworks, titled Receipt Racer, which uses a thermal receipt printer modded with a "light beamer" to display game info and represent a car, a DS3 to control it, and a laptop to connect the devices and run the software. A random track with obstacles gets rapidly printed while a player attempts to navigate it without crashing -- sort of like Lane Splitter -- or until the paper roll runs out after 164 feet. There's a tree-loving web browser version and the full details of how it works in the source link below. We scored just over 1,400 1,752 points; let us know how you do in the comments. [Thanks, Jesse]
Kinect meets its maker with new air guitar hack (video)
Let's face it, the daddy of all motion-controlled gaming is the humble art of air guitar. There's no question about it, creationists and evolutionists all agree, the genesis of our modern craze for motion sensitivity was your uncle rocking out to Jimmy Page's face-melting solo in Stairway to Heaven. Now that we've got the history lesson out of the way, someone's gone and programmed Kinect to recognize the fine craft of your air strumming and deliver concordant chords in response. Excellent!
Kinect now offers a stealth mode, courtesy of optical camouflage hack (video)
You've seen so many Kinect hacks by now that you probably think you know them all -- but wait, have you seen one that makes you look like Predator when he's busy predatorizing the populace? Or one that lets you reenact your favorite Metal Gear Solid scenes with Snake's camo turned on? Yup, a Japanese coder by the name of Takayuki Fukatsu has exploited the versatile openFrameworks to give Kinect a mode where it tracks your movement and position, but turns the dull details of your visage into an almost perfectly transparent outline. Of course, you're not actually transparent, it looks to be just the system skinning an image of the background onto the contours of your body in real time, but man, it sure is cool to look at. You can do so for yourself with the video after the break.
Kinect theremin is just too late for the 'Day the Earth Stood Still' remake soundtrack (video)
The sound of the original theremin frightened audiences of spooky and science fictiony movies in the '50s and '60s, and while this digital replication is perhaps a little less chilling it's also a lot less physical. It's the so-called Therenect from Martin Kaltenbrunner, created using the Open Frameworks and OpenKinect libraries. To play just hold your hands up, allow the software to detect them, and then let the digital falsetto flow, as Martin kindly demonstrates for you below.
Kinect hack creates world's greatest shadow puppet (video)
Hey Xbox 360 Kinect owners, want to spice up those family shadow puppet shows? Then check out the installation prototype created by Emily Gobeille and Theo Watson using an Xbox Kinect connected to a laptop using the libfreenect Kinect drivers and ofxKinect. The openFrameworks system tracks the elbow, wrist, thumb, and tips of the fingers to map a skeleton onto the movement and posture of an animated puppet. And get this: it was made in a day. So just imagine the Kinect homebrew we'll have around this time next year. See it in action after the break. [Thanks, Pradeep]
L'Artisan Electronique ushers in the era of the virtual pottery wheel (video)
Want to reenact Ghost but don't care for all the messy bits? Let lasers do the work for you. L'Artisan Electronique uses a laser scanner to detect your hand-sculpting gestures, transfers their gently urging instructions over to a computerized 3D model, and -- should your production exhibit sufficient creativity or je ne sais quoi -- prints it out using a 3D ceramic printer. This is part of a Design by Performance exhibition taking place over in Belgium and is seriously one of the cooler things you're going to come across today -- or any other day, for that matter. See it on video after the break.
