Skip to main content

Microsoft's IllumiRoom takes gaming visuals outside the box and onto the living room

At CES in January, Microsoft Research teased its IllumiRoom concept, which involves projecting an image around a TV screen to enhance video games with additional visuals. Unfortunately, the company didn't offer much info beyond a short video that briefly showed it in action. But the team behind the project recently showed up at the CHI 2013 conference in Paris with some more in-depth details about how Illumiroom will not only expand the game screen, but completely alter the appearance of your living roomThe team's initial prototype consists of a widescreen InFocus IN126ST projector and a Kinect for Windows sensor mounted above and behind the user, though they hope to create a future version that sits on a coffee table between the player and the television. The device is able to calibrate itself to any room, with the Kinect detecting the colors and layout in front of it, while the projector uses that data to properly align the image displayed around the TV.
We've seen how this can extend the game environment beyond the boundaries of a TV screen, but that's just the simplest use for it. The system can also set the visuals to appear differently from those on the TV, so only certain elements (edges of buildings, bullets, explosions, power-ups, etc.) are shown for a more a distinctive style. It's even able to project only onto the wall behind the television, leaving out any surrounding furniture or objects and giving the appearance that the game extends beyond the wall.
IllumiRoom can also alter the appearance of the room and objects contained within to match the aesthetics of the game by mapping visuals to their geometry. By overlaying objects in the room with corresponding bright colors and dark outlines, for example, it can give everything a cartoonish look, or it could cancel the colors out almost entirely to give the room a black-and-white appearance.
By overlaying objects in the room with corresponding bright colors and dark outlines for e...

The system can even project the exact same features of the room and then distort them to match the gameplay – making the room ripple or shake with each gunshot, for instance. It also allows virtual objects to interact with the room so that balls can bounce out of the screen onto the floor or falling snow gathers on the ground. Developers can essentially mix and match various effects to create more immersive games.
This expanded view allows for increased visuals with movies as well, either turning your whole wall into a projector screen or adding effects outside of the TV. The catch is it only works with footage shot using a custom dual camera rig that captures narrow and wide fields of view simultaneously.
The system is even able to project only onto the wall behind the television, leaving out a...

It's important to note that this is all just a proof-of-concept model (i.e. not necessarily a future consumer product), and carries a number of limitations with it, like the fact that the projection effect appears muted when the lights are on. So while these new details arrive tantalizingly close to Microsoft's reveal of the next Xbox on May 21, it will probably be some time before the technology is available in a consumer device.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Nerf Vulcan Sentry Gun tracks targets and avoids friendly fire

Anyone who plays video games will know that few things protect an area like a well-placed sentry gun. In the real world, though, even a person's bedroom or office could use a little protection sometimes, which is why one designer has built the Nerf Vulcan Sentry Gun. Using a custom program and some servos, the sentry can automatically locate targets and unleash a stream of foam darts at over seven times the usual speed, while keeping its owner out of the crosshairs. Britt Liv Ulrike Michelsen, a chemical and biological engineering student from Germany, designed and constructed the sentry using mostly basic electronics and some plywood. This isn't the first time she's modified a Nerf gun, but building this robotic turret is arguably her most ambitious project to date. Luckily, the Nerf Vulcan already operates using an electric motor, so controlling the actual firing mechanism through a computer was just a matter of connecting it directly to an Arduino Uno and a laptop. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Students crash rockets to develop new asteroid sample collection technique

In what at first glance seems like a terrible sense of direction, in March students from the University of Washington fired rockets from kites and balloons at an altitude of 3,000 ft (914 m) straight into the ground at Black Rock, Nevada: a dry lake bed in the desert 100 mi (160 km) north of Reno. This may seem like the ultimate in larking about, but it's actually a serious effort to develop new ways of collecting samples from asteroids. The test was part of the “Sample Return Systems for Extreme Environments” project. The idea is to find cheaper, more efficient ways of collecting samples from asteroids and hazardous areas on Earth, such as volcanoes and nuclear disaster zones, by using penetrators instead of soft landers or ground crews to hammer out sample cores. According to the team, this would result in lower cost than soft landing techniques by reducing the velocity and vehicle mass needed to gather the sample, minimizing damage on impact, as well as being mechanically s...
Post a Comment
Read more

Stephen Hawking chooses a new voice

Celebrated Astrophysicist Stephen Hawking has selected and is using NeoSpeech's Text-to-Speech engine, VoiceText, as his new voice. VoiceText is integrated into Dr. Hawking's communicator, E Z Keys, enabling him to clearly communicate with the outside world. 'As a scientist and lecturer, it is imperative that Professor Hawking presents his findings in a clear and concise manner,' said Tom Pelly, Dr. Hawking's technical assistant. 'Professor Hawking was very impressed by  NeoSpeech 's speech synthesiser, as it was by far the most natural-sounding and realistic of all of the off-the-shelf software voices that he has heard. This technology can help ensure that his vocals match his research in terms of credibility and believability.' Dr. Hawking, a renowned scientist, professor and author, suffers from Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), a degenerative motor neuron illness. While the disease has not affected Dr. Hawking's intellectual capacity, ...
Post a Comment
Read more