YouTube. Multimedia - Xtion PRO. Who IS this guy? Before we look at the newer video, here’s the one that caused all the fuss. You’ll probably need to watch it a few times to take it all in. I did. No, he’s got some other ideas. His latest involves combining the Kinect, the Wii and nanotechnology. The result is at least as stunning as the first video.
And it looks like he’s hardly begun exploring the possibilities. He says he’s just done an interview with the New York Times, hence the formal shirt. If, like me you were fascinated by that 3d nanotech structure that he was creating (using the Nanotech Construction Kit, a piece of software he wrote himself) here’s a video of him finishing the job. Top 10 Robotic Kinect Hacks. Hooking up a Kinect to your Computer (Using Ubuntu) I've been watching the Kinect hacks online for the past several months and really enjoyed them. I started thinking recently that I would kind of like to work with it myself, see what kinds of things I might be able to make and do, and decided to get a Kinect to play with. The first thing I found was that there are a lot of different development platforms that all connect the Kinect to the computer in different ways. I also found out that all of these platforms were in different stages of development, and I don't think any of them are finished. In the end, I found a lot of information about Kinect 1.2 running under Ubuntu, and felt that this platform gave me the most initial options for immediate enjoyment.
OpenKinect. Top 10 Robotic Kinect Hacks. Kinect Hacked to Control Humanoid Robot: First Steps to Avatar. Another day, another Kinect hack, but this one really gives us a taste of a sci-fi-esque future: Kinect can now directly control the limbs of a humanoid robot. Yup--those Evangelion or Avatar dreams now seem a little more possible. Taylor Veltrop is a software engineer and robot tinkerer, and his latest impressive feat is to link up a Microsoft Kinect via some custom software and a wireless link to his Kondo KHR-1HV kit robot. Essentially Taylor's code takes the data feed from Kinect's motion and body sensing systems, and works out what position his limbs are in before beaming that data to custom software he's installed in the robot's ROS operating system.
Check out the results below: (Taylor explains his project at the start, and the good stuff happens after 1:20) Impressive stuff--even while it's only mapped onto the robot's arms for the moment. But make no mistake, this is big stuff: It was crafted quickly by an enthusiast, using relatively inexpensive gear.