Another collection of video reports from Siggraph 2007
Siggraph 2007 Demo Reel
Part 1 of the Softimage SIGGRAPH 2007 Video Series
Part 2 of the Softimage SIGGRAPH 2007 Video Series
Part 3 of the Softimage SIGGRAPH 2007 Video Series
A project from Microsoft Research shows how it is possible, using a simple webcam and some specially developed gesture recognition software, to control a computer using single and multiple gestures. Could be almost considered as similar to on-screen multitouch functionality, but the remoteness from the screen may prove a limiting factor.
This item is taken from the original Podtech MS Research video The Gestures of Microsoft Research, A Walking Tour which is worth watching (but is 50 minutes long).
http://www.podtech.net/home/1482/the-gestures-of-microsoft-research-a-walking-tour
Even earlier research, along similar lines, is described at the Theoretical Physics group from the University of Zaragoza in the following article A EyeToy/WebCam Mouse in Visual Basic
http://dftuz.unizar.es/~rivero/alumnos/vmouse.html
Talking about Gigapixel Images, it looks like there is a new feature in Google Earth that incorporates photos into the Earth Environment.
You can try it for yourself by switching on the “Gigapxl Photos” layer beneath the “Featured Content” layer. This will show placemarks for the available locations with gigapixel images.
There’s a sample video showing the feature in action
and an accompanying article on the Google Earth Blog here
http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2007/08/new_photo_viewer_wit.html
Here’s a sample – the Angels Window , Grand Canyon at the starting point
and zoomed in …
Came across this short video demonstration of Google Earth – Sky Mode
Here’s a link to the Google Channel on YouTube which you may find useful.
One of the more interesting applications using Silverlight to appear recently.
Tafiti, which means “do research” in Swahili, is an experimental search front-end from Microsoft, designed to help people use the Web for research projects that span multiple search queries and sessions by helping visualize, store, and share research results. Tafiti uses both Microsoft Silverlight and Live Search to explore the intersection of richer experiences on the Web and the increasing specialization of search.
If you already have Silverlight installed (or don’t mind installing it) find out more at
Apparently developed by a company called Jackson Fish
The Best Emerging Technology prize at Siggraph 2007 has recently been awarded to ICT Research.
Researchers at the USC (University of Southern California) Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT) along with their collaborators have devised a reproducible, low-cost 3D display system that requires no special glasses, and is viewable from all angles by multiple users. This system allows computer generated 3D objects to be seen in new ways, and will impact the future of interactive systems.
Details of the Rendering for an Interactive 360º Light Field Display can be found in a pre-print of a paper to be published in the ACM SIGGRAPH conference proceedings from the project page at
http://gl.ict.usc.edu/Research/3DDisplay/
There is also a video news item by CBS at
http://www.cbs2.com/video/?id=36497@kcbs.dayport.com
The display consists of a high-speed video projector, a spinning mirror covered by a holographic diffuser, and FPGA circuitry to decode specially rendered DVI video signals. The display uses a standard programmable graphics card to render over 5,000 images per second of interactive 3D graphics, projecting 360-degree views with 1.25 degree separation up to 20 updates per second.
Find out more about ICT Research at
Microsoft PowerShell is a command-line environment for Windows and is available for Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, and Windows Vista (links below)
A pre-requisite is the .NET Framework Version 2.0
There is a free eBook that introduces PowerShell scripting at
http://download.microsoft.com/…/Windows Powershell – EN.zip
(In addition to scripting, developers can create new commands for PowerShell using C# or VB. The Windows SDK contains everything you need to start developing commands.)
Full documentation for PowerShell is available from MSDN ( the Microsoft Developer Network) at
The latest version of Google Earth provides an option that allows you to flip around and see the sky from that location.
But it’s a bit more than blue sky and clouds. The Sky option enables budding astronomers to browse Space and provides the ability to search through and view over 1,000,000 stars and 200,000,000 galaxies.
Other options allow you to browse and learn more about pre-selected interesting features.
Here’s NGC 5128
You may need to update to the latest version. Google Earth is available from
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