Star Wars: Blogs | Continuity, Criticisms, and Captain Panaka

Continuity, Criticisms, and Captain Panaka

by: Dan Wallace

date posted: Apr 29, 2009 8:15 PM

Augmented Reality: Living Sasquatch

I helped work on this project, so if you get a chance please check out www.livingsasquatch.com.

This works via what's being called "augmented reality," and it's best explained by just going to the site and experimenting. What's going on here is that your webcam registers a specific image (in this case it's Sasquatch's footprint on a piece of paper that you print out beforehand) and then projects a hologramatic Sasquatch on top of that image.

Your Sasquatch will move whenever you move the footprint, even a full 360 degrees. Your Sasquatch will change size depending on whether you have a big footprint or a tiny footprint. You can record your Sasquatch so that he talks, jumps, dances, punches, or gets hit in the groin. The effect is pretty remarkable and will make you say "whoa" when you try it for the first time.

Here's a couple videos I put together:

Help Me Obi-Wan Kenobi
Breakfast of Champions

Dan
(writing projects and current releases)

http://blogs.starwars.com/danwallace/131

Click here to hide comments for this entry

	Sarlacc-Pitt Slowly Digested Over A Thousand Blogs
date Posted: Apr 30, 2009 12:21 AM I tried it! Very, very cool!

	Master Ki-Aaron-Mundi I was a Teenage Jedi
date Posted: Apr 30, 2009 12:51 PM Cool! I'm going to have to try my hand at a video of my own!

	bbarton72 I Am Your Father
date Posted: Jul 02, 2009 9:24 AM Thanks for pointing out the Sasquatch project! My company also dabbles in Augmented Reality projects, primarily for trade show applications, and has had lots of fun in figuring out new ways to make the process accessible. Sasquatch was a great one and one of the first times I've seen anyone add an "edit your own sequence of movements" type feature. Nice!

	Dan Wallace Continuity, Criticisms, and Captain Panaka
date Posted: Jul 02, 2009 9:52 AM Thanks bbarton72 -- I'd love to check out your AR projects too!

bbarton72
I Am Your Father

date Posted: Jul 21, 2009 12:16 PM

Sorry for the slow response Dan. None of our AR work has made it's way to mainstream public consumption yet. The company I work for mostly creates interactive installations for trade shows (touch screen programming, Microsoft Surface applications, etc.) and museums. While we've created some thrilling (he says sarcastically) animated AR models of pharmaceutical mechanisms of action and other assorted corporate imagery, we haven't done anything like your Sasquatch project that engages the general public.

Please log in to post comments