I'm currently an undergrad in the Computer Science department, hopefully to graduate in April 2013.

Kinect Design Decisions

Integrating the Kinect and Wiimote with Tim's Troy editor. Currently, live retargeting is working, and motions can be recorded through the Kinect and saved without problems. The Wiimote is also linked in, and can be used to move between and select options.

Purpose: Integrate the Kinect Sensor and NITE middleware into the Qt framework to enable motion capture, live retargeting, and gesture detection.

Progress: A Kinect class has been built which lives within the Qt framework, and provides the low-level interface to the Kinect. It is extendable via KinectComponents that process the raw data given by the Kinect and NITE software in order to create higher level abstractions and APIs. The current components include:

• Image: Retrieves depth and RGB image data from the Kinect and exports it as a QImage for use in Qt widgets and interfaces. Sends signals when new image data has been received.
• Skeleton: Retrieves the skeleton tracking data generated by the NITE middleware. Sends signals to indicate current tracking state, and when new skeleton positions have been found. By way of the SkeletonRecorder class, complete skeleton tracking can be saved to a file and then replayed with the SkeletonPlayback class.
• Gesture: Allows for gestures to be watched for, and fire signals when the requested gestures have been found. Supports the built-in NITE gestures: push, steady, swipe, wave, and circle. Allows gesture detection to be paused and resumed.
• Slider: Provides a simple slider that tracks hand position along the x axis.

Other components and modules can be added, to provide other input systems or tracking models.