Touchscreens are fine but if you’re ready to take web-browsing or manipulating your computer’s user-interface to the next level in 2013, then we suggest you keep an eye on Leap Motion. The new 3D motion-tracking system is set to launch this May.
It would be impossible not to compare Leap Motion with the orchestrated UI shown in ‘Minority Report’ but the tech behind the device is infinitely more interesting than the movie. Leap Motion is scheduled to launch on May 13, 2013 when the first shipments are sent to eager customers. The device will work with either a Mac or a PC and the precise details and abilities of the peripheral are nothing short of astonishing.
Much like the Microsoft Kinect, users will have the ability to make commands using large movements, but it will also allow precise finger movements, pen manipulations and other exacting motions to control the computers UI. It can easily track more than one object as well, allowing two-hands to make a commands or adjustment. All of this is housed by a 3″ rectangle on your desk. It’s also being developed by Windows 7, Windows 8, OS X 10.7 and 10.8, allowing a broad range of consumers to use the device.
Developers are already hard at work developing apps for ‘AirSpace’ which is the central hub for all Leap Motion designed applications and software. Already on board are Corel Painter applications, a wide-array of Disney games and many more unannounced titles. All of this technology for $79.
“Breakthroughs in technology come in all sizes, but often the very biggest disruptors come in very small packages: the computer chip, the mouse, the smartphone and now the Leap. Roughly the size of your pinky finger, I believe the Leap is the future of how people will interact with their devices,” said technology visionary Bill Warner, founder of Avid Technology and a Leap Motion investor. “What’s previously been an expensive special effect in movies is now an affordable everyday reality, in full 3-D. With the Leap, you use both hands and all 10 fingers to work within your computer’s virtual environment just as easily as you do in the real world.”
source: leapmotion, bestbuy
