Den Ivanov blog.

Microsoft release beta of Kinect SDK.

The Kinect for Windows SDK beta is a programming toolkit for application developers. It enables the academic and enthusiast communities easy access to the capabilities offered by the Microsoft Kinect device connected to computers running the Windows 7 operating system.

The Kinect for Windows SDK beta includes drivers, rich APIs for raw sensor streams and human motion tracking, installation documents, and resource materials. It provides Kinect capabilities to developers who build applications with C++, C#, or Visual Basic by using Microsoft Visual Studio 2010.

This SDK includes the following features:

• Raw sensor streams
• Access to raw data streams from the depth sensor, color camera sensor, and four-element microphone array enables developers to build upon the low-level streams that are generated by the Kinect sensor.
• Skeletal tracking
• The capability to track the skeleton image of one or two people moving within the Kinect field of view make it easy to create gesture-driven applications.
• Advanced audio capabilities
• Audio processing capabilities include sophisticated acoustic noise suppression and echo cancellation, beam formation to identify the current sound source, and integration with the Windows speech recognition API.
• Sample code and documentation
• The SDK includes more than 100 pages of technical documentation. In addition to built-in help files, the documentation includes detailed walkthroughs for most samples provided with the SDK.
• Easy installation

The SDK installs quickly, requires no complex configuration, and the complete installer size is less than 100 MB. Developers can get up and running in just a few minutes with a standard standalone Kinect sensor unit (widely available at retail outlets).

This SDK is designed for non-commercial purposes only; a commercial version is expected to be available at a later date.

Testing my new GoPro 3D camera outdoors. First test looking very good.

Prototype of Kinect Fitting Room. Created in Processing. 16 Hi Poly dress models. Cloth physics coming soon.

Microsoft Kinect SDK will be available for developers on May 19.

With this SDK, you’ll be able to take advantage of:

• The latest advances in audio processing, which include a four-element microphone array with sophisticated acoustic noise and echo cancellation for crystal clear audio.
• Sound source localization for beamforming, which enables the determination of a sound’s spatial location, enhancing reliability when integrated with the Microsoft speech recognition API.
• Depth data, which provides the distance of an object from the Kinect camera, as well as the raw audio and image data, which together open up opportunities for creating richer natural user interface experiences.
• Highly performant and robust skeletal tracking capabilities for determining the body positions of one or two persons moving within the Kinect field of view.
• Documentation for the APIs and a description of the SDK architecture.
• Sample code that demonstrates how to use the functionality in the SDK.

This SDK is intended for non-commercial use to enable experimentation in the world of natural user interface experiences, with new state-of-the-art features planned for future releases that will continue to provide new ways to experiment.

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UPDATE: And looks like Microsoft Kinect SDK will be open source!!!

UPDATE2: False alarm. NO open-source.

Very nice OpenNI/NITE updates available for downloading from OpenNI site.

Some key features include:

* Added the ability to load & save NITE skeleton calibration from files.
* Improved .NET Wrappers (with feedback from the community).
* Improved NITE algorithms.
* Auto-detection of sensor capabilities (such as resolution /compression / etc...) - No more hardcoded values (like X/Y res) in the XML files!
* Preliminary DirectShow interface for image & audio.
* Native 64-bit windows support.
* Proper multi-sensor support (with NiViewer integration as a sample)
* Support for ASUS WAVI/Xtion devices.
* Added a brand new Unity wrapper which is now an integral part of NITE.
* Switched Windows installer from NSIS to MSI/WIX (for proper upgrade / add & remove / UAC support etc...).
* Split installers to redist (runtime DLLs only - no includes/samples/etc...) and development versions.
* Many many many bug fixes & performance improvements!