Sixth Sense Technology

SIXTH SENSE TECHNOLOGY:

Sixth Sense technology (a camera combined with a light source) was developed in 1997 as a headworn device, and in 1998 as a neckworn object, but the Sixth Sense name for this work was not coined and published until 2001, when Mann coined the term "Sixth Sense" to describe such devices.
The Sixth Sense technology contains a pocket projector, and a camera contained in a head-mounted, handheld or pendant-like, wearable device. Both the projector and the camera are connected to a mobile computing device in the user’s pocket. The projector projects visual information enabling surfaces, walls and physical objects around us to be used as interfaces; while the camera recognizes and tracks users' hand gestures and physical objects using computer-vision based techniques. The software program processes the video stream data captured by the camera and tracks the locations of the colored markers (visual tracking fiducials) at the tips of the user’s fingers. The movements and arrangements of these fiducials are interpreted into gestures that act as interaction instructions for the projected application interfaces. SixthSense supports multi-touch and multi-user interaction.\
SixthSense is a gesture-based wearable computer system developed at MIT Media Lab by Steve Mann in 1994 and 1997 (headworn gestural interface), and 1998 (neckworn version), and further developed by Pranav Mistry (also at MIT Media Lab), in 2009, both of whom developed both hardware and software for both headworn and neckworn versions of it. It comprises a headworn or neck-worn pendant that contains both a data projector and camera.

Advantage:

• One of the main advantages of the Sixth Sense devices is its small size and portability. It can be easily carried around without any difficulty. The prototype of the Sixth Sense is designed in such a way that it gives more importance to the portability factor. All the devices are light in weight and the Smartphone can easily fit in to the user’s pocket Support Multi touch and Multi user interaction Multi touch and Multi user interaction is another added feature of the Sixth Sense devices. Multi sensing technique allows the user to interact with system with more than one finger at a time. Sixth Sense devices also in-corporate Multi user functionality. This is typically useful for large interaction scenarios such as interactive table tops and walls.Portable:

• Cost Effective:

The cost incurred for the construction of the Sixth Sense prototype is quite low. It was made from parts collected together from common devices. And a typical Sixth Sense device costs up to $300. The Sixth Sense devices have not been made in large scale for commercial purpose. Once that happens it’s almost certain that the device will cost much lower than the current price.

• Data access directly from the machines in real time:

With the help of a Sixth Sense device the user can easily access data from any machine at real time speed. The user doesn’t require any machine human interface to access the data. The data access through recognition of hand gestures is much easier and user friendlier compared to the text user interface or graphical user interface which requires keyboard or mouse.

• Open Source Software:

The software that is used to interpret and analysis the data collected by the device is going to be made open source as said by its inventor. This will enable other developers to contribute to the development of the system.