Home Wearables This iOS app and motion tracker can autoedit your… THIS IOS APP AND MOTION TRACKER CAN AUTO-EDIT YOUR SPORTS VIDEO AND OVERLAY METRICS By Aliya Barnwell — August 24, 2015 > >
Home Wearables This iOS app and motion tracker can autoedit your…
THIS IOS APP AND MOTIONTRACKER CAN AUTO-EDIT YOURSPORTS VIDEO AND OVERLAYMETRICSBy Aliya Barnwell — August 24, 2015
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After a long day out shooting sports footage (see, “not sitting at a
desk”), few people actually look forward to the process of cutting
out the boring parts. Even less want to refer to an external sensor
program for stats so you can say “See, man? I told you that jump
was five feet at least.” Luckily, Blast Motion can take care of that
drudgery for you. It’s essentially a fitness tracker and sports video
auto-editor that work together to cut your workload in half.
Blast Motion is a wearable precision motion sensor that provides
3D-movement metrics for a variety of sports. The device is about
the size of a peanut butter cup, and is designed to work with
iPhone and iPad, as well as the occasional GoPro. Each sport has a
dedicated app designed to automatically edit footage for the best
scenes, and the sensor provides the metrics for overlays onto the
video.
Related: Trace sport tracker can document your surfing and
snowboarding escapades from every angle
The Blast Replay apps and use a patented Smart Video Capture
algorithm to automatically identify actions in HD footage and clip it
into a highlights reel. The Blast apps know when they’re
processing high-frame-rate video capture, each app will
automatically apply slow motion to scenes that warrant it, and
speed up scenes that don’t for dramatic effect. Add to that the
metrics overlay, and Blast Motion steps up as a great option for
creating training reels and sharing video proof for social media
bragging rights.
The Blast Motion Action kit comes with an action cam attachment,
the sensor and a wearable clip for it, as well as a wireless charging
pad. The Blast Action app is for skateboarding, BMX, and
motocross. (though I imagine it would work fairly well with
rollerblading, and maybe even cyclo-cross) and records jump
acceleration, vertical height, rotation, and hang time. It runs on iOS
7x or 8x with the iPhone 5, 5c, 6 and 6 Plus, iPad 3 and 4, iPad Mini
2 and 3, Air and Air 2, which is standard for all the apps. Unlike the
other apps, it also works with two GoPros, the Hero 3 and 3+.
The Blast Basketball Replay and Atheltic Performance kits come
with the same wearable clip. The basketball kit covers layups, jump
shots, and dunks, while the Athletic Performance kit handles
volleyball, gymnastics, and athleticism. The basketball and
athleticism apps offer the same stats as the action app
(acceleration, height, rotation, and hang time).
For baseball, Blast Motion partnered with Easton to produce the
Easton Power Sensor. Baseball, softball, and T-ball are all covered.
The kit comes with a bat attachment for the knob, and a precision
swing sensor. Swing speed, direction, power, time-to-contact, and
more are picked up by the motion sensor.
The Blast Golf kit comes with a standard grip and an oversized
putter attachment instead of a wearable clip. Putting and swing
data is pretty impressive. It includes back- and forward-stroke time,
total stroke time, tempo, loft, lie, and rotation, speed, downswing
and upswing time, tempo, power index (the mass of the club, swing
speed, downswing time calculated for kinetic energy transfer),
efficiency index (energy transfer, velocity direction), and blast
factor (score defined by efficiency index and power index). The
Blast Motion website has a page to define their metrics, listing pro
and amateur averages, and suggestions to improve.
Related: If only your GoPro could edit its own footage like this
smart camera
The sensor is the key to Blast’s success; for each sport you can
review your stats in the associated app in real time. Blast Motion
did a good job of combining sensor tech with video auto-editing
and making it applicable to a wide variety of sports. The senors,
while they look alike, are specifically calibrated to deliver accurate
metrics for those specific sports. You can try using the Easton pack
for tennis, for example, but if you want a tracker for tennis you’re
better off going with something like the Zepp or Sony sensors.
Unfortunately, neither associated app will edit footage of your
court domination for you, like Blast Motion.
There are other automatic sports video trimmers out there, but
Blast Motion stands out for the variety of sports it covers. There are
other sensors available with great potential, but they’re still playing
catch up. All five Blast Motion kits go for $150 on its website. Yes,
it’s Apple-only for now, but expect Android apps this fall.
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Home Gaming Android cofounder thinks augmented reality is the…
ANDROID CO-FOUNDER THINKSAUGMENTED REALITY IS THEFUTURE OF GAMING, INVESTS $15MIN CASTARBy Robert Nazarian — August 24, 2015
> >
We haven’t heard from Andy Rubin in a while. After leading the
Android team at Google for close to 10 years, he handed the reins
over to Sundar Pichai in 2013 to “start a new chapter” within the
company. As it happens, that chapter was never finished, as he left
Google about a year later to start his own hardware incubator
called Playground Global to invest in startups.
One such startup is a company called castAR, which specializes in
augmented reality glasses for gaming. Playground Global will fund
the company to the tune of $15 million in order to “drive forward
business and continue product development efforts” leading up to
a planned 2016 commercial launch.
Related: Epic Games’ Tim Sweeney thinks augmented reality will
trump virtual reality
Augmented Reality (AR) glasses shouldn’t be confused with Virtual
Reality (VR) glasses or headsets. AR transposes 3D-like objects on
top the real world, whereas VR is limited entirely to the virtual
world. In other words, AR is basically a virtual layer on top of the
real world, which makes the perfect environment for gaming.
The castAR sports two micro projectors that cast stereoscopic
images onto a retro reflective surface, and a tracking camera that
measures the position and orientation of the head. Users will
control input with a motion-tracking wand similar to a Wiimote. The
company will also offer a RFID tracking grid, which fits underneath
the retro reflective surface to track and identify objects.
castAR has already demoed a number of implementations,
including a first person shooter and a board game. Playing a game
of chess could be as easy as putting on a pair of castAR glasses
and looking at a table. The board will magically appear and you
could then play against someone else in another part of the world.
Here’s a quick video showing you some of the possibilities:
The company was founded by Valve Software employees Jeri
Ellsworth and Rick Johnsonborn. After Valve decided to drop the
project, the duo formed Technical Illusions in March 2013. The
company launched a KickStarer campaign in November 2013 for
the castAR glasses and reached its $400,000 goal within 48 hours,
eventually raising over $1 million. The company is now based in
Silicon Valley, and is now known as castAR.
Related: Chop down mountains with the edge of your hand in this
augmented-reality sandbox
Some Kickstarter backers have already received prototypes, with
more on the way. The company will be announcing a developer kit
in the near future, and a commercial launch is expected in 2016.
If you’re not a Kickstarter backer, you can still pre-order the castAR
from the company’s website. The castAR itself goes for $400, while
the wand controller is $65 and the RFID tracking grid is $85.
castAR - Share your 3D world as it springs to life
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Home Health & Fitness Ralph Lauren’s new smart Polo shirts combine…
RALPH LAUREN’S NEW SMARTPOLO SHIRTS COMBINE FASHIONAND TECHNOLOGYBy Lulu Chang — August 22, 2015
> >
Image courtesy of RalphLauren.com
High-tech, meet high fashion. With Ralph Lauren’s introduction of
its new “smart” PoloTech shirt, high-tech fashion is now
synonymous with high-fashion technology. For a cool $295, you
can be the proud owner of one of these luxury items, made all the
more impressive by their next generation material (or, if you’re a
purist, their name brand design). With the silver fibers that have
become a mainstay in smart clothing, including in radiation
protecting underwear, Ralph Lauren’s PoloTech shirt tells you how
to work out, and records information about your exercise routine
so that you look as good out of the shirt as you do in it.
The PoloTech, first debuted at the 2014 U.S. Open, was initially
worn by ball boys and American tennis player Marcos Giron to test
the technology’s effectiveness. It marked the first time a major
fashion label had delved into the realm of smart clothing —
previously, only accessories had been breached by designers of a
similar caliber, like the Tory Burch-designed FitBit. David Lauren,
the Ralph Lauren’s executive vice president of global advertising,
marketing and corporate communications noted that their latest
release appears as “the first major luxury fashion brand to come to
market” with such a technologically advanced piece of clothing.
Related: Protect your fertility with Wireless Armour, the new smart
underwear for men
Thanks to the silver fibers and a tiny “black box” sensor that
attaches into the shirt close to the wearer’s rib cage, the “second-
skin” PoloTech expertly tracks health metrics like steps taken,
heart rate, breathing rate and depth, and energy expenditures. This
data is then transferred to a Ralph Lauren iOS app — sorry Android
users, no fun for you. Still, the PoloTech shirt believes that it and its
app set themselves apart by not only aggregating information, but
then going a step further and providing the user with advice on
how to improve workouts.
While the PoloTech will only be available for men when it launches
on August 27, the company is also looking toward a women’s
version, and expanding its line of smart wear to include other types
of clothing — maybe even a smart suit. Of course, given the price
point of the shirt alone, you’ll have to be prepared to shell out
some major change for this personalized workout device, but just
think of it this way — at $295, it’s still $55 cheaper than the Apple
Watch.
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