#KINECT XBOX 360 SOFTWARE#

Maizels doesnвЂ™t have a job, and neither do his friends Ophir Sharon, Alex Shpunt, Dima Rais, and Tamir Berliner. It seems really silly now, but thatвЂ™s how we want technology to work. I asked him, вЂWhy would you want me to write it?вЂ™ He said that if I write it on the tape, that is the show the machine will play. вЂњThe episode had a very specific name, and he told me to write it on an empty video cassette. вЂњWhen I was 10 years old, my kid brother was 5, and he wanted to watch an episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,вЂќ he told Engadget in 2013. ItвЂ™s 2005, and Aviad Maizels has the show Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on his mind. Kinect was one of many controller ideas Microsoft considered in response to NintendoвЂ™s Wii Remote It begins in Israel, when five soldiers find themselves unemployed. Speaking to 12 people that worked on and with the peripheral, from former Microsoft employees to third-party developers, we pieced together a story that begins as a small team on a skunkworks project and balloons into a companywide effort, requiring multiple divisions, angry children, the help of waiters and waitresses, and an insistence that people keep their clothes on.

It would be a large-scale investment for Microsoft, but one that wouldnвЂ™t pan out in the long run. Over the years, depth sensing had been something on the minds of a lot of people at Microsoft, jumping from an exciting new technology, to something on the backburner, to an integral part of one of XboxвЂ™s most ambitious projects to date: Kinect, a motion-sensing peripheral for the Xbox 360, meant to eliminate the need for standard controllers.

A couple of years prior, for instance, Microsoft senior product planner Richard Velazquez had a 3D camera on his product roadmap for Xbox, before putting it in what he calls вЂњthe Boneyard,вЂќ with other discarded ideas. It isnвЂ™t the first time Microsoft has investigated camera-based technology. YouвЂ™d see basically varying levels of collaboration between Microsoft and these other companies where we had these relationships.вЂќДuring this period, one technology begins getting a good amount of attention within Microsoft: depth-sensing cameras, cameras that can recognize the size of a room and the objects within. But also stereo 3D, headsets, and all these things. You would talk to the Samsung display team, and theyвЂ™d tell you everything theyвЂ™re envisioning for higher-fidelity displays. вЂњThe people working there - kind of like our people - were very eager to push the boundary forward. вЂњBasically, all of these companies have their own prototyping divisions,вЂќ Bertolami says. HeвЂ™s seeing what these companies come up with when they shoot for the moon. вЂњAnd thatвЂ™s if things go optimistically well,вЂќ he says. Meeting with companies such as Samsung and LG, Bertolami is looking not at what the companies have in stores, not at what theyвЂ™ll put on shelves in six months, but where they think technology will be in two years. HeвЂ™s getting, as he puts it, a вЂњtangible peekвЂќ into the future. He and his team are doing incubation work for the future of Xbox, figuring out what the next several years might look like, and looking at what various technology manufacturers have in the pipeline.

#KINECT XBOX 360 SOFTWARE#

In 2005, with the Xbox 360 a strong force in the market, the Microsoft senior software engineer is considering whatвЂ™s next. Joe Bertolami is looking into the future.

Kinect xbox 360