Motion

If you’re looking for a universal remote to complement any Harry Potter marathons screening on the tube, you might want to consider the Magic Wand universal remote control from Kymera. Sure to raise the eyebrows of any nearby muggles, the remote allows budding magicians to control their magical picture box or other piece of remote controllable electronic wizardry with a flick of the wrist - 'Abracadabra' optional. Read More

Nintendo certainly created a stir when it introduced motion-sensing controls to the video game industry, but subsequent developments that are no more than a year or two from fruition are already threatening to confine this relatively new technology to the proverbial scrap-heap. The latest of these is PrimeSense, a 3D camera that allows devices like televisions to ‘see a view of the surrounding area’ by scanning a room to determine who is present through a combination of shape recognition and thermal imaging. Read More

When we first came across MotionPower, a prototype system that converts the kinetic energy from cars driving over it into electricity, we mentioned we would keep tabs on the technology to see if it could make the leap to real world implementation. Well, the company behind the MotionPower system, New Energy Technologies, has taken the next step along that road by expanding the durability field tests of the device. Read More

“You are the controller.” No, it’s not some new Zen proverb for gamers, it’s how Microsoft describes its new motion-sensing, controller-free technology code-named Project Natal. Following details leaked a few weeks ago when the US patent office released documents, Microsoft has given a demonstration of the technology that looks and behaves a little like a Sony PlayStation Eye on some serious steroids. Read More

Anyone who has seen Aliens will remember the exoskeleton forklift that Ripley wears to fight the alien queen at the end of the movie. Well, Japanese company Cyberdyne has unveiled a robotic suit that works on a similar idea of a robotic suit capable of augmenting human motion and strength. The Robot Suit Hybrid Assistive Limb (HAL for short) is a wearable robot that uses a “voluntary control system” first to interpret the wearers' planned movement and then assist them in it. Read More

The United States has about 250 million registered vehicles, which adds up to a lot of pollution and burning of fossil fuels. New Energy Technologies, Inc. prefers to look at it another way, however – they see those 250 million vehicles as a potential energy source and have developed a prototype engineered to harness some of the kinetic energy being generated, and wasted, by moving cars and light vehicles. Read More

Wheelchairs serve the important function of giving those who have difficulty walking their independence. They’re a tried and true technology whose design has remained largely unchanged for many years due to the effectiveness and simplicity of the design. For all their usefulness though wheelchairs do have a number of drawbacks - they force the users into a seated position, making interacting with a world designed for upright people frustrating as well as not being able to interact with those standing at their level. A new concept vehicle from Exmovere Holdings called the Chariot makes these problems a thing of the past by letting amputees and others who have difficulty standing move around in an upright position. Read More

No one could fail to notice it bears an uncanny resemblance to the Wii remote (Wiimote) and the folks at Performance Designed Products (PDP) claim that the Gametrak Freedom - a new control device set for release on the Xbox 360 - is the most accurate and versatile 3D motion controller on the market. Read More