- Mike (iSightSee):
- Blog
- My Idea
- About Me
- Judge's Comments
Round 1
Sigh… I’m always a fan of programs that make you look like a fool at your desk; unfortunately, precious few are willing to do so the way I am. iSightSee could lead to some interesting new ways of controlling your computer. However, the limited resolution of iSights and the need for color coded controls would make it difficult to create anything useful. I wish I could encourage this app, but it will be hard to convince anyone to use anything like this for more than just showing off.
A fun idea, and I believe it to be practical, but I’m not sure that it’s something people would use. Honestly, it’s tiring to hold something up in front of the computer. Try to just hold your hand in front of your monitor for two minutes. It gets old really fast.
I’m not sure how (or even whether) I would use this in practice, but the more input mechanisms the better.
It sounds like fun for a few minutes — but it would become tiring after a while. It would mean having to reach for my red pen (or whatever) — which is one more input device, which means my interaction with my computer is more complex rather than less complex.
Typing and using the mouse requires little muscular effort compared to waving a pen in front of my iSight — and I think that effort would become a nuisance and I wouldn’t do it anymore.
And any artist who doesn’t buy a graphics tablet for drawing is probably an artist who doesn’t do much drawing.
I don’t think I’d actually use this myself, but it would be fun to watch other people use it. In the same way that watching people play Dance Dance Revolution is fun. But I could see it really taking off IF it works reliably.
And that might be a problem. Feature abstraction from moving images is a tough problem. I think it can be done, but I don’t know how accurate it’d be. For example, if there are people walking around behind the person who’s trying to control the computer with her hand, well, it might break horribly. Likewise, if the user is sitting in front of a wild Mondrian painting, same deal.