Last night, I encountered something so perplexing, so out of this world, that it left me with a puddle of questions and a scroll of possibilities. Just the utterance of such an idea gave me the chills. G-Speak is its name and blowing minds is its game.
I was to meet my cousin, Robbie, at downtown LA. His high school friend, Kate, was going to give us a demonstration of a new project her company (Oblong) was working on. Now Kate.. what an interesting bubble of persona. An alumni of MIT (yes, MIT) in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, currently working on her Masters in Media Arts and Sciences, she is.
Sorry, I couldn't resist. But she is pretty genius like yoda.
As I ventured through the roads with the assistance of my brand new GPS system (insert shimmery commercial jingle here), I found myself at a destination not too pleasing. Buildings that only showed signs of depreciation and artwork (to some) caught my attention. There were only two humans in sight. They didn't look too friendly. I arrived too early. I was scared.
So I sat and waited for a familiar face. I kept thinking to myself, this meeting feels a set up from those old school mobster films. I mean comon, skid row was only a few streets down. You get the idea.
Once my cousin arrived with his bubbly friend, Tate (from the USC School of Cinematic Arts), basically my hero, we scampered through the block to find our destination. And, ofcourse, their workplace was located through a side entrance of a disgusting building where you must pass a hidden sushi restaurant called "R23" before you reach the yellow paneled walls to find glass doors. This little workplace must be top secret and important to be placed in such an obscure location.
Top secret? Not so much. Very cool and futuristiky? Yes, very much so.
This little room located in a shady building contained individuals whose job it is to blow your mind. Well actually I wouldn't call it a room but, rather, a large, easily manipulated area. There were about eight geniuses, I might say, who worked in this relatively small company. Who, a majority of them, went to MIT. The school for the witty and big brained. (Sometimes I picture people that look like Jimmy Neutron walking down their halls. Cool head dude.)
One wall was made up of a huge chalkboard that required the assistance of a ladder to reach the higher layers. This green wall was blotched with formulaic compounds and algorithms beyond my comprehension. All I could comprehend was that one little section near the middle comprised of electron components in a three-dimensional space. I looked like a little boy in a candy store as I looked up at this magnificent wall of nonsense. I love that stuff. Nerdy much? I don't give a shit. I like it.
That's enough. Now to the main attraction. G-Speak.
Picture the movie
Minority Report with Tom Cruise. Remember those massive, gesturally driven displays the characters use for forensic examination? The ones where a person stands and uses his hands to operate. Yeah, those. Well, let me just say, it was a jaw-dropping, glasses-fogging, inhaler breathing moment for me.
With the use of gloves and these miniature white plastic balls that were attached, you were able to operate this system. They showed us a demonstration which ranged from video editing to locating airports and visually seeing the flight patterns of the plane through G-Speak. Above us hang about 25 sensors that emitted red light towards the focus, along with about 6 projection monitors. I don't want to get into too much detail because I'll post up a video demonstrating it all. And plus explaining it all drains out the interesting factor ya know.
Let's just say it was amazing. I can imagine them integrating an FPS game which would mean full-out ingame immersion. Radical.
G-speak by Oblong Industries.
Yeah, that's right. The future is here. Whattya ganna do 'bout it?
-------------------------------
G-Speak Overview - http://www.vimeo.com/2229299
Video editing using G-Speak - http://www.vimeo.com/2821182
