Microsoft's Research department is always coming up with cool new ways to interact with gadgets, and this newly released video of the "Holodesk" is definitely one of the cooler ones. It uses a Kinect ("hacked" doesn't seem really correct when it's a Microsoft project) to see your hands and face, and allows you to juggle completely virtual 3-D objects--balance a virtual ball on a book, then tip it into a bowl of water, or stack virtual 3-D blocks. It's pretty amazing.

 

 

 

 

 

The system got a major shot in the arm thanks to the Kinect. As it turns out, interacting with virtual objects is just as much about tracking your line of sight as about tracking your hands. Its accuracy is much more on-point thanks to our little $150 buddy, though you still have to look through the screen or glass plate to see the virtual objects.