Gesture control is a tough nut to crack. Microsoft’s Kinect has proven that. But there are bright spots — like Leap Motion — that promise a futuristic world of hands-off finesse. Add Thalmic Lab’s muscle-sensing Bluetooth arm band “MYO” to that list.
Instead of watching your hands and arms directly — like current solutions do — the MYO sits on your bicep, where it feels for the slightest adjustments of your muscles. Combined with some standard motion-sensing, the arm band can apparently get a feel for what you’re doing with your hands and arms, all without getting in the way.
Reliant on Bluetooth to communicated with controlled devices, the MYO armband will initially support Macs and Windows machines, with upcoming support for Android and iOS. Units aimed at developers are available for pre-order now at $US150, and will ship at some as-yet unspecified point in the future.
The MYO demo reel definitely looks promising, but we’ll withhold any judgment until we get a chance to play with it ourselves. The band’s ability to reliably control anything is really going to hinge on its ability to tune into subtle gestures but filter out garbage data; our arms are always moving. At the moment, details are scarce. But if it’s half as good as it looks though, we’ll be in for a treat. [MYO via TechCrunch]