Ever felt like wearing Barbie’s wardrobe? I can’t say I have, but then I’m truly not the target market in any way shape or form. Still, while the marketing is lost on me, Australian Barbie fans will soon get to live out their dressup fantasies via Kinect.
Barbie: The Dream Closet uses a custom made XNA application and Kinect For Windows to overlay Barbie’s costumes onto whoever’s in front of the camera. The application — part of a global branding exercise — was developed by Perth based outfit Adapptor — who we’ve featured on Developers Cubed previously — and according to Adapptor’s Richard Giles, the local Kinect App is distinct from one that’s already been seen in the US. The locally developed app uses Kinect skeletal tracking to adjust the size of the outfit to the size of the subject — which makes an awful lot of sense when you’re talking Barbie fans of highly variable ages — and maps different clothing articles to each body part.
The Dream Closet will be making a tour of Australia, with the resultant images it takes of dressed up Barbie fans being uploaded to the Barbie Facebook page. I’m guessing if I stood in front of it, they’d burn that image rather than post it up.