Home   Wearables   This iOS app and motion tracker can autoedit your…

THIS IOS APP AND MOTIONTRACKER CAN AUTO-EDIT YOURSPORTS VIDEO AND OVERLAYMETRICSBy Aliya Barnwell — August 24, 2015

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After a long day out shooting sports footage (see, “not sitting at a

desk”), few people actually look forward to the process of cutting

out the boring parts. Even less want to refer to an external sensor

program for stats so you can say “See, man? I told you that jump

was five feet at least.” Luckily, Blast Motion can take care of that

drudgery for you. It’s essentially a fitness tracker and sports video

auto-editor that work together to cut your workload in half.

Blast Motion is a wearable precision motion sensor that provides

3D-movement metrics for a variety of sports. The device is about

the size of a peanut butter cup, and is designed to work with

iPhone and iPad, as well as the occasional GoPro. Each sport has a

dedicated app designed to automatically edit footage for the best

scenes, and the sensor provides the metrics for overlays onto the

video.

Related: Trace sport tracker can document your surfing and

snowboarding escapades from every angle

The Blast Replay apps and use a patented Smart Video Capture

algorithm to automatically identify actions in HD footage and clip it

into a highlights reel. The Blast apps know when they’re

processing high-frame-rate video capture, each app will

automatically apply slow motion to scenes that warrant it, and

speed up scenes that don’t for dramatic effect. Add to that the

metrics overlay, and Blast Motion steps up as a great option for

creating training reels and sharing video proof for social media

bragging rights.

The Blast Motion Action kit comes with an action cam attachment,

the sensor and a wearable clip for it, as well as a wireless charging

pad. The Blast Action app is for skateboarding, BMX, and

motocross. (though I imagine it would work fairly well with

rollerblading, and maybe even cyclo-cross) and records jump

acceleration, vertical height, rotation, and hang time. It runs on iOS

7x or 8x with the iPhone 5, 5c, 6 and 6 Plus, iPad 3 and 4, iPad Mini

2 and 3, Air and Air 2, which is standard for all the apps. Unlike the

other apps, it also works with two GoPros, the Hero 3 and 3+.

The Blast Basketball Replay and Atheltic Performance kits come

with the same wearable clip. The basketball kit covers layups, jump

shots, and dunks, while the Athletic Performance kit handles

volleyball,  gymnastics, and athleticism. The basketball and

athleticism apps offer the same stats as the action app

(acceleration, height, rotation, and hang time).

For baseball, Blast Motion partnered with Easton to produce the

Easton Power Sensor. Baseball, softball, and T-ball are all covered.

The kit comes with a bat attachment for the knob, and a precision

swing sensor. Swing speed, direction, power, time-to-contact, and

more are picked up by the motion sensor.

The Blast Golf kit comes with a standard grip and an oversized

putter attachment instead of a wearable clip. Putting and swing

data is pretty impressive. It includes back- and forward-stroke time,

total stroke time, tempo, loft, lie, and rotation, speed, downswing

and upswing time, tempo, power index (the mass of the club, swing

speed, downswing time calculated for kinetic energy transfer),

efficiency index (energy transfer, velocity direction), and blast

factor (score defined by efficiency index and power index).  The

Blast Motion website has a page to define their metrics, listing pro

and amateur averages, and suggestions to improve.

Related: If only your GoPro could edit its own footage like this

smart camera

The sensor is the key to Blast’s success; for each sport you can

review your stats in the associated app in real time. Blast Motion

did a good job of combining sensor tech with video auto-editing

and making it applicable to a wide variety of sports. The senors,

while they look alike, are specifically calibrated to deliver accurate

metrics for those specific sports. You can try using the Easton pack

for tennis, for example, but if you want a tracker for tennis you’re

better off going with something like the Zepp or Sony sensors.

Unfortunately, neither associated app will edit footage of your

court domination for you, like Blast Motion.

There are other automatic sports video trimmers out there, but

Blast Motion stands out for the variety of sports it covers. There are

other sensors available with great potential, but they’re still playing

catch up.  All five Blast Motion kits go for $150 on its website. Yes,

it’s Apple-only for now, but expect Android apps this fall.

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Home   Gaming   Android cofounder thinks augmented reality is the…

ANDROID CO-FOUNDER THINKSAUGMENTED REALITY IS THEFUTURE OF GAMING, INVESTS $15MIN CASTARBy Robert Nazarian — August 24, 2015

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We haven’t heard from Andy Rubin in a while. After leading the

Android team at Google for close to 10 years, he handed the reins

over to Sundar Pichai in 2013 to “start a new chapter” within the

company. As it happens, that chapter was never finished, as he left

Google about a year later to start his own hardware incubator

called Playground Global to invest in startups.

One such startup is a company called castAR, which specializes in

augmented reality glasses for gaming. Playground Global will fund

the company to the tune of $15 million in order to “drive forward

business and continue product development efforts” leading up to

a planned 2016 commercial launch.

Related: Epic Games’ Tim Sweeney thinks augmented reality will

trump virtual reality

Augmented Reality (AR) glasses shouldn’t be confused with Virtual

Reality (VR) glasses or headsets. AR transposes 3D-like objects on

top the real world, whereas VR is limited entirely to the virtual

world. In other words, AR is basically a virtual layer on top of the

real world, which makes the perfect environment for gaming.

The castAR sports two micro projectors that cast stereoscopic

images onto a retro reflective surface, and a tracking camera that

measures the position and orientation of the head. Users will

control input with a motion-tracking wand similar to a Wiimote. The

company will also offer a RFID tracking grid, which fits underneath

the retro reflective surface to track and identify objects.

castAR has already demoed a number of implementations,

including a first person shooter and a board game. Playing a game

of chess could be as easy as putting on a pair of castAR glasses

and looking at a table. The board will magically appear and you

could then play against someone else in another part of the world.

Here’s a quick video showing you some of the possibilities:

The company was founded by Valve Software employees Jeri

Ellsworth and Rick Johnsonborn. After Valve decided to drop the

project, the duo formed Technical Illusions in March 2013. The

company launched a KickStarer campaign in November 2013 for

the castAR glasses and reached its $400,000 goal within 48 hours,

eventually raising over $1 million. The company is now based in

Silicon Valley, and is now known as castAR.

Related: Chop down mountains with the edge of your hand in this

augmented-reality sandbox

Some Kickstarter backers have already received prototypes, with

more on the way. The company will be announcing a developer kit

in the near future, and a commercial launch is expected in 2016.

If you’re not a Kickstarter backer, you can still pre-order the castAR

from the company’s website. The castAR itself goes for $400, while

the wand controller is $65 and the RFID tracking grid is $85.

castAR - Share your 3D world as it springs to life

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Home   Health & Fitness   Ralph Lauren’s new smart Polo shirts combine…

RALPH LAUREN’S NEW SMARTPOLO SHIRTS COMBINE FASHIONAND TECHNOLOGYBy Lulu Chang — August 22, 2015

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Image courtesy of RalphLauren.com

High-tech, meet high fashion. With Ralph Lauren’s introduction of

its new “smart” PoloTech shirt, high-tech fashion is now

synonymous with high-fashion technology. For a cool $295, you

can be the proud owner of one of these luxury items, made all the

more impressive by their next generation material (or, if you’re a

purist, their name brand design). With the silver fibers that have

become a mainstay in smart clothing, including in radiation

protecting underwear, Ralph Lauren’s PoloTech shirt tells you how

to work out, and records information about your exercise routine

so that you look as good out of the shirt as you do in it.

The PoloTech, first debuted at the 2014 U.S. Open, was initially

worn by ball boys and American tennis player Marcos Giron to test

the technology’s effectiveness. It marked the first time a major

fashion label had delved into the realm of smart clothing —

previously, only accessories had been breached by designers of a

similar caliber, like the Tory Burch-designed FitBit. David Lauren,

the Ralph Lauren’s executive vice president of global advertising,

marketing and corporate communications noted that their latest

release appears as “the first major luxury fashion brand to come to

market” with such a technologically advanced piece of clothing.

Related: Protect your fertility with Wireless Armour, the new smart

underwear for men

Thanks to the silver fibers and a tiny “black box” sensor that

attaches into the shirt close to the wearer’s rib cage, the “second-

skin” PoloTech expertly tracks health metrics like steps taken,

heart rate, breathing rate and depth, and energy expenditures. This

data is then transferred to a Ralph Lauren iOS app — sorry Android

users, no fun for you. Still, the PoloTech shirt believes that it and its

app set themselves apart by not only aggregating information, but

then going a step further and providing the user with advice on

how to improve workouts.

While the PoloTech will only be available for men when it launches

on August 27, the company is also looking toward a women’s

version, and expanding its line of smart wear to include other types

of clothing — maybe even a smart suit. Of course, given the price

point of the shirt alone, you’ll have to be prepared to shell out

some major change for this personalized workout device, but just

think of it this way — at $295, it’s still $55 cheaper than the Apple

Watch.

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