The Super Mirror is an application of motion-capture technology that uses a Kinect camera to record ballet positions (also called “poses”), capture live motion, and show the difference between the two.
The research project was developed in the University of Austin, 2011, and is a set of free, open source, modular software tools for motion tracking and dance performers developed during my PhD research.
Marquardt, Zoe; Beira, João; Em, Natalia; Paiva, Isabel; Kox, Sebastian (2012); Super Mirror: A Kinect Interface for Ballet Dancers; ACM, CHI ’12 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Pages 1619-1624
The following video shows the overall research project and software design.
Super Mirror download (Quartz Composer)
Another usability evaluation research study was conducted by Mika Trajokva at the University of South East European with the Super Mirror system in order to discover the impact of the usability in ballet instruction. The study Trajokva and her team conducted at the University of South East European was established by a new methodology focus in a level of effectiveness and efficiency of the system and software for a professional ballet teacher. More precisely, “can a system prove to be as accurate as a ballet teacher in assessing the quality of dancer´s movements? “ (2015, pag. 465)
Interface for calibration of ballet positions recording system. It allows for the user to personalize recorded poses in and create new library positions.
The X/Y rotations are rendered into one graph per bone element. The prerecorded pose value is the centre of the graph, the dotted box a combination of the preset x/y thresholds and offset. The Z rotations are render separately, in a at graph. The X/Y rotations provided more usefull data for analysis.
More recently, the Super Mirror will be created for virtual reality interface in HTC Vive by a doctoral student in Portugal. More to come soon!!
Research Team: João Beira, Nattalie Em, Isabel Paiva, Zoe Marquardt and Sebastian Kox (oneseconds.com)
Credits:
-David Justin ( UT Professional Dancer and head departament) and all the dancers for the testing sessions
-Luis Revilla (UT, School of Information)
Austin, University of Texas 2011
