[Vigo’s] Stare Follows You Wherever You Go

To decorate the office for Halloween [Eric] decided to make [Vigo the Carpathian] stare at passersby. We hope that readers recognize this image, but for those younger hackers who don’t, this painting of [Vigo] played an important part in the classic film Ghostbusters II.

In the movie, his eyes appeared to be following anyone looking at the painting. [Eric] grabbed a Kinect and used Processing to recreate the effect in real life. The image is displayed on an LCD screen. A bit of work with Photoshop allowed him to cut out the eyes from the image, then create sprites which are moved by the Processing sketch. It’s reading data from the Kinect (so it knows where to ‘look’) which you can see perched on the top of the cubicle wall. The illusion is delightful, see for yourself in the clip after the break. We’ve already watched it a half-dozen times, and it looks like it was a real hit with the guests at the open house.

Can you believe they threw this together in just one day?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LM9VWiMOhs&w=470]

[Thanks Nicko]

20 thoughts on “[Vigo’s] Stare Follows You Wherever You Go

  1. Great idea but the execution isn’t perfect. The eyes don’t move exactly at the same time so you get this weird “googly eye” effect, at least from what I can see in the video.

  2. some clear canvas over the screen and a picture frame are needed to complete the ensemble.

    its amazing how many things the kinect is good for and how many of them have nothing to do with gaming.

      1. Advertisers let leak that the camera could be used to gauge user reaction, or in other words MS is looking at you remotely, don’t connect a kinnect to an xbox unless you want to perform for them, and don’t appreciate any privacy in your home.

    1. I have a 360 unused for at least 2 years, I plan to buy a kinect, and it will never seen the 360. Such a fantastic product, marketed within such a narrow minded application range.

  3. Has anybody managed to get this running using the instructions. Been trying for days and just keep getting errors. Cant understand what I am doing wrong as I am following instructions exactly.

    I think this is superb and would love to get it up and running for halloween party.

    Any help would be greatly appreciated.

  4. This is the error msg.

    The file “data/vigo.png” is missing or inaccessible, make sure the URL is valid or that the file has been added to your sketch and is readable.
    The file “data/vigo-left.png” is missing or inaccessible, make sure the URL is valid or that the file has been added to your sketch and is readable.
    The file “data/vigo-right.png” is missing or inaccessible, make sure the URL is valid or that the file has been added to your sketch and is readable.
    The file “data/eye-left.png” is missing or inaccessible, make sure the URL is valid or that the file has been added to your sketch and is readable.
    The file “data/eye-right.png” is missing or inaccessible, make sure the URL is valid or that the file has been added to your sketch and is readable.
    SimpleOpenNI Version 0.20
    Exception in thread “Animation Thread” java.lang.NullPointerException
    at processing.core.PGraphics.image(Unknown Source)
    at processing.core.PApplet.image(Unknown Source)
    at vigo.leftEye(vigo.java:190)
    at vigo.draw(vigo.java:145)
    at processing.core.PApplet.handleDraw(Unknown Source)
    at processing.core.PApplet.run(Unknown Source)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:662)

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