Painter Freestyle + Leap Motion

[Henry Stahle]

Have you heard of this? I will surely preorder the Leap thing...and try out the Painter Freestyle when it arrives. This must be magic tech...! Painting in the air..!

http://www.corel.com/corel/pages/ind...?pgid=14500169

This Leap thing + a painting app will free my arm. While painting on a Wacom board my arm is nearly still, just the hand is moving, not like IRL painting using acrylics or oil... Leap will make me move my arm when I paint with pixels...

Any ArtRage Leap ahead?

[D Akey]

Have you heard of this? I will surely preorder the Leap thing...and try out the Painter Freestyle when it arrives. This must be magic tech...! Painting in the air..!

http://www.corel.com/corel/pages/ind...?pgid=14500169

This Leap thing + a painting app will free my arm. While painting on a Wacom board my arm is nearly still, just the hand is moving, not like IRL painting using acrylics or oil... Leap will make me move my arm when I paint with pixels...

Any ArtRage Leap ahead?

I personally never needed to move my arm per say. I just needed to touch the end of my mark making device (brush or pencil) to the place where I want the mark made.

It's interesting if you feel the need or desire to wave your arm though. You also mentioned that with digital you miss the smell of paint and so forth. I would need the resistance of the materials for the feel of the drag of the crayon on the paper tooth or the brush on the canvas. It's part of my 'real materials experience' for it to satisfy the feeling of traditional art making. What you show is getting farther away again for me for that use.

As a musician, there are some things that are taught as good technique for the purposes of music making, one is using the minimum physical motion to get the notes you want, rather than showmanship like Pete Townshend of The Who windmilling his arm as part of his stage theatrics. The comparison with the guitar is that this would be like 'playing wild' where your hand doesn't appear to have the precision without some kind of anchor point.

Also, for keyboard players, it is desirable to have keys that are weighted like real pianos. There is a certain tactile resistance that registers in the mind as you play. This is a marketing feature about synthesizers that people will pay more to get, as opposed to many which are light and that feel more like toys, though that touch is not a factor that matters about the quality of sound. It's just preferred my many who learned on a real piano or keyboard with similarly weighted keys.

Anyway, this technology is interesting and futuristic. And it's a significant advancement as an interface. But it doesn't interest me in the form it is in the video you linked to. Perhaps some generations down the road. And that paint program looks pretty primitive as well.

I'm still getting excited about being able to, like I say, touch the point of my stylus to the point where I want the paint to go in the virtual picture I'm painting. I tried Dr. Lima's tool with the aluminum foil on the end of a brush as a stylus on my iPhone and it works. Not sure the versatility. But I was actually holding a brush and the old traditional painter in me was cheering at like a tearful reunion with an old love.

Thanks for the update on technology, Henry. Very interesting step. Combine this with a hologram and we're about ready to step into that virtual world. I see this holding lots of promise for that.

[copespeak]

It certainly is a novel idea, but I would worry about the total disconnect of touching your pen/finger to a surface to make your mark.

[Henry Stahle]

It certainly is a novel idea, but I would worry about the total disconnect of touching your pen/finger to a surface to make your mark.

I imagine myself sitting there waving my arm in the air and my neighbours passing by my window. What will they think? "I am just painting" I say. The walk away and smile silently thinking "painting in the air?, now some artists are really nuts!". And yes, what a strange feeling to paint on - nothing - and still making those pixels shine on the screen. I imagine myself connecting my computer to the 42" television screen and sit there in my sofa waving my arms...how will that look?

and D Akey: the making of marks on papers, canvas, clay or whatever is a physical thing for me, involving all senses, even muscular... But this air kind of painting is probably too much non-resistant, non-physical, non sensual to my taste. Anyway, I have to test it...just like I have tried these computer games where you play games in the air (Ms Kinect)...

[copespeak]

You could just put some music on loud and they would think you were conducting!

[D Akey]

I imagine myself sitting there waving my arm in the air and my neighbours passing by my window. What will they think? "I am just painting" I say. The walk away and smile silently thinking "painting in the air?, now some artists are really nuts!". And yes, what a strange feeling to paint on - nothing - and still making those pixels shine on the screen. I imagine myself connecting my computer to the 42" television screen and sit there in my sofa waving my arms...how will that look?

and D Akey: the making of marks on papers, canvas, clay or whatever is a physical thing for me, involving all senses, even muscular... But this air kind of painting is probably too much non-resistant, non-physical, non sensual to my taste. Anyway, I have to test it...just like I have tried these computer games where you play games in the air (Ms Kinect)...

Hahaha. Funny image. My neighbors have given up on me.

Yeah, if I come across a demo somewhere I'll definitely have to try it out.

The one that makes me queasy is the one in which it tracks the eye movements as a cursor that I saw a video of about 6 months ago. I'm not so sure my eyes are that disciplined to control a device.