Microsoft creates ‘smarter’ camera app for the iPhone

Microsoft’s Research team is at it again with a new app for the iPhone. This time, the tech company claims the Microsoft Pix can take better shots than the default iPhone app. This “smarter camera app” makes use of artificial intelligence to do things like adjust camera settings, automatically enhance shots, and choose which image is the best out of a burst of photos. The app has more automatic enhancements for focus, color, and exposure if it sees people in the photo. Microsoft Pix also has a Live Photos-like feature that stitches together burst frames and creates a looping video.

You can see the difference between the original and enhanced shots with a toggle button within the app. The app is already available for free download on the App Store.

Source: The Verge

FlexCase concept introduces a secondary e-ink display in a phone case

This new concept from Microsoft Research and the University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria is a case unlike anything else out on the market. Called “FlexCase,” this prototype features a secondary e-ink display that doesn’t just extend the content on your smartphone but can also help control your main screen using gestures, taps, and even bends and twists of the flexible e-ink display. It can help you turn pages of an e-book you’re reading by bending the edge of the e-ink screen or use it as a keyboard when you turn the phone into landscape. The video above elaborates on the different things the FlexCase can be used for.

Source: SlashGear

Microsoft to let you scan 3D objects with your smartphone

It's not exactly groundbreaking tech as other companies have done it before. But Microsoft is taking their own approach to mobile 3D scanning. The Microsoft Research team is testing out its new software called MobileFusion. It lets you take shots to create 3D images that you can later turn into 3D-printed objects or, as they suggest, augmented reality objects. With MobileFusion, you don't need to use an Internet connection for it to work. And it doesn't seem to be chained to Windows Phone either has the company is testing it out with an iPhone. The team hopes this app makes a general public release soon but there is not release date scheduled yet. 

Source: Mashable 

Microsoft RoomAlive turns your room into an Xbox game

Microsoft hopes to bring augmented reality gaming into your whole living room with its new proof-of-concept demo, RoomAlive. The concept makes use of six Kinect sensors and projectors to create that AR experience in a room. It'll let you reach out to hit objects or interact with the game using any surface in the room. Of course, it'll be too expensive to bring this setup to the market at the moment but Microsoft is hoping this will be part of the future of gaming.

Source: Projection Mapping Central | Via: The Verge