Researchers demonstrate interactive board game technology (with video)

A long time ago board games were all the rage.

People used to sit around a table and spend hours throwing the dice, spinning wheels and flipping cards while moving the little pieces around a board. With the appearance of video games, for many people the focus changed from a table to the TV and now several of those board games are a thing of the past (or ironically turned into video games).

Now, thanks to a couple of Canadian researchers, board games may be making a come back.

Roel Vertegaal and Eric Akaoka, of Queen’s University, are developing a way to make interactive board games in a whole new way. By using a projector and a motion tracking camera they can create interactive playing cards that react to motion and their position in relation to other cards. An image is projected on the cards and the camera tracks their motion so when they are in the right position, like next to another card, the images on both cards interact.