Softkinetic, the leading 3D gesture recognition solutions provider, today announced that Raytheon BBN Technologies, the legendary R&D provider, has selected Softkinetic’s iisu™ middleware to develop a gesture-based interface for their military virtual world training systems.

Raytheon BBN’s virtual world technology allows users to train in immersive, highly visual, 3D environments before actually facing the real situations.

"By using Softkinetic’s 3D camera-based gesture recognition technology we can further improve the sense of being immersed in the simulation," said David Diller, Senior Scientist at BBN Technologies. "Our training work strives to prepare soldiers today for the uncertain needs of tomorrow. The more we allow soldiers to train the way they fight, the better prepared they will be."

The result of five years of research and development, Softkinetic’s award winning middleware iisu recognizes gestures and movements in real-time, captured by a single 3D depth sensing camera. The technology has already been incorporated into large-scale applications for gaming, multimedia systems and fitness and rehabilitation systems.

In an initial prototype already built and successfully demonstrated at the Interservice/Industry Training, Simulation and Education Conference (I/ITSEC) in Florida in December 2009, users were able to interact naturally through speech and gesture with on-screen avatars in a virtual checkpoint scenario.

"From the beginning we always imagined that our 3D imaging solutions could bring digital simulations to the next level," said Eric Krzeslo, chief strategy officer at Softkinetic. "We are very excited that a leading high tech company in the security field such as Raytheon BBN Technologies has decided to work with our iisu middleware to build their sophisticated virtual reality simulations."