Baseball fans have a virtual fit
Major League Baseball’s 2015 All-Star Game is in the record books, with the victorious American League earning bragging rights and home-field advantage in this year’s World Series. But the American Leaguers weren’t the only winners at Cincinnati’s Great American Ball Park: lots of fans of either league came away with a winning fit in All-Star apparel, thanks to Virtual Mirrors powered by Zugara’s virtual dressing room software and the latest Kinect sensor.
Virtual Mirror stations were strategically placed near the entrance to the Major League Baseball store at the All-Star FanFest, which was located at the nearby Duke Energy Convention Center. These stations looked like boxes with dressing room mirrors, but above the mirrored surface was a Kinect sensor that captured the shopper’s image. The setup allowed fans of all sizes and ages (men, women and children) to try on All-Star branded jerseys, T-shirts and other baseball-related apparel—virtually.
Virtual Mirror at the MLB All-Star Game FanFest
The latest Kinect sensor’s advanced body tracking capabilities are key to the Virtual Mirror, providing an accurate body map, which the software then uses to automatically size and scale the selected clothing to fit the shopper. What’s more, the Kinect sensor’s ability to accurately follow the movements of 25 skeletal joints enables enhanced motion and gesture tracking, allowing the software to synchronize the apparel to the would-be purchaser’s movements. Add in background subtraction and the insertion of a high-definition virtual background image, and the shopper needn’t imagine how she’d look in that new National League jersey, she can see it right on the screen!
Although the 2015 All-Star Game is history, the Virtual Mirror technology is poised to take off, as more and more retailers use it to engage with customers. So maybe you don’t want an American League warm-up jacket—how about a nice Oxford shirt and matching tie? Step up to the virtual dressing room and see how they look.
The Kinect for Windows Team
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