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With compact, low-cost sensors and capacious memory, “Were getting to a point where we can store everything that happens to a person.” That was the opening observation by Microsoft Senior Vice President Rick Rashid, formerly the director of Microsoft Research, at this months OReilly Emerging Technology Conference in San Diego.
Rashid discussed a Microsoft project called SenseCam, a wearable recording device that uses a variety of detectors to capture a profile of a persons activities. Triggered by global-positioning measurements, infrared sensors, gesture recognition and other event signatures, the prototype typically captures 2,000 images during a 12-hour period.
Various forms of sensor fusion improve overall performance: The moving device can wait, for example, for a moment of relative stillness after a trigger event before it takes a photo.
In-home elder care and tourism, Rashid suggested, are among the applications for such a device.
More information is at research.microsoft.com/research/hwsystems.