
Elon Musk took the futuristic gesture interface from Iron Man and made it real - SanderMak
http://thenextweb.com/shareables/2013/09/05/elon-musk-shows-off-iron-man-inspired-gesture-control-for-designing-rockets/
======
DanBC
HN again has some depressingly negative comments.

It's good that there are people with the disposable income, and the
engineering resources, to tinker with stuff like this.

This particular iteration may not be interesting to you, but we're stuck with
WIMP (or WIMP-lite) environments very similar to the 40 year old versions.
(More colours, more animation, bigger icons, but little actual change).

Kludging together desktop and mobile interfaces is being attempted (with a
variety of horrible unpopular results) by many people, so it's great that
other people are experimenting with other paradigms.

~~~
_delirium
I agree that tinkering is good, but this seem more like hype than tinkering.
This demo (rotating stuff with gestures) has been done over and over, and
hyped up each time as _the future, like in the movies_ , and doing it one more
time is not engineering and is not problem-solving. Real experimentation is
one thing, but more glitzy demos that aren't actually usable is the last thing
"virtual reality" type interfaces need: that's been what has sunk the field
over and over for 30 years and gotten it a negative reputation.

Particularly the part about how it's from the _Iron Man_ movie is silly,
because it's not like this is some futuristic interface that previously only
existed in films. It's been done, in real life, a number of times. The hard
problem is making it usable, not just demoing its mere existence _yet again_.

~~~
krschultz
I worked in a Fortune 500 company that designed mechanical product. Every
single one of the 3,000 CAD operators in the company had a 3D mouse on their
desk. You too can have one for $350 minimum. This stuff is not the future in
that field, it's routine.

Does it translate out to most people surfing the internet and jockeying Excel
all day? No. But in the field of designing 3D mechanical things, 2D mice are
not the norm right now.

------
jrkelly
Seems clear he is doing this to increase his personal brand as the "real life
tony stark" as opposed to it actually being useful for engineering. His
personal brand is an enormous asset on the balance sheet of his companies, so
I really respect this - but lets call it what it is.

~~~
flexie
Of course this will be useful for engineering. Maybe not in it's current state
but in future, better versions.

He and his team are trying out some really cool ideas. While most of us work
on apps that involve displaying text and pictures, this guy has the good
fortune to be able to play with rockets and cars etc. Good for the World that
not everybody is working on another app.

~~~
jrkelly
>Good for the World that not everybody is working on another app.

Couldn't agree more with that.

I'm just explaining the reason you are seeing this is primarily for PR
purposes -- which is a huge part of his job. HN should be able to tell the
difference between good PR and good tech.

~~~
skore
> HN should be able to tell the difference between good PR and good tech.

You know what? I make an exception to that in Elons case. There are plenty of
people who do that and who leave us pretty much where we were before. Think of
the tons of Microsoft Research projects that are mighty cool and are thrown in
our face every half year or so... but never go anywhere expect right in the
basket of "well, I guess Microsoft isn't entirely dead, yet" PR.

Is this extremely exciting stuff in itself? No. But it is still exciting to me
because I know if Elon does it, he will follow up and make the best of the
opportunity. It is the marriage between the person and the project - in the
Microsoft example, some, probably mostly PR, division comes up with "oh, I
suppose that's neat" on a regular basis, but what they do has no direct link
to any real life implementation. What you need is that connection of being
able to dream big and execute big - and for that, the impulse has to come from
engineering, not PR.

It's like knowing that Carmack is hooked on VR goggles. For some things, the
person doing the thing really makes all the difference in the world.

~~~
HCIdivision17
Just how I feel about his brand: he'll probably build it. And that is pretty
big. We face a lot of disappointment when it comes to tech promises. They
don't all have to me amazing and change out lives now, so long as they
credibly _could_ later. Musk seems to actually implement things and has the
power to actually drive a project forward, so this is neat.

------
solistice
I'll have to go against the grain here, but this isn't anything special.

The Leap has been around for a good while, the Occulus Rift has been around
for a good while, and 3D Laser Sintering has been around for a while, along
with every other technology they're using for this application.

Also, I believe they're the wrong people to use it. Making the feedback
involved visual instead of mathematical/geometrical has it's applications
(quickly looking through the design), but it'll still have to be made to
precise tolerances, and that's an engineers job, not a sculptors.

On the other hand, it's perfect for sculptors and designers. If their setup is
considerably improved in resolution, designers can get very fast visual
feedback, and trying out things suddenly becomes very cheap. Architects can
mold parts of their buildings, your furniture can get those last brushes
before it's milled out, and your phone can be molded to "just perfect".

But this isn't a Musk thing, nor is it an Iron Man thing, the idea has been
floating around for a good while, the tech is there, they just went ahead and
made it. That's not groundbreaking, and it isn't revolutionizing
manufacturing.

~~~
nothingspecial
Just like the world wide web was nothing special since at the time it was
invented

    
    
      * tcp/ip and the internet had been around for a good while
      * client/server document browsing had been around for a good while and
      * hypertext documents with clickable links generated from markup
        had been around for while (microsoft help viewer)
    

The ideas behind the WWW had been floating around for a good while. TBL just
went ahead and made it.

~~~
grannyg00se
Crockford's story [1] behind the genesis of JSON is similar. Everything was
already there, but he's the one who formalized it gave it an official home.
That helped propel it to its current level of popularity. The fact that he
didn't create javascript, the internet, the www, tcp, etc is not relevant.

[1] [http://www.yuiblog.com/blog/2009/08/11/video-crockford-
json/](http://www.yuiblog.com/blog/2009/08/11/video-crockford-json/)

------
mhd
This looks nice, but I doubt that it's really much more productive than the
usual 3D mice (SpaceMouse) setup that almost every CAD shop uses. Just like
touchscreens are hardly superior to ordinary mice, when you can afford to lug
the latter about. And much more prone to gorilla arm syndrome. So for a desk,
this is probably no big win. Maybe for some kind of highly integrated CAVE
setup, where you'd be wandering about.

~~~
jessriedel
> This looks nice, but I doubt that it's really much more productive...

You're missing the point. Musk's life is actually an elaborate experiment to
see what would happen if you took a very smart 11 year-old and gave him a
billion dollars to build toys.

~~~
Symmetry
I dunno, space travel and electric vehicles are pretty high up on the "good
for the human species" scale.

------
realrocker
We all know who Elon Musk is talking to. It's not us. It's the other billion
people on youtube who will watch this and go, "this is the coolest thing I
have ever seen".

~~~
itsallbs
This is definitely not geared toward techies. The closeup of the mouse and
keyboard in the first few seconds is meant to make average people think "Oooh,
this is high tech."

~~~
nrivadeneira
I think the close-up of the mouse is to illustrate his point about 2D
interaction via mouse.

------
rwinn
Very similar to what Oliver Kreylos has been doing with the oculus and hydra
controller. Check his videos out, some amazing stuff in there.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_HH-
ucA_Us](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_HH-ucA_Us)

~~~
scotty79
I live in cool times. I can watch it in 3d on el cheapo 3D LG 23' monitor and
feel amazed.

------
ck2
I was impressed about a minute into it and then he said "that's what we were
able to do a few months ago" I was expecting he would pull the monitor away
leaving a 3D holographic projection. I guess I watch too many movies, lol

But the glass projection looked fascinating.

~~~
RVijay007
Wasn't this a scene from a Ben Affleck movie? Paycheck I think it was called.

~~~
RVijay007
For those that are interested, here is a link to the scene:

[http://www.criticalcommons.org/Members/ccManager/clips/paych...](http://www.criticalcommons.org/Members/ccManager/clips/paycheck-
holographic-3d-interface)

~~~
bhouston
I worked on some of the interface graphics for Paycheck, but not this
particular scene. Fun work.

------
KingdomSprite
"Elon Musk Learns Leap Motion and builds a grabbing tool" should probably be
the title. I don't get what the hype is all about. It looks as though as his
team just created a program that can change the position and rotation of a
virtual model in space. I know the community here on HN seems to worship Elon
Musk, but that demo definitely was NOT making the Iron Man gesture interface
real.

~~~
rogem002
Did you even watch past the first 30 seconds of the video?

------
jnardiello
Sorry guys. While the "concept" is nice, i think this is quite overselling a
new "manifacturing" process which obviously (at least for anyone who has any
CAD modeling and manifacturing experience) is far from being anyhow usable in
industry.

Why overselling? Because the precision provided by that tool (as shown in the
video) is surely not enough to achieve anything other than reviewing CAD
models.

~~~
progx
Yes and there is nothing new. Big Car Companies use such things since many
years.

Oculus Rift / or a normal Display and MS Kinnect make it obviously usable for
a mass of users.

Only the Software has to support the kind of IO.

------
jbrooksuk
Sadly, there is no creation or modification of hardware using the interface. I
can see why, it's extremely hard to use CAD etc with a mouse and keyboard, let
alone creating an interface just for hand movements.

Impressive, only because they added hardware such as the Oculus Rift, but it's
almost the same as the DNA demo for Leap Motion.

~~~
nixarn
Yeah I was hoping for more creating and modifying than just a CAD viewer. I
wasn't that impressed with what he showed, nothing revolutionary.

------
stinos
Since when does designing something consist only of zooming and panning the
obviously already designed object? Nice for presentation, but now try
offestting a single component a couple of mm with it, which is something you
typically do a lot in CAD.

------
dirktheman
Amazing technology by what I consider one of the greatest visionaries of our
generation. I do wonder however if this is something you could do all day,
instead of using a mouse. It seems rather straining, holding your arms in
front of you all day.

~~~
reeses
Unless there's no gravity giving your arms weight.

------
outworlder
Too many negative comments here.

Folks, "there's nothing new", until there is. At some point, new tech is a toy
and dismissed because of its limitations. The whole idea is to identify those
limitations and push through them.

SpaceX actually has some use for new ways to interact with virtual 3D objects.
Everyone is focusing on modelling, but there's also the visualization. Which
can be more important than the modelling itself. For comparison, think about
how much time you spend writing code, vs reading and debugging code.

Technologies like these enables us to get new ways of looking at things. We
are focusing on rotation and panning, but gesture-based interfaces can provide
so much more.

Also, we are thinking about people sitting at desks, where other input devices
might be more desirable. But what about gesture-based screens in other
environments. Say, at the factories themselves? We are visual beings and we
like to point at stuff (and talk about stuff). Maybe a combination of speech
recognition and gestures would enable new interactions with machines?

Yeah, comparing to Iron Man is silly, but it is amusing. And easy for the
average Joe to understand. That is PR, and NASA could learn from it.

------
davemaya
This idea is very old and there is nothing new here. The first interface
allowing to move object on screen using gesture or touch screen were
abandoned. Why? because maintaining your arms in the air to manipulate object
is exhausting. You cannot work more than a few minutes at a time. Much more
promising are brain-computer interface.

------
tonylemesmer
This video shows him rather ham-fistedly interacting with a 3D model of a
rocket engine assembly, then for some reason he goes on to show it being 3D
printed.

Anyone involved in using 3D CAD and component design, including using Siemens
NX which he refers to in the video will have seen or used a six axis Space
mouse controller by 3D connexion which costs a few hundred bucks and is
massively more precise than using a leap motion.

These space mice have been available for well over a decade and use simple
optical encoders to derive translation and rotation.

No doubt the leap motion has uses at and beyond the desktop but it has a way
to go yet to overcome the problems in the algorithms for interpreting gestures
at a distance.

------
grannyg00se
What are the glasses shown at 2:07? They look somewhat like meta's
spaceglasses but too dark. I'd be interested to know if there is another
player in that market.

~~~
TomAnthony
I think they are just 3d glasses like you get at the cinema.

------
harrytuttle
Where's the bit where he designs something rather than throws predesigned
meshes around?

Also, I've seen people working in SolidWorks. They were far more impressive
than this!

------
yardie
> To top it all off, the team then printed the part in titanium using a 3D
> laser metal printer.

If such a beast does exist I'd be even more amazed than the leapmotion
controller. But I have a nagging feeling the author doesn't know what they are
talking about.

milling =/= printing

Edit: Well then, I stand corrected. I wasn't even aware there were 3D metal
printers available.

~~~
supermatt
Laser sintering: [http://www.eos.info/en](http://www.eos.info/en)

It is an additive 3d printing process based on atomic diffusion.

I believe I saw an advertisement (possibly for an eos model) where they 3d
printed titanium parts for surgical replacement.

------
swamp40
The best critique I've heard of the Leap interface is that human hands are
extremely proficient at manipulating small _physical_ objects.

But without any kind of _force_ feedback, manipulating images using the Leap
is neither simple nor easy.

You must become like a good mime, and that takes a _lot_ of practice and is
very counter-intuitive.

~~~
knowaveragejoe
In my experience with the Leap it's more important to learn the limits of the
capture space and the device's sensitivity in the individual application than
getting the gesture perfectly right. Another thing that people don't get
immediately is that you're not signalling at the visual medium on the screen
to perform tasks, rather, the screen doesn't matter at all. It's a sensory
feedback loop adjustment that takes a few hours of tinkering around, but once
you get it, you get it. The main problem is gorilla arm and the tediousness of
some tasks, the latter of which will hopefully be solved in software. Check
out the 3D skull explorer app if you get a chance, it's the best
implementation of gestures I've seen for the Leap, actually usable. I could
definitely see people who regularly need to manipulate 3D models using similar
metaphors.

------
rejuvenile
This isn't at all new in the world of mechanical engineering. Devices like the
SpaceMouse ([http://www.3dconnexion.com/](http://www.3dconnexion.com/)) have
been around for decades.

What is new is the Leap Motion device Elon plugged into the workstation. All
of the fanciness of this UI can be attributed to the Leap Motion, which has
generally been available for about a month.

So Elon plugged in a Leap Motion into software which is already programmed to
use a Space Mouse, which took all of about ten seconds, then made a video and
published it. What a publicity whore.

He should refrain from stunts like this, lest people get the impression that
every advance at Tesla and SpaceX is, in fact, something invented elsewhere
and opportunistically seized upon with as little effort as this took.

------
deadslow
Why is He the tony stark and not the people who have been working with leap
motion devices for years now?

~~~
Flenser
Do they make rockets?

------
philbarr
Seems like we've got quite a long way to go before this is "Iron Man" quality.
It looks like they've hooked up all the latest bits of cool tech to each other
just for the fun of it.

Having said that, it _is_ cool...

------
nrivadeneira
I'll be honest, I was pretty disappointed by this. Elon is my hero so I was
excited to see what he might have come up with, but this doesn't seem like
anything that your average hacker couldn't build with the tools he used.

I will say this, despite my disappointment, I'm very happy that Elon continues
to push our imaginations and encourage us to believe that fantasy and sci-fi
can become reality. As others have said, there are enough schmucks working on
more apps (myself included) that it's refreshing to witness someone building
something greater.

------
jkscm
It looks realy akward when he needs to hold his arm still while closing his
hands. I'm skeptic of the current state of "gesture/3D/motion/whatever"
controls, but there is a big potential here.

3D design tries to work around the problem of working with 2D screens by
showing multiple sides at once (Front/Left/Top/Perspective). You have to
adjust objects in at least 2 screens to get it right, which isn't a perfect
solution as well.

------
clientbiller
Elon Musk isn't Tony Stark, Tony Stark is Elon Musk!

------
sp332
This looks quite a bit less useful than Oblong's tech, which is already
commercially available.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcMhZ9J0qN8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcMhZ9J0qN8)
That's John Underkoffler, the MIT Media Lab guy who designed the Minority
Report interface and thought it was realistic.

~~~
JonFish85
Didn't a few people at MIT do this about 5 years ago? I seem to recall seeing
something like this in demo form (not production-ready, obviously) about that
long ago. It could read gestures and perform functions (i.e. if you framed
something with your fingers, the built-in camera would take the picture), if I
recall correctly.

------
jpeterson
This man is an inspiration.

------
washedup
At one point while manipulating the CAD software, the person conducting has to
use their hand as a mouse. They stick out their pointer finger and slowly move
the cursor around. This is not much different from using a mouse. However, it
makes visualizing the manifold very simple and intuitive, which gives this
experiment real value.

------
ondross
So what he can do in the video is not exactly revolutionary. But none of those
techs can live up to their potential without this kind of experimentation and
integration with each other.

It's not the next Tesla, but I'm glad to see someone taking these technologies
seriously, even when they have some work ahead of them.

------
kayoone
By using the Leap Motion SDK and something like Unity (a 3D Engine) this is
really easy todo, well the zooming and rotating stuff atleast. Same goes for
Oculus Rift integration.

However, seeing it all combined like this using a 3D printer in the end is
really inspiring, it just sparks so many ideas in my head immediatly :)

------
31reasons
Can you really make hand sculpted rockets parts for rockets that can go to
space ? I thought they need micrometer accuracy for million reasons and can
only be "made" using CAD softwares with mathematical precision. Its a great
demo but bit misleading.

~~~
Zoomla
It looks like a CAD person did the modeling using real CAD tools (maybe just a
mouse and keyboard).

------
domdelimar
It's just a nice showcase of the emerging technologies, kind of like these
guys did it (even better IMHO) months ago:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keHXjidUmC0
](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keHXjidUmC0 )

------
Fuxy
It's about time somebody put this together. We have the technology necessary
to build it.

Nothing revolutionary though he just put the pieces together. It needs more
tweaking before it can be very useful.

------
hardwaresofton
This is like the 8th (?) time I've seen this on HN.

Also, roughly everything that is amazing about this interface is the Leap
Motion Controller. They're not getting enough press from this.

~~~
talmir
"This is like the 8th (?) time I've seen this on HN."

Congratulations! You are a special little snowflake. This was the first time
I've seen this posted and I found it cool so I appreciate the post.

Better not let new people see stuff you personally have seen before! What
would the world come to if that was allowed?

~~~
hardwaresofton
Great job on the snarky comment buddy -- that'll definitely set me straight!

Silly of me to consider it useful for people to check if things have been
submitted before re-submitting them to the same listing/news source.

Also, way to ignore my point, this article NOT cool. It's Elon Musk propoganda
(and I think the guy is awesome) -- the real hero here is the Leap Motion
controller, and not enough is being said about it.

------
bachback
I wonder why he doesn't start 10 side companies run by other people. Say a CAD
software company. It's a bit strange format to put out a 3:49 minute video.

~~~
kayoone
Focus. And with running Tesla and SpaceX i guess he already has alot on his
plate.

------
ianstallings
ApeArms™: you're going to have them in the future.

I don't think the idea of holding my arms out for interacting with the
computer is a good idea, no matter who builds it.

------
awjr
Dammit this man rocks my boat in so many ways.

He feels to me like he's really pushing the boundaries of human innovation.

------
kmfrk
... using the software by Leap Motion.

------
richardlblair
Screw all you haters, this is badass.

------
robomartin
My guess is that most commenters on HN have a CS background and are not
immersed in the world of mechanical design. This demo is not unlike that
saying about sufficiently advanced science looking like magic. Demos like
these are definitely of the kind that provoke lots excitement from people who
don't work in the field and, generally speaking, exactly the opposite reaction
from those who do.

I must also note that Musk is a deity on HN and, therefore, anyone posting
anything counter to what he says is often met with negative reactions. In
general terms one is labeled a hater and things go downhill from there.

I straddle the software, electronics and mechanical design worlds and have
devoted a significant amount of time and effort to mastering the tools of each
discipline. In mechanical design my tool of choice these days is Solidworks. I
have also used AutoCAD and ProE extensively.

I would never, ever, in a million years, want to spend eight or more hours a
day moving my hands around in the air to design mechanical parts. It would be
a horrible productivity sapping experience. A trackball and keyboard, once
you've learned the interface, form an effortless man-machine interface to
design parts with software such as Solidworks. My preference is for
trackballs. When using one, in a very real sense, you are touching, grabbing
and interacting with the objects on your screen. It feels very natural. More
importantly, it is fast, accurate and ergonomically sustainable for long
hours.

I realize I need to provide context for someone who comes from pure CS to get
a grip on what I am saying here. Here it is: Imagine someone came along and
suggested that instead of using VIM, your favorite editor or IDE you consider
using this new interface that requires you having your hands in the air all
day to manipulate graphical objects that, when linked together, create
programs.

It would look very slick. Perhaps they'd even make a reference to a similar
concept see in a movie. You would probably recoil at the very idea and post
negative comments on HN. Those outside the CS world would see it as an
incredible potential advance in the field and call you haters for not praising
an attempt to advance the art.

That's exactly what we are looking at here. I can't think of many people who
do MCAD for a living who would think this is actually useful at any level
except for one: It might be cool to have as a presentation tool. It would be
neat to allow anyone to feel like they are touching and manipulating objects
in free space in an intuitive fashion. That's it.

The other more subjective point I'd like to make is that I find myself
wondering why Musk/Tesla/SpaceX are burning clock cycles working on anything
outside of their core missions. The fact that he had engineers spend time on
the Hyperloop and this doesn't sit well with me. I could be wrong, of course,
and I am sure there are plenty who will point that out. I just don't think
these companies are mature enough to engage in such pointless distractions.

------
mariusz79
Great, but how is it different from using a mouse wheel with CTRL/ALT/SHIFT
combination?

~~~
Zoomla
it is harder to use then the mouse and keyboard combo and specially harder if
you are going to use it all day.

------
enscr
It's sillier than the 'MIT Sixth Sense' thing. Seems equally difficult to use.

------
Demiurge
does this mean that Elon Musk is Iron Man??

