EyeToy Creator Discusses Product's Genesis

Thanks to NewsObserver.com for reprinting an L.A. Times article discussing the genesis of Sony's inventive PlayStation 2 EyeToy USB camera hardware/software. According to the piece, the hardware designer behind the peripheral is Richard Marks, a "...Stanford avionics PhD who built cameras that guide one of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute's underwater exploration robots." He comments on low initial expectations: "If there's one thing that's been hammered into my head over and over... it's that peripherals don't sell, and the camera is a peripheral", and explains the early development of the quirky add-on at Sony's Foster City studios, as he "...bought a Web camera and hooked it up to a computer that fed video to a PS2 prototype." Concrete sales figures for the popular, 'mass-market' accessible EyeToy are also revealed: "By the end of 2003, it had sold more than 2 million units in Europe and 400,000 in the United States. Sony estimates it will have shipped 4 million units by March 31, the end of its fiscal year."

Comments

Sony Camden

[semaj]

The article doesn't mention the conversion of the technology demo'ed by Richard Marks into an actual product, which took place at Sony UK's Camden studio. That's where they added the fun gameplay that turned it into something worth buying. It's not a big deal, but it's strange that it's not mentioned at all in the original article.

It's quite cool reading about the initial presentation of the technology to a bunch of awestruck developers. :-)

I agree with the article.

[Sklivvz]

I own one of these cams and I gotta say, I totally agree with the point of the article. It's a totally new way of interacting with games, and it attracts non gamers a lot, because it's so simple. I have had my whole family (ages 9 to 57) playing with Groove.
Also it just works (TM). One would think that a thing like this would have some problems recognising your movements, but I found that it works perfectly right out of the box.
I hope that more innovative ways of interacting with computers/consoles come forward in the near future (Matrix anyone? ;-P)