Using the Microsoft Kinect for Position Tracking in LabVIEW

[PBoutros]

Hi,

I am currently working on a project to take 2-D ultrasound images and reconstruct them into a 3-D image for a physician to use. In this project, we need to be able to know the relative position of the ultrasound probe in order to connect the 2-D images to their position on the part of the body being imaged.

My current plan is to utilize the Microsoft Kinect in LabVIEW to track the ultrasound probe as it takes 2-D images, in order to later organize the images by position.

Can anyone point me in the right direction for this task? I have found many different utilities for LabVIEW use of the Kinect, but I am specifically looking to track one single point as it moves a short distance. I could even put a red ball on the end of the probe, and have the Kinect only track the movement of that red ball.

Any help with this task, or any integration of the Kinect with LabVIEW would be a great help,

Boutros

[Matt-J]

Hi PBoutros,

Your best bet in using the Kinect in LabVIEW will be to use the LabVIEW Interface for Microsoft Kinect API.  We have an article that discusses this use in depth. Find the link below.

http://zone.ni.com/devzone/cda/epd/p/id/6504

You will need to interface with this API in order to create the functionality you want. A good starting place might be to take a look at this robotics project that made use of the Kinect interface functionality. 

https://decibel.ni.com/content/docs/DOC-15920

Let me know if this helps,

[Julio_HDT]

hi i want to start to work with kinect, but in that link,  my aplication cant find .dll i dont know how i have to put it..

[Jorge_Fernández]

Hello jchdt,

Which of the two links are you making reference to? Would you explain exactly what dll. is missing? Are you getting any message/warning when opening one of the VIs from that link? If so, what is that message telling you?

Regards,

[N2Blues]

I get some dll issues as well. Can you help with this?

[Julio_HDT]

hi N2 blue, i had the same problem, did you intall visual studio, microsoft kinect page say intall that

[Peter-E]

The reason for this is because the LabVIEW interface you are using (from the link above) were developed using Kinect's SDK version 1.0.0.11, but you are most likely using a more recent version (1.0.0.45). Version 1.0.0.11 has been discontinued and so you cannot find it to download through the usual channels.

These APIs then do not know where to find the particular .dlls and therefore the error occurs.

If jchdt's suggestion does not work, you will need to find the SDK version 1.0.0.11 to work with these particular APIs.

[PBoutros]

Hello all,

I wanted to update everyone on how our project is coming, and for some further help.

We have followed some of the work of this group: https://decibel.ni.com/content/docs/DOC-16978

 and have tested a large portion of their code. The benefit of this project is that they have isolated individual limbs to be tracked by the Kinect. So, we can choose to isolate and track the "right arm" if the pysician is using the ultrasound probe in that arm.

We have tested the code and it is working sucesfully. The only problem is then we are unsure of how to export the position data into our reconstruction code. We want to take the position data acquired by this LabVIEW routine AS IT IS SAMPLED IN THE TIME DOMAIN, and export it for use in the reconstruction of the 2D ultrasound images. I am unsure of how to take this data, whcih is provided in realtime, and store it as sampled position data points in time.

Please let me knwo if any clarification is needed of my issue, or the project in general.

Any help would be greatly appreciated,

Peter

[davylee]

I met  the same problems of yours which is shown in your pictures. My solution is here ,first copy this  "LabVIEW.exe.config" file in config_file.rar to the folder of LabVIEW 2010 in your hard disc. Then copy the file  "Microsoft.Research.Kinect.dll" in this dir C:\Program Files\Microsoft SDKs\Kinect\v1.0 Beta2\Assemblies and paste it to the folder kinect-1-4 to overwrite the origin .dll file. After that your API can work normally.

[AsianSensation]

Hello,

I am trying to do the same thing as you but I am running into an issue with the previous SDKs.

I have a new Kinect for Windows and the Beta 2 sdk installed, yet the device is not detected.  My device manager lists it as "Unknown device".

If I install the new sdk 1.0, I have no such problem. Unfortunately sdk 1.0 uses Microsoft.Kinect.dll not Microsoft.Research.Kinect.dll.  Because of this the labview code does not work because of a few changes to how the dll works.  

Has anyone figured out how to use sdk 1.0 in labview?

Is there any solution to for the Kinect for Windows not properly being recognized by the SDK beta 2's drivers?