World# - Real Time 3D Augmented Reality with Silverlight

Please read the Update at the end of this post.

In the Silverlight 4 Augmented Reality Proof Of Concept blog post I proved that it's possible to implement Augmented Reality applications with Silverlight 4 and the built-in webcam API. The proof of concept used an image showing a Silverlight logo that was attached to the tracked marker. With this blog post I'm back in this field, but this time with real 3D Augmented Reality in Silverlight!
I use the open source Augmented Reality library NyARToolkitCS again and implemented the necessary interfaces to make it work with Silverlight. The NyARToolkitCS library is a completely managed version of the well known ARToolkit. I also use the open source managed game engine Balder for the rendering of 3D models that augment the reality. Balder is mainly developed by the Silverlight MVP Einar Ingebrigtsen. He is working hard on his 3D game engine and provided quick fixes for some issues I encountered while using Balder and I also had a nice chat with him, so big shout out to Einar.

Live
A webcam and at least the Silverlight 4 runtime must be installed to run the sample. To view the application you need to install the Silverlight 4 runtime. It's available for Windows and Mac. You can also watch a video below.
If you want to try it yourself you need do download the SLAR and / or L marker, print them and hold them in front of the camera. The marker(s) should be printed non-scaled at the original size (80 x 80 mm) and centered for a small white border. Also make sure the camera is set up properly and the scene is illuminated well without hard shadows. See the SLARToolkit Markers documentation for more details.

Try it out here.

Simply press the "Start Fun" Button, hold the printed marker in front of the camera and move it around. Use the ComboBox to select a different 3D model. The "Flip x-axis" Checkbox could be used to flip the video (the webcam output is mirror-reversed by default).
If you click the "Start Fun" Button for the first time you need to give your permission for the capturing. This application uses the default Silverlight capture device. You can specify the video and audio devices that are used by default with the Silverlight Configuration. Just press the right mouse button over the application, click "Silverlight" in the context menu and select the "Webcam / Mic" tab to set them.
The Car model was made by Psionic, the Tank model by Ken Beyer. The Teapot is from the Balder samples and I guess it was made by Einar Ingebrigtsen. The rest was made by myself.

Video
This time I used Expression Encoder's Screen Capture feature to record a short video of the demo in action. Please keep in mind that the screen recording software eats up a lot of resources while recording and that the actual frame rate is way better.

Background music is Black Lipstick by 4mat / ATEbit (Matt Simmonds).

How it works
Every time the CompositionTarget.Rendering event is fired, a webcam snapshot is taken asynchronously with the CaptureSource.AsyncCaptureImage method. This snapshot is converted in the right format and passed to the NyARToolkitCS library that outputs a transformation matrix. This matrix is used to transform the 3D model. The Balder viewport has a transparent background and the scene with the 3D objects is laid over the webcam video output. Another layer is an image that uses a WriteableBitmap and the WriteableBitmapEx library to highlight the tracked marker region with a red quad.
Sounds pretty easy, but actually it was not that easy and straight forward. One of the hardest parts was the initialization and to find the right parameters.

Results
I'm quite satisfied with the results and if you consider that all the heavy computation is done by the CPU, the performance is pretty good as well. The demo runs smoothly at 50-60 fps on a dual core machine utilizing its whole power and it should also scale up on more cores.

To be continued
If you expected source code this time I have to disappoint you. The code is not at that level where it should be, but I wanted to push this demo out. I'm not sure if I find enough time this year to work on the code and I don't want that someone tries to use it in the current state. But trust me, I will provide open source functionality to make Augmented Reality in Silverlight in the near future and I normally keep my promises, so stay tuned for more happy days...

Update 02-24-2010
This demo is now part of the open source SLARToolkit library which was announced in this blog post.

Update 03-15-2010
Updated to the Silverlight 4 Release Candidate.

Update 04-15-2010
Updated to the final Silverlight 4 RTW build.