CNETAnalysis: Wave a friendly hello to the Leap Motion controller, which will finally get its day in the limelight with the announcement of an official North American release date. Leap Motion started taking pre-orders for its motion control camera earlier this year, and confirmed today that the controller will start shipping out to pre-order customers on May 13. While the camera can be ordered through Leap Motion’s website, Best Buy also has an exclusive retail deal for the Leap Motion controller, and will begin carrying it in stores a little later starting May 19. With an official release date comes a slight price increase, with pre-orders now listed for $79.99 instead of the $69.99 price that was previously announced. Just the flick of a wrist The Leap Motion controller plugs into either a Mac or PC via USB and is equipped with a camera that can track a user’s hands and 10 individual fingers in 3D space. It tracks hand gestures with an accuracy of 1/100 millimeter to the user’s movements by snapping at 290 frames per second. Leap Motion claims its controller is 200 times more accurate than other motion control cameras on the market, such as Microsoft’s bulkier Kinect sensor . A range of software will support the Leap Motion controller at launch, including Autodesk’s 3D design software, Corel’s Painter apps, and an optimized version of the popular game, Cut the Rope . The camera-based controller can also be put to use for music creation , and will support a new experimental music game from Double Fine called Dischord . The Leap Motion controller will support Windows 7 and Windows 8 along with Mac OS X 10.7 and 10.8 , bringing gesture control to all manner of computers. Well, unless you’re a Linux fan.
