Accessing Kinect Color Data

One of the new features of the Kinect v2 is the upgraded color camera which now provides images with 1920 x 1080 resolution. This post will illustrate how you can get access to this data stream.

This is an early preview of the new Kinect for Windows, so the device, software and documentation are all preliminary and subject to change.

Much like the other data streams, accessing the color image is done using a reader:

private void SetupCamera();

    var sensor = KinectSensor.Default;
    sensor.Open();
    ColorFrameReader reader = sensor.ColorFrameSource.OpenReader();
    reader.FrameArrived += ColorFrameArrived;
}

In this example, I'm simply copying the frames to a WriteableBitmap which is bound to the view.

private readonly int bytesPerPixel = (PixelFormats.Bgr32.BitsPerPixel + 7) / 8;
private readonly WriteableBitmap _bmp = new WriteableBitmap(1920, 1080, 96, 96, PixelFormats.Bgra32, null);
Byte[] _frameData = null;

private void ColorFrameArrived(object sender, ColorFrameArrivedEventArgs e)
{
    var reference = e.FrameReference;

    try
    {
        var frame = reference.AcquireFrame();
        if (frame == null) return;

        using(frame)
        {
            FrameDescription desc = frame.FrameDescription;
            var size = desc.Width * desc.Height;
            
            if (_frameData == null)
            {
                _bmp = new WriteableBitmap(desc.Width, desc.Height, 96, 96, PixelFormats.Bgr32, null);
                _frameData = new byte[size * bytesPerPixel];
            }

            frame.CopyConvertedFrameDataToArray(_frameData, ColorImageFormat.Bgra);

            _bmp.WritePixels(
                new Int32Rect(0, 0, desc.Width, desc.Height),
                _frameData,
                desc.Width * bytesPerPixel,
                0);
        }
    }
    catch
    {}

}

As you’d expect, this updates the view every 30 frames per second with a HD image. The wide-angle lens of the camera (84°) captures a fair amount of my office.

Happy Coding.