SoftCollection Shooting-Range

Technology has come a long way in only a few years, and entertainment on a computer doesn’t have to mean just playing video games. For instance, SoftCollection Shooting-Range is a neat application which helps you turn your room into a harmful shooting range with the help of a few objects, such as a webcam and a laser gun.

The application takes little time to install on your computer, but before you get it to work you need to make sure .NET Framework is on your PC. On the other hand, it’s delivered in the default set of features in modern Windows iterations, so there’s a high chance it’s already there.

As mentioned, a couple of physical requirements need to be met, such as a webcam and laser gun. In fact, there’s also a third requirement, namely the target you get to shoot at. This needs to be represented by a thin sheet of paper on which you print a target. You can find a sample PDF file with a target to print out.

The sheet of paper needs to be placed in front of the webcam. Needless to say that it’s best if it’s perpendicular and standing still at all times. Before starting a game, it’s a good idea to pay a visit to the settings panel to configure camera and detection options. Here you get to drag a box around the webcam feedback to define the target area.

Additional settings allow you to adjust average buffer size in frames, resize in square, tolerance, median square, minimal distance between two objects, as well as frame type, and camera position.

Once setup is complete, you can easily connect to a local or IP camera. In case of the latter, you also need to provide the corresponding URL. The application attempts to record every time the laser hits the sheet of paper, displaying the result and score in a table. In the end you get to see who is the winner.

Taking everything into consideration, we can state that SoftCollection Shooting-Range comes with a neat idea to provide an alternative entertainment method. Sure enough the initial setup can take a little while and effort, but it can sure make for some fun times with multiple friends.