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OmniTouch is Microsoft's projector based touch computer
Daniel Carey
In recent years Microsoft has been at the forefront of innovation in the tech game - you really only have to look as far as the Kinect for Xbox 360, or the overly impressive Courier to see what they’re capable of - continuing on with this trend, the Redmond based computer conglomerate has presented two very interesting touch based systems at the UI symposium, UIST 2012. The first project, OmniTouch, which in my opinion is certainly more sci-fi than its brethren, aims to turn any and all surfaces into a touch-enabled space. — More after the break!
Taking cues from Microsoft’s already developed and highly successful Kinect system, Microsoft researchers have devised a kinect-like device that can be incorporated onto one’s shoulder. Once in place, a user is able to interact with the projected display via such means as multitouch, tapping, dragging and the venerable pinch-to-zoom.
According to Hrvoje Benko, of Microsoft’s Natural Interaction Reserach Group, the company planed to “capitalize on the tremendous surface area the real world provides.” Further explaining, “the surface area of one hand alone exceeds that of typical smart phones. Tables are an order of magnitude larger than a tablet computer.”
It certainly is an interesting concept, in a way, it feels a lot like the natural progression or evolution of the Kinect, after all there are similarities, in fact Microsoft research teams would have relied on information learnt from Kinect development. However, it is important to remember that OmniTouch recognises human input on a completely different, rather intuitive level.
Broken down to its bare essentials, the device consists of a laser pico projector and a depth sensing camera. Through technological wizardry, the research team were able to modify the depth camera in order to recognise human fingers as the source of input.
“Sensing touch on an arbitrary deformable surface is a difficult problem that no one has tackled before. Touch surfaces are usually highly engineered devices, and they wanted to turn walls, notepads, and hands into interactive surfaces-while enabling the user to move about.”
According to information gleaned from the symposium, Microsoft’s research team has stated that the device itself is able to differ between surfaces, user movements and input i.e. should a user tap on the projected surface. As stated, the researchers were able to gain accurate feedback and detection when a finger is 0.4” or 1cm away from the surface. At this distance, the device assumes that a tap has been made, yet at the same state, users are also able to perform drag and pin actions.
As you will no doubt notice from the video above, the Kinect-like depth camera rig is quite large, especially for use in open public spaces. According to Microsoft however, there aren’t any major hurdles to cross in order to shrink such a device down to the size of a small matchbox.
Innovation doesn’t stop with the OmniTouch either. As you will recall, Microsoft displayed two devices at UIST 2012; the second being PocketTouch. As the name implies, PocketTouch is a technology that aims to allow user interaction with a device - in my guess namely smartphones or tablets - through different fabrics. In essence such technology could allow a consumer to use a specific swipe gesture on, oh say a smartphone, without the need of device-pocket removal. As to why anyone would need to use a device without wanting to look at it alludes me, yet it is safe to assume that Microsoft’s latest technologies have, in some respects, come from the realms of science fiction.
More — ChrisHarrison.net
