Sunday, December 14, 2008
More from lm3labs: Ubiq'window & Reactor.cmc's touch-screen shopping catalog, AUDI's touch-less interactive showroom screen, and the DNP Museum Lab
Lm3labs has been involved with innovative, creative interactive applications for quite some time. I came across the following items during recent visit to the company's news blog:
Catalog Browsing in Japanese Streets:
Video:
Touchless Sapporo from Nicolas Loeillot on Vimeo.
I get tired of shopping if I can't quickly find what I'm looking for, so this display, or something similar, would be quite helpful to me, especially if it was linked to both the shopping opportunities nearby as well as good bargains online.
This concept is a big improvement over the static maps I find in most malls and shopping centers. It would also be quite helpful to me when I'm out shopping with my daughters, as we could plan out our shopping trip more efficiently.
With the present economy, people who are considering the purchase of an automobile have many options. To assist in the decision-making process, an Audi dealership in Singapore used a large-size interactive holography, based on Lm3lab's touchless Ubiq'window 200:
Audi goes Touchless from Nicolas Loeillot on Vimeo.
(Mosaic Solutions coordinated the interactivity project.)
Lm3labs has been involved in the museum industry, and recently collaborated with the Louvre-DNP museum lab to create an exhibit in Tokyo, Japan.
From the Museum Lab website:
"The Louvre - DNP Museum Lab is a special experimental space in which the Musée du Louvre exhibits works and provides an in-depth explanation of them. In an exceptional atmosphere, visitors can take time for the leisurely viewing and appreciation of artworks from the world's largest museum."
"A circuit with a wealth of multimedia mediation devices draws visitors into the history and analysis of the works, letting them follow in the footsteps of the artists in question and affording an insight into the details concealed. This ground-breaking feature al lows visi tors to discover the hidden face of some of the museum's masterpieces."
"New works are presented at Museum Lab every six months in an entirely novel approach to artworks."
According to information from the Lm3lab's website, " LM#LABS has built a series of solutions to serve the museum and culture industry. Interactive solutions are based on computer vision and have the common point to be easy to deploy and manage. LM3LABS' solutions are highly engaging and easy to use....they create on natural interaction with digital content...people use their fingers to interact and discover."
Slide Share by Lm3labs:
Outdoor Ad: The Future is Interactive (Asia Outdoor Advertising 2007)
Saturday, October 25, 2008
SNL's Multi-touch Parody of CNN's Interactive Touch Screen Magic Map Wall
Via Interactive Multimedia Technology
Most viewers familiar with CNN news know about the "Multi-Touch Collaboration Wall", or Magic Wall, used by John King. David Borhman, a CNN producer, was describes the purpose of the Magic Wall in a quote in a Washington Post article:
"It's a stupendous way to explain a lot of complicated data"..."Fundamentally, our job is to explain things to people, and we need it visually. This lets us do it naturally, without a keyboard or mouse getting in the way....Once you see it, you get it instantly."
This would be fun to play with- for just about everyone! If you don't have ready access to a "magic wall", take a look Fred Armisen's playfulness in a recent Saturday Night Live parody of the CNN Magic wall:
Video clip via Hulu
Partial Transcript:
"One thing we are going to look at is Pennsylvania..Have a very good look at Harrisburg.....Get in really close to this. Back a bit, back a little bit, excellent"
"Now the country can be moved up and down, like so....We can also shrink it and put it in your pocket if you need to."
"You can always change the colors. You got blue, blue again, a little bit of red...right over there, a little bit of blue of course, if you want to make something out of green, you got a little face there, some whiskers, we can ..... make a cat. Notice the triangle nose!"
"Let's look at Ohio. Lets look at the Cleveland area. Lets look really really close. Really close. Really really close, You can see the top of a warehouse. We're really going to want look at that. Very, very important, were going to want to look at that."
"You can take Oregon, lets move it out into the ocean. It will be completely surrounded by water. That's very, very dangerous."
"And here is New York.... New York was there in 2004, and you can shake it around like that.. (shakes New York)"
"Actually, what I'm doing is very important, and informational"
"OK, Fred, stop goofing around..."
Fred turns to the map, and with both hands, moves all of the states out of place.
Photo via engadget
"Check out Michigan... I can make it bounce!" (Drags down Michigan on the map, it bounces up and down once it reaches the bottom of the map.)
Rumor has it that Jeff Hans, of Perceptive Pixel, was responsible for the SNL version of the Magic Touch-Wall map.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Interesting Technology: InfiniTouch Expands the Concept of Touch-Screen Interaction
I just learned about an interesting form of touch-technology that works on a variety of surfaces and materials. Someone from the company behind InfinityTouch left a message on one of my blog posts, and thought readers would be interested in learning more about it. I agree. Here is the link the post: Hands On Computing: How Multi-Touch Screens Could Change the Way we Interact with Computers and Each Other (link to Scientific American Article)
Here are a couple of videos about this technology, called InfiniTouch, by QSI Corporation.
Force Panel Touch Screen Gas Pump
In this example, items can be ordered and paid for from the pump, such as a DVD, food, coffee drinks.
InfinitiTouch Music Kiosk
This explains how the technology behind the kiosk works. The material is rugged and weather-proof. The interesting thing with this technology is that the touch-sensitivity is not limited to the screen. The rest of the surface can be touch-enabled, even the frame!
According to an article about InfiniTouch from 2007,on the eMediaWire website, InfiniTouch has many useful features:
- - Capable of dynamic self calibration
- - Scalable to any size, proven up to 1.2 meters
- - Supports two-sided display
- - Usable with various elevations: flat plane, curved surface, 3-D surface,projected surface, or a surface with holes, such as a speaker
- - Highly light transmissive
- - Touchable with a finger, gloved hand, stylus, or other object
- - Operable when covered with ice, water, dust or debris
- - Capable of capturing signatures
InfiniTouch senses force as the z-axis. Items that raise above the frame can also be touch-enabled. It can sense touch on 3D surfaces, as well as curved and irregular surfaces. It is designed to withstand public outdoor use. At the present time, it does not support multi-touch interaction.
Additional Information:
Video: InfiniTouch Introduction (This video demonstration will give you an idea of the tactile "touchy-feely" possibilities of this technology.)
Wall Panels Video (This video provides examples of how the technology can be used in public spaces.)
How It Works
Sensing Touch by Sensing Force pdf
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Multi-Touch Plug-in for NASA World Wind?!
NUI group member Paul D'Intino is developing a Multi-Touch display called Orion mt. He's working on a multi-touch plug-in for NASA World Wind.
This would be a cool way of exploring the world for students who have access to multi-touch screens at school!
The plug-in is a work in progress. You can download the latest version from Paul's blog.
Paul is "Fairlane" on the NUI Group's forums.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Design Considerations: Touch screen interaction, mobile computing, and Synaptics
Keeping with my theme of touch-screen interaction, I thought I'd share some information about the work of Synaptics. I am not sure if Synaptics is venturing into the world of large touch-screen interaction, given their focus on laptops and smaller devices. From looking over the company's documents, it is clear that some of what they do could translate effectively to the large-screen arena.
Example: Synaptic's YouTube video about the use of gesture interaction with laptops:
Synaptics Presents: Things You Can Do with a Gesture
According to the company's website,
"Synaptics is the leading worldwide developer of user interface solutions for mobile computing, communications and entertainment devices. Our mission is to enrich the interaction between users and their intelligent devices. Synaptics products emphasize ease of use,small size, low power consumption, advanced functionality, durability and reliability, making them applicable to a multitude of markets, including notebook computers, PC peripherals, mobile phones, and portable entertainment devices such as MP3 players."
Kevin Arthur's Touch Usability Blog
(Kevin is a usability analyst who works with touch interfaces at Synaptics)
Voltage's Post "Best Practices of Touch Screen Interface Design"
Voltage Creative
Design and the Bottom-Line
Voltage's Post "Your Customers Care about Design, Even if they Don't"
"A 3-year Fortune-500 study conducted by research firm Homepage" href="http://www.peerinsight.com/index.php">Peer Insight found companies focused on customer-experience design outperformed the S&P 500 by 10-to-1 from 2000-2005. One more time for those in the back: that was 10-1. Your customers care about design; a lot; ten-to-one a lot. Even if they don’t (know it)."
Saturday, March 1, 2008
Interactive touch displays for ordering meals at the table? Link to article from the Sunday Times Online
Photo from the Sunday TimesAlthough this form of table-top computing is not the same as Microsoft's Surface concept, it is a move in the right direction.
Information from the Conceptic website:
"With networked LCD touch screens installed at each table, diners can - at the touch of a mouse or the screen- not only order and pay for their drinks or food, but also select music and video, play games, chat with other customers, and more."
(I'd like to test the system for usability.)
Links:
"A clever touch at the restaurant: Diners can now view and order their dishes using a touchscreen at the table"
Conceptic
Friday, February 22, 2008
Convergence: Digital Out of Home Experience, Marketing, Pervasive Computing...
It is interesting to see how various digital technology sectors are overlapping and converging as make attempts to expand their markets, improve education.or make a social impact.
One example of this convergence is described in a recent post in Future-Making Serious Games, by Eliane Alahdeff about Reatrix, a company that focuses on interactive digital OOH marketing and "brand play". 
Excerpt from the Reatrix website:
"The unique Reactrix advertising and entertainment experience leads to unsurpassed media effectiveness, made possible by proprietary reactive technology that projects vivid branded messages onto 6-foot by 8-foot surfaces. Images instantly respond to movement or gestures, creating a participatory media experience that allows brands to "come alive" and invites people to interact with them."
I haven't come across anything from Reactrix in the course of my daily life, but when I do, I'll be sure to have my video camera ready! I wouldn't want to be disappointed.
Note:
To get a better understanding of this phenomenon, do a search on the following terms or combination of terms:
Off-the-desktop, Internet tablets, interactive whiteboards, web-enabled cell phones, sensors, GPS, GIS, "digital-out-of- home" (Digital OOH),digital signage, interactive kiosks, advergaming, wayfinding, pathfinding, "in the wild", pervasive computing, ubiquitous computing, mobile, interactive, ambient, mScapes, serious games, social spaces, public places, networked real estate, touch screens, intelligent buildings, user-centered design, user-centered content, usability, user experience design, interaction design.
