vizualz

Why Knot?: “

(via FoundByJames/via triangulationblog)

“

(Via swissmiss.)

The BendDesk solution to desktop multi-touch: “

To paraphrase Steve Jobs, a central problem with multitouch as a desktop user interface is that we need to work with our hands on the horizontal (think of the keyboard, mouse, or tablet on your desk) and view on the vertical (the monitor in front of you). Jobs indicated that Apple testing showed users’ arms would become fatigued from constantly reaching out to touch a vertical monitor.

Well, check out Media Computing Group’s BendDesk concept, a wicked touch display that curves like a halfpipe:

I have problems believing something this bulky will become the dominant solution, but I think it’s a neat and important step in the development of desktop multitouch. And as CNET’s Ed Moyer suggests, I’d love to be able to modify Photoshop docs with my hands, then flick the finished image up onto the vertical part of the screen to examine.

via engadget

(more…)“

(Via core77.com’s design blog.)

Felix Vorreiter’s handheld skywriter: “

More proof that it takes (x) years to make an overnight success: Karlsruhe-based communications designer Felix Vorreiter invented the txtBOMBER back in 2005, but it’s just in the past few days that it’s exploded onto the blogosphere.

What is it? It’s basically a handheld skywriter that prints on walls using an Arduino processor and seven markers. Pretty damn rad!

TEXTBOMER from H@nnes at HfG on Vimeo.

(more…)

“

(Via core77.com’s design blog.)

iPhoneBook: “

Mobile Art Lab in Japan created a picture book using the iPhone.

(via minordetails)

“

(Via swissmiss.)

LG’s “Design the Future” design competition winners: “

LG has announced the winners of their 3rd Annual Design the Future Competition, which asked entrants to ‘define the future of mobile communication’ via a design for a cell phone. Oddly, the press release does not include images of the winning design (done by Virginia Tech ID students Zack Filbert, Chris Carpenter, James Connors, and Kees Luyendijk) but does include runners up:

The second place winning entry – titled Premium – is a mobile phone with 3D interface that connects the phone and the car together to adjust in-car climate, control the infotainment system, select seat memory, check tire pressure, gauge the fuel amount, etc. It should come as no surprise that the winner, Nouphone Bansasine, is a professional car designer.

This year’s competition marked the first-ever Prop Mater’s Choice Award which was given to Dua Xiong for his cutting-edge design titled the Flutter. A smartphone that fans open to reveal a beautiful flexible OLED touch screen that scrolls radially, the Flutter has won the opportunity to be featured in future blockbuster film.

Participants submitted a wide range of ideas including accessories and concepts for the disabled. For example, an honorable mention – titled Atlas – is a smartphone that docks into a base which projected the pages, so you can view multiple applications simultaneously. The dock features a tracking system which senses your hand gestures, so you can spin the pages in a loop and zoom in and out.

Another honourable mention – titled Surface – is a watch phone for the blind and features a Braille keypad and a unique shape, so you can distinguish orientation of the phone by feel.

(more…)

“

(Via core77.com’s design blog.)

More Browser Fun: A MIDI-to-YouTube Converter, Sequencer: “

Youtube MIDI interface from Gijs on Vimeo.

Among Gijs Gieskes many mad creations, this artist has hacked the browser as well as hardware. (’Browser bending,’ anyone?) With all the talk of browsers, he reminds us of this previous work, which combines hardware, server software, and browser software to make a MIDI sequencer for YouTube.

http://gieskes.nl/browserjockey/hardware/yt-midi/
http://gieskes.nl/browserjockey/youtube-tracker/

From the hardware description:

A arduino usb hid keyboard emulator is used to convert midi note messages to keypresses. This can be usefull to controle online videos with midi, in combination with the youtube mixer (uses the youtube javascript api).

“

(Via Create Digital Motion.)

Augmented Projection: “Magic Projection” Creates Elegant Moving Screens: “

Where better in the world to introduce elegant moving screens than a country that made narrative on flat surfaces come alive, from painted screens to manga?

Magician, visualist, and technologist Marco Tempest sends this brilliant video documentation of the work he’s been doing with what he calls ‘Magic Projection.’ The technique is simple – and extraordinarily effective. Infrared tracking points in the screen, coupled with extremely efficient vision analysis software on the computer, produce a perfectly-scaled image. Beyond that, everything is Marco’s own ingenuity. (One reason I think we all have a lot to learn from Marco is that his sense of how to do things as a magician is different from how a lot of us with arts backgrounds approach developing our techniques.)

This is, of course, markedly different from manual projection mapping, which requires that you scale your image by hand to whatever surface you’re using.

The tools are all free and open source. Our friend Zach Lieberman, a fantastically-skilled coder and originator of OpenFrameworks, worked to develop the project with OF, Intel’s free vision library OpenCV, free hardware platform Arduino, and Sony PS 3 Eye drivers MacCam. (OpenFrameworks, for those of you just joining us, is the Processing-inspired, artist-friendly C++ coding platform.)

Description from Marco:

Here is my ‘Magic Projection’ system out on the streets in Tokyo. ‘Magic Projection’ is my new Augmented Reality Projection Tracking system created for use in my magic stage performances. Have a look and let me know what you think.

The system works by tracking embedded infrared LED tracking markers in lightweight screens with a modified PS3 EyeToy camera and then fits projected video images onto moving screens at 120 fps.

In addition it features a virtual spotlight to light the performer while holding the screen without spilling light onto the projection surface, real-time 2D particle physics, an electronic whiteboard and a 3D function that rotates 3D objects in real time in relationship to the screen angle relative to the projector.

And yes, I was a bit lazy and didn’t link to Johnny Lee’s work, which inspired this (and is credited accordingly):

Foldable Displays (tracked with the Wiimote)

The Wiimote also works effectively; Marco is instead using the PS3 Eye, which will also work as a camera feed if that’s important. Lee’s creation plays with the idea of folding, but as you can see, the idea is familiar. (Thanks, John Holdun!)