You know how everyone and their mama can’t live without touchscreens these days. The problem is that touch-enabled surfaces tend to cost much more than their non-touch counterparts. No more.
A low cost system called STATINA developed by Nanyang Technological University (NTU) relies on the principles of vibration and imaging to track the movements of multiple fingers and of objects to achieve the same thing. With this technology it will be possible to retrofit existing flat-panel TVs and transform them into new, touch sensitive display screens, at only a fraction of the cost of new touch-sensitive display screens.
By using a few low-cost vibration sensors and a specially developed algorithm, the system can pinpoint the location of a light tap on any surface. When further equipped with (again low-cost) web-cameras, this system can also track the movements of multiple fingers or objects on any surface.
NTU Assistant Professor Andy Khong, who led the research, says STATINA has been proven on different types of large surfaces, hence we’re not surprised researchers won the Prestigious Engineering Achievement Award 2012, presented by The Institution of Engineers Singapore (IES) last December.
For instance, the system was used to transform surfaces such as wooden tables, aluminum, steel, glass and even plastics into low-cost touch screens. “It means in future, you could play computer games or draw sketches on walls or windows since almost all surfaces can be made touch-sensitive with our system,” says Prof Khong. He and his team of researchers are now working to commercialize their invention by developing a more compact system and expanding its capabilities to include tracking of fingers and stylus movements using optical cameras…
Not sure how this is related to mobile but I love how it sounds… What do you think?
[Via: CellularNews]