Multitouch Without Touch Using Wiimote

owlgorithm writes to mention that Gizmodo has a neat hack for the multitouch Holy Grail — multitouch without the touch. This hack turns the Wiimote into a receiver for IR light reflected from an emitter off of your fingers using reflective tape.

Comments

Good Point

[blhack]

At the end he makes a very good point. Your arms get tired after a while. As cool as the interface in minority report might be....it isn't very practical. Keyboard and mouse interfaces have lasted for so long because they are VERY VERY good....a mouse is a perfect way of interacting with your monitor...you're using a 2d surface to interface with another 2d surface (not to mention the fact that you can let go of a mouse, and it stays in the same place....unlike a wacom tablet, or this thing). If we ever get to a point where monitors truly are 3d (which seems rather pointless to me, albeit cool)...then something like this MIGHT make sense....that is if you tracked it in all 3 dimensions.

Re:Good Point

[Gibble]

Heaven forbid any of us geeks build up some arm strength by doing more than pushing a mouse around!

Re:Good Point

[LiquidCoooled]

I can see this owrking really nicely with a glass table.
Who says you have to aim at the tv?
It might work coming to the actual glass surface which means you could lay your arm down and rest it like a mouse but you have the third dimension when you need it.

Re:Good Point

[Tom]

You haven't seen Jeff Han's talk.

nerds at four o'clock!! (ok, slightly after...)

[xeno]

ok, i appreciate the true geekitude of taping your fingers with reflective stuff to air-type, but editing the video to 4:04 is just over the top nerdiness.

damn.

"Holy Grail" is pretty old tech already

[bobbaddeley]

The "Holy Grail" of multitouch without the touch is a pretty old problem. I've been working on something at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory for a while called the HI-Space table, and it was around before I came to the lab. It uses infrared and a camera and detects multiple inputs simultaneously, as well as object placed on the table. It doesn't require touching at all and works fairly well, detecting not only single fingers but each of the fingers, allowing the user to do different things with different arrangements of fingers. It understands motions as well, and can detect a swipe, circle, etc. Objects aren't tagged with anything special; they're just cardboard shapes.

Here's a video of the HI-Space table in action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFBoq1i81V4

Here's an old link to some of the work: http://infoviz.pnl.gov/hces/

Stuck in our past.

[bigattichouse]

Seems to me we always seem to be building technology to make old ideas into a reality. I've always felt that all these hands-free interface ideas look like wizards waving their hands around in the air. If they had eye-glass headsup displays, they'd look like they're casting spells or something.

Its not that it is indistinguishable from magic, its that were TRYING to make it look like that.

Just a thought.

Danger to eyes

[Anonymous Coward]

I would be careful making very bright infrared light. Because your eyes do not pick them up, your pupils will not know to shrink in bright infrared light.

I would suggest doing this in a very well lit room, and NEVER in the dark, or you will likely seriously damage your eyes.

Re:Danger to eyes

[francium de neobie]

Exactly the same thing I've been thinking after watching the demo. Although our eyes cannot see the IR light it can still pass onto the retina without much trouble. Using that thing for an extended period of time would quite probably damage the eyes.

The goggles they do nothing

[Earered]

I'm sorry for the awful picture you will get in your mind if you continue reading.

But it occured to me that you could use a penis instead of a finger (giving it another use beside: http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2007/03/21 )

(Why, oh why this thought came to me...)