If you have been worried that the continual gains in computing horsepower in smartphones was reaching the point of uselessness, you can breathe easier as Disney Research has discovered a new technology for touchscreens that will surely chew up computing cycles. The team in Pittsburgh has created a way to communicate tactile information creating a sensory illusion of 3D objects or textures when a user is touching a screen.
The first step in reaching this point was the discovery that people sense bumps in a surface due to the stretching of the skin in the fingertip. The stretching of the skin can be simulated by changing the friction of a surface causing the user to register the change as a bump or other change in elevation. The Disney researchers then got to work on adding electrostatic capabilities to a touchscreen that would result in the necessary changes in friction.
The final piece of their work was to produce an algorithm that analyzes what is being displayed on the screen and uses that to map the necessary electrostatic charges so changes could be generated on the fly as a user drags their finger across a screen.
The Disney researchers believe the technique is effective in fooling the user’s mind into thinking they feel bumps and ridges even though the surface stays flat the whole time. We have seen other illusions on computing devices, like parallax effects to simulate a visual 3D surface. This new method from Disney does something similar, but with the sense of touch. It seems like the applications for this new technology may be more far-ranging than creating optical illusions, especially for users with visual difficulties.
Check out the video below explaining the technology and then let us know in the comments how you think the technology could be used.
Click here to view the embedded video.
source: Disney Research
via: Gizmodo
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