New ways of reading books

Following my previous post, here another example on how iPad and the new tablet devices are going to change the way we read, learn and interact with books and magazines:

Multitouch devices and education

We have been discussing a lot about the possibilities of multitouch interfaces, speculating about their real advantages over traditional interaction paradigms.

But now, with the current explosion of the iPad and a huge assortment of new multitouch tablet devices to come, we have now real and fully functional applications.

The example of the following video is really very representative. It's really a good example on how these new devices, multitouch enabled, with the new refreshing way of approaching to user interfaces, can undoubtely change fields such as education, magazines, books etc.

AR at SkyNews

A very interesting AR demo from Total Immersion at SkyNews. Visit this specialised AR French company website for additional online demos and videos.

Without any doubt, Augmented Reality is becoming more and more popular.

An online Augmented Reality application really useful

Although we have been able to see a lot of Augmented Reality (AR) applications recently, some even online (based on Flash, for example), it is not common to see some real useful examples. I mean, examples where the use of the AR is really interesting and contributes to the final product.

A good example of this is the U.S. Postal Priority Mail with its Virtual Box application. Visit their website, and see the demo video to get the final idea.

"Which box fits your shipment?" By using AR, the user can print a pattern, and can visually explore if the different box sizes are or not appropriate for the object the user want to send. The boxes are visualized with transparency, so they can visually compare the size of the object to send vs. the box. Great and useful.

Another video about Microsoft's Natal project

Another video of a real demo of this new project from Microsoft called Natal project.
This time, it's not an advert but a real and live demo.

'We' are the interface !

It's really impressive what Microsoft is preparing under the codename 'Project Natal'.

Is this the Wii killer ? I don't know but if it works as in the demo, we are going to go beyond the actual standards ...

Envisioning the future ...

If there's something really difficult is to predict the future. Microsoft has tried to do it in this video.
What it seems true is that pervasive computing and advanced GUI are going to be an essential key.

Enjoy the video ... what's your opinion ?

<a href="http://video.msn.com/?mkt=en-GB&amp;playlist=videoByUuids:uuids:a517b260-bb6b-48b9-87ac-8e2743a28ec5&amp;showPlaylist=true&amp;from=shared" target="_new" title="Future Vision Montage">Video: Future Vision Montage</a>

Kodu: a new game programming environment for kids

Game programming has always been considered one of the most difficult programming fields. As a computer graphics lecturer and a former game programmer, when I was a teenager actually, I can not say the opposite.

Processing is an excellent framework for those interested in developing games without having to use more low-level API's or development environments.

XNA, visit this and this, is perhaps the perfect choice if you want to use a specific API for computer game development. It is based on .NET and has the additional advantage of letting the game to be deployed directly into a Xbox console.

Thinking basically in new developers, beginners and those who do not want to know anything about programming, Microsoft is about to launch Kodu.

Kodu is not just a game, is a game generator. Using a graphical language, it offers the opportunity to develop computer games without a single line of code.

It is better to see it in action:




Kodu has been created by Microsoft. The project web site can be found here.

QuickHandNote - A note-taking application

I'm a digital tablet user and I love tablet PC's. When I was a Windows user, OneNote was my tool of choice. Now, using mainly Linux and Mac OS, I have to say I have not found something similar. So, I decided to develop my own tool: QuickHandNote.

QuickHandNote is a project which objective is the creation of a notetaking application especially designed for teaching purposes, thinking overall in electronic whiteboards, digital tablets and tablet pcs.

I have developed it using processing with Eclipse. Actually, this project is an experiment about the real possibilities of processing in the development of real applications.

You are invited to test and cooperate: http://sourceforge.net/projects/quickhandnote/

It will be fantastic to receive suggestions or bugs. At the sourceforge site of the project, you can find a tracker, called 'Bugs', where you can post any suggestion or bug of yours.

I have tested it in Mac OS, Linux and Windows. The only drawing tool is a handwriting one, but I'm preparing now much more. The results can be saved in a XML format file and can be also exported to PDF.

Try Augmented Reality on-line !

In my profile, you can see a photo of mine I took using ARToolKit.

Based on ARToolKit, at Boffswana web-site, you can enjoy a complete example of an AR application based on optical tracking without having to install anything.

It's really very funny and easy to use (if you use a Mac, read the instructions carefully).

The example was developed using FLARToolkit which, at the same time, is based on NyARToolkit (a Java/C#/Android ARToolKit wrapper without native code).

An example with myself again:

Wii Fit - There's no limits in Nintendo's imagination

Wii fit is going to be the next Nintendo's toy everybody is going to talk about, and the truth is that it seems there's no limits for the range of possibilities we're going to enjoy with it.

It's not the future, it's the present. The conception of computer game is continuously reinvented by Nintendo.

Enjoy the video:

An amazing 2D physics game

Visit Kloonigames web site and enjoy a very simple but effective 2D physics game. It's perfect for children (and those not so child...)

See a fantastic video of it with a tablet pc (although a tablet is not required to play with it):

Another nice look to the future - UMPC

Uhmm... again, a refreshing new look to what Ultra Mobile technology will be able to offer us in a near future ...

Microsoft Surface - selling old things as new ones

Microsoft is now presenting Microsoft Surface. The web site is really beautiful, the videos fantastic, the marketing impressive... as usual. However, the product they show is not new. In previous posts you can see similar products.

But it is always interesting to see how Microsoft is able to get previous ideas, remake them, and sell them in a way they can reach everyone. It's Microsoft, and one of the advantages is that thanks to them the ones like me, who love these new interaction devices, are going to have more chances to purchase these products.

Explore the Microsoft Surface website, it's very interesting.

Here, some videos of this 'new' product. Thanks again to Jordi Camarasa for this information.


Microsoft Surface Computing - The Possibilities



Details Of MS Surface

Another video about multi-touch screens

I have found another excellent video on multi-touch screens (thanks to Jordi Camarasa), where Jeff Han and Phil Davidson (see their website) demonstrate this technology is really very useful.

Enjoy it.

Tangible user interfaces and music

The Music Technology Group (Pompeu Fabra University of Barcelona) specializes in audio processing technologies and their music and multimedia applications.

Among several research projects, I have found a very interesting one: reactable (see http://mtg.upf.edu/reactable/)

reactable, as you can see in the following videos, is characterized by the use of a Tangible User Interface in the production of sounds and music.







Don't lose the opportunity to test this software. It's open source. You can get it here.

At reactable website, there's also a fantastic collection of similar projects, all with videos ready to be enjoyed. See them here.

Intelligent interfaces in CAD

Have you ever worked with a 3D CAD system ? It is really time consuming... In order to get some results, you need a lot of time.

New AI techniques can provide very interesting results to this problem. A solution can be the use of handwork or sketches as input in those systems. The problem is however, how can these sketches be transformed into technical and accurate geometry.

GIDeS++ is a good example. From the authors we can read the following:

With the advent of new interaction techniques and supporting hardware we should look beyond traditional WIMP (Windows, Icons, Menus, and Pointers) interfaces. Mouse and keyboard are by far the most widespread input devices and have been around for a good many years. However, before these, designers have been using pen and paper for an even longer period. GIDeS++ is a tool that adopts the paper-and-pencil metaphor to bridge the gap between designers’ and modellers’ innate ability at freehand drawing and the more elaborate and structured methods required by traditional CAD systems. GIDeS++ offers handwriting recognition for both gestures and measures, combined speech recognition as an alternative to floating toolbars and a set of innovative, simple and efficient tools that allow for quick prototyping and modification of three-dimensional shapes.

In the following video, a bit long but very interesting, you can see the product in action:



You can get more information of this system here. In this website, you can enjoy with more videos and even to download the product itself. Inevo is the company behind.

Motion capture as a 3D modeling tool

Recently, via Gizmodo (thanks to Ignacio Bellver for the link), we were able to see an amazing work from a sweedish group called FRONT.

The idea is quite simple and not new, but perfectly undertaken. Using 3D motion capture, it is possible to design 'in situ' a collection of new furnitures. After this process, real size models are generated (using stereolithography).

More information can be found at Dexigner web site here.

Finally the link to this impressive demonstration of the process:

Virtualizing my 'chaotic' physical desk

How is your physical desk ? I mean your everyday work table... In my case, oops. A really messy one.

So, now, imagine your computer desktop with an almost identical interface of the one you use in the 'real' world.

See what I'm talking about in the following video:



You can see more information of this new interface in its original website here. (Thanks to David Siñuela for this link).

Do you see what I mean ? I'm not quite sure this is going to help my chaotic way to organize my life :) But, seriously, it's a fantastic example of what we will have as our new desktop.

Tangible User Interface - A new approach on how to interact with computers

A tangible user interface is a user interface in which a person interacts with digital information through the physical environment

Wikipedia definition

Tangible User Interface (TUI) is something I have recently rediscovered. Some time ago, I read something about it, and now, working on topics related to augmented reality, I have found out that this field is growing up very quickly with a lot of solutions and people working on it.

The idea is quite simple: use physical objects (sometimes even tools we use every day) in order to interact and work with computers. This concept means that using technologies like computer vision, tracking devices, touch screens etc. the system is able to know how the user is manipulating a collection of physical objects, and then it is able to translate these actions into events in the computer interface.

There's a basic paper you should read in order to understand this concept. The author is one of the TUI parents (Hiroshi Ishii). The title is Tangible Bits: Towards Seamless Interfaces between People, Bits and Atoms. You can get it in pdf here. Please, read it.

Professor Hiroshi Ishii is in fact, the leader of one of the most important research groups working on that, the tangible media group at MIT. If you want to see how a group of researchers can combine work and fun, research and pleasure, don't lose the chance to see the projects they have developed and they are working on ... and there are some very amazing videos. In fact, I put one of them in one of my first posts here.

Although it is clear that TUI has a great future, there's a lot to do in order to see real applications. The key is to be able to find something clearly easier to do with a TUI than with any other approach.

As usual, I like to look for some videos about the topic. Again, I invite you to see the videos at the tangible media group.

Although Prof. Hiroshi with his paper began this new field, in the following video, you can see that in 1990 people from Xerox was working on the concept:



An from the MIT, the SenseTable: