Wearable Multi-touch Interaction Anywhere

Through time, we have utilized our five given senses to surmount information from our surroundings. In this new digital age, we have tools to access digital information with the aid of computer devices that we use through carefully tailored interfaces crucial to properly facilitating interaction. Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) prioritizes the study, planning and design of the interaction between human users and computer hardware. The most important facet of HCI is user satisfaction, and wearable multi-touch interaction hopes to bridge the gap between the end user and the interface they use to access computer information. The future of information access embodies the idea of “wearable depth-sensing and projection system that enables interactive multitouch applications on everyday surfaces,” using the surface real estate of any object around you, or your own body, to interact with it.

Pocket projectors, mirrors, and cameras come together to create a wearable device. The depth camera senses if the user is touching the surface by using dynamic template matching. It looks for a steep positive derivative followed by a region of relative smoothness then followed by a region of steep negative derivative. If the camera senses something with these characteristics, then the device inherently surmounts that region is the location of the user’s hand or finger. The small projector that displays the image that the user will interact with. Using hand gestures on the surface supported by many Multi-touch based systems lets a user zoom in, zoom out, or pan through content using flood filling algorithm that allows “click and drag” motions. A user can even draw in the air while mapping applications augment the gestures into interaction instructions or process the information as written notes. To determine if a user has clicked a button, the interaction system uses a flood-filling algorithm. This technique starts at the mid-point of the finger and fills in neighboring pixels towards the finger tip until it reaches a threshold. The threshold is broken, a click will be registered with the system.

The miniaturization of computing devices allows us to stay connected to information and communication available through the devices we carry with us. These new devices offer the ability to interact with technology on any surface, a keyboard, a watch, or creation of a free drawing would open be able to be accessed, allowing interactivity on an array of surfaces with your body as the mediator between the surface and technology.