skinput

Skinput turns your body into a touch screen | News.com.au

MICROSOFT researchers have developed technology to turn your skin into a touch screen.

Called "Skinput", it uses acoustic signals that travel through the body to track touch and movement.

Chris Harrison, a PHD student who joined Microsoft for three months to develop the technology, said it could eventually replace touch screen phones.

"Your palms could do everything an iPhone could do," Mr Harrison told news.com.au.

"If you consider your palm and fingers provide about as much surface area as a iPhone screen, you might begin to wonder if we shouldn't just use that as the touch screen surface."

The device is worn strapped around the bicep and projects an input interface onto the forearm or hand. Videos released by Microsoft show it being used to play retro games like Tetris and Frogger on a user's hand.

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Mr Harrison says Skinput works by detecting sound that travels through the body.

"Different locations sound different. The computer learns what each location sounds like, so that it can later identify it," he said.

He said the technology could also be used to make a new kind of wearable music player.

"Perhaps it has no buttons at all, and only uses the skin as the finger input canvas," he said.

"You could then just tap your fingers to advance to the next song, change the volume, or pause the current song."

The prototype technology was still in its testing stage and needed to be refined before a wider release, Mr Harrison said.

"We achieved high 90s per cent input accuracy in the lab — that's about one error in 20 key presses," he said.

"Accuracy would need to be increased before it could be a commercial product."

Links

Skinput research paper (PDF) — http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/redmond/gro...
More of Chris Harrison's projects — http://www.chrisharrison.net/projects/research.html