Did
you ever see a sci-fi movie in which they had some really cool gadgets
that you just had to have… if they would exist? Or in which they used
some pretty amazing technology-yet-to-be-invented? Well, today
Microsoft turned a little piece of science fiction into science faction
with the launch of Microsoft Surface.
Microsoft Surface
is a device that could well be the next step in how we interact with
computers and applications. Forget the keyboard, forget the mouse. Just
a 30″ diagonal touch-sensitive display table giving you access to your
applications using nothing but your fingers. Sounds just like
touch-screens? Not quite: it goes a lot further: Surface also allows
interactions with other objects placed on top of it, like eg mobile
phones, mp3 players (I wonder if it’s gone be iPod or Zune 
), … So you could copy pictures from your digital camera onto your
mobile phone just by placing them both on the Surface and drag them
-using your fingers- from one device to the other.
Or imagine this: you’re looking for a new mobile phone. You walk
into a store and want some information on the latest models. You place
them on the MS Surface counter and immediately a comparison table
appears of all the features of the mobile phones you picked out. Pretty
neat, ey!
In terms of advertising, the possibilities are virtually limitless.
Think of it as digital signage (the TV screen advertising networks in
stores etc) … turning interactive. Not so long ago I posted an article on the LUON blog
on the touch-screen ad by Nokia for its new N95 mobile phone. Very
impressive campaign, but imagine what you could do with a device like
Surface…
Technically, it consists of:
- a piece of holographic glass
- a projector that can shoot images at the glass
- two cameras, aimed at the glass
- a computer running a version of Windows Vista
- software written in Windows Presentation Foundation
Want to see it in action? Take a look at this video:
