A Look Beneath the ‘Surface’
May 31, 2007
Hajsky writes “Ars Technica takes a closer look at Microsoft’s new “Surface” tabletop device. Turns out that Surface isn’t actually a touchscreen at all, but uses five cameras located in the table’s base to record movement and touch. ‘The five cameras are near-infrared devices, but that’s not because they are trying to read heat signatures from fingertips (or other body parts) on the table. Instead, it’s because the entire surface of Surface is bathed in light; by illuminating the top of the table, the cameras can easily see when things are placed on it. Shining colored light across the surface of the table would spoil the effect that Microsoft wants, so near-infrared light is used for invisible illumination.’ The whole setup runs on a Core 2 Duo and off-the-shelf hardware, and can handle 52 simultaneous touches.” jfanning wrote with a link to an overview of similar technology used in the Helsinki ‘CityWall’. The article she provides discusses the unique public display, and has an in-depth video on the way these kinds of setups work.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
