User Interface and Digital Cameras: Gizmodo's Detailed Visual Tour; PMA 2009

I just love it when someone takes the time to do a detailed review of a broad spectrum of user interfaces, with loads of comments and pics. Matt Buchanan, of Gizmodo, has done so in his recent post, Click: A Visual Tour of Camera Interfaces. Matt has a nice section dedicated to cameras with touchscreen user interfaces, with all of the touch-screen pictures in one spot. He liked the Sony camera touch screen UI the best.

I liked one of the comments to Matt's post:

"Yeah, but when will they come out with a UI that my grandmother can use on her own without calling me every d--- time she wants to know how to turn on the camera and take a picture?"
-someoneUKno

Someday.

More about cameras: PMA 2009

Dell's All-In-One Studio One 19, With Optional Multi-touch Technology Released in Japan

Via BusinessWire

Photo via Rafe Needleman/CNET

Dell's Studio One 19 All-in-One System Fits Anywhere in the Home
(BusinessWire)

Here are the specs from the press release:

• Easy multi-touch photo editing, slideshow creation, playlist compilation, notes, and even web browsing.
• Unleash creativity with You Paint finger painting software.
• Record videos and upload directly to YouTube with the touch of a finger.
• Flick to Flickr – Upload photos to Flickr to share with family and friends.
• Create a musical masterpiece with the multi-touch percussion center.

†Software is optional and works with multi-touch configurations only.

Power & performance:

• Intel® Celeron, Dual Core Celeron, Pentium Dual Core, Core 2 Duo, and Core 2 Quad Core Processor options
• Choice of nVidia GeForce 9200 or GeForce 9400 integrated graphics^[i]
• Up to 4GB^[ii] dual channel memory
• Up to 750GB^[iii] HDD
• Slot load Optical drive
• 7-in-1 media card reader, six USB ports
• Optional integrated wireless, web camera, Blu-ray Disc™
• Optional multi-touch capability
• Optional facial recognition security (with webcam)

According to Warner Crocker, from Gottabemobile, the Studio One All-in-One will be available in the U.S. later this spring, with a starting price for the non multi-touch version around $700.00.

I'll post more information about this soon!

Update

Here are a few more pics of the Studio One, via Darren Gladstone, PC World:

Multi-touch Drum Application on the Dell Studio One 19

Extensive PC World Review:

Dell Studio One 19: All-in-One Stunner Takes Japan

Update:

After I wrote this post, I received a comment from Nicolas (see below). If you are interested in this sort of interaction, take a look at lm3lab's touchless interaction. No fingerprints!

Digital Convergence & Interactive Television

The idea of interactive television was born long before the Internet era, but it never really emerged.

Why? Television programming was designed to be the opposite of interactive. The medium centered around lulling viewers into passive submission, with mesmerized minds wide open to the influence of entertainers, talking heads, and commercials. All of this helped to perpetuate our growing consumer economy, which was not really a bad thing, right?

It appears that interactive television is re-emerging. Today, DISH Network announced the premiere of HISTORY Interactive, "an enhanced 24/7 interactive (iTV) experience." A collaboration between HISTORY and Ensequence, DISH TV customers with an OpenTV-enabled receivers can watch the Battles BC series beginning Monday, March 9 ET/PT.

So now what?

To get a better understanding of this concept, I dug up some information and found myself somewhat entertained by the process. Take a look:

Interactive Television: A Short History Interactive Television Alliance
(Scroll down to the history section)

A "must-see" gem from 1998:

Welcome to Digital TV: A Cringely Crash Course, Robert X. Cringely, 1998, PBS Online

This interactive presentation includes a nice overview of the history of television. It also includes a letter written in 1998 by the late Fred Rogers, of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood. I love this quote:

"...Imagine how much more meaningful any television can be when children have a caring person sitting right there beside them ... someone who wants to listen to their questions or comments ... someone who encourages their careful looking and listening and learning! That's what I call "interactive."

"We're glad to be your neighbors, and we applaud all the "interactive" ways you and your family are using television." -Fred Rogers

Interactive Television Production Mark Gawlinski, 2003

The Road to Convergence: Network Transformation and IP David Russell, Converge Digest, 5/17/06

Development and Current Issues of Interactive Television in the UK pdf Barbara Katz, 2004(?)

Blog: bitdamaged - Mike Ryan, Interactive Television Specialist

Translation Please: Broadband cable TV technology explained by Leslie Ellis
Leslie's blog is a treasure of technical information related to trends in broadband television. The information on the blog is well-organized and newer technologies are tagged as "Translation Please 2.0". Here are a few of Leslie's posts that I found interesting:

Translation Please 2.0: Digging Deeper into DSG 06/02/08
A Wireless Decoder for Wired People 7/28/08
What's Up in the Upstream 2/23/09
Widget World (Widgets on your Interactive TV)

RELATED
Another Gem for techies and the tech-curious:
ODEN: The OCAP/EBIF Developer Network
"Founded in 2007, the mission of the OCAP/EBIF Developer Network (OEDN) community is to drive awareness of and development efforts using the two primary interactive cable television open standards for middleware: OCAP (known to consumers as tru2way) and EBIF."

"As interactive television application development for cable is a (relatively) young field, the initial focus of OEDN is on sharing information and facilitating communication between those "in the know" and those who are new to interactive television development - especially academic researchers and university students. As the community grows and its needs mature, this site will support deeper collaboration."

Update to this post, including information about boxee

Interaction with the Web of Things; LIFT '09

I recently came across the Web of Things blog and found it to be a gem. Vlad Trifa and Dominique Guinard are the brains behind the blog. They have lots of interesting ideas that are at the intersection of WSN (Wireless Sensor Networks) and HCI (Human Computer Interaction).

Vlad and Dominique recently presented at LIFT '09. If you haven't heard of Lift, take some time and visit the website:

"LIFT is a series of events to inspire and connect the community of doers and thinkers exploring the social impact of new technologies. Each LIFT conference is a three days experience made of talks, workshops, interactive art and discussions to understand and anticipate the most important social changes, and meet the people behind them."

Everything on the Web of Things blog inspired me to write two posts, back to back, on my Technology Supported Human World Interaction blog:

More cool things from the Web of Things blog

The Web of Things, Wireless Sensor Networks, Embedded Systems, and (Everyware) Health Care
(The above post was inspired by my experience at the Cleveland Clinic, spending time every day with my father, who has been in the cardio ICU since his surgery a few days ago.)

Microsoft and the Future of Interaction

Over the past week or so, I've heard quite a bit about Microsoft's vision for the future, across a variety of domains.

To get started, take a look at the following video from CES 2009: Microsoft Future Products Demo


Take a look at the Microsoft Office Labs Vision 2019 video, presented by Microsoft's Business Division president Stephen Elop at the Wharton Business Conference, via the istartedsomething blog:

&<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">lt</span>;a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">href</span>="http://video.msn.com/?mkt=en-GB&<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">playlist</span>=<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">videoByUuids</span>:<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">uuids</span>:a517b260-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">bb</span>6b-48b9-87ac-8e2743a28<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">ec</span>5&<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">showPlaylist</span>=true&from=shared" target="_new" title="Future Vision Montage">Video: Future Vision Montage&<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">lt</span>;/a>


Stephen Elop's Keynote Powerpoint Presentation Link

The Microsoft Office Labs Vision 2019 video sparked an interesting discussion in the comments section of the istartedsomething blog post.

There is more! Coldwell Banker will be using a customized home searching application using the technology of Microsoft Surface:




Futuristic Microsoft in the News:

Microsoft aims to turn PCs into personal assistants, teachers (or robot healers).
3/3/09, Byron Acohido, USA Today

Microsoft Mapping Course to a Jetsons-Style Future
3/2/09, Ashlee Vance, New York Times


Photo by Stuart Isett for The New York Times "Eric Horvitz, left, and Dan Bohus of Microsoft with the prototype of a virtual assistant that can understand its surroundings"

Stuart Isett for The New York Times "Hrvoje Benko demonstrating a Microsoft projection system that lets people manipulate large video images with their hands"

Yet another video:
Microsoft Research: A look at tomorrow's health solutions today: Part I
Laura Foy, 8/19/08


"In this special two-part video edition of House Calls for Healthcare Professionals, Bill Crounse, MD, visits with researchers at Microsoft Research. Each program reviews three promising areas of research that may one day lead to solutions with a direct or indirect application to health and healthcare. Viewers will gain insight to advanced ideas and technologies now in the labs at Microsoft Research long before they find their way into future products, solutions, or applications."


Surface Computing in Health Care: VitraView from InterKnowlogy:



Here is a 2008 video from Microsoft: Office Labs: Future of Personal Health Concept



Interesting concepts, but will they translate to the real world? Time will tell.

RELATED
Microsoft HealthVault Beta
3D Multi Touch Application for Heart Surgeries - Microsoft Surface and Health Vault
Microsoft Research Blogs

Tangible User Interfaces Part II: More Examples, Resources, and Use for TUI's in Education

In Part I of my "mini-series" about Tangible User Interfaces, I discussed the origins of TUI and provided some examples of Siftables. In this section, I've provided some links to information about Tangible User Interfaces and the abstracts of two articles pertaining to TUI's in educational settings.

Zen Waves: A Digital (musical) Zen Garden


reactable from Nick M. on Vimeo.

Reactable

More about the Reactable
"The reactable hardware is based on a translucent, round multi-touch surface. A camera situated beneath the table, continuously analyzes the surface, tracking the player's finger tips and the nature, position and orientation of physical objects that are distributed on its surface. These objects represent the components of a classic modular synthesizer, the players interact by moving these objects, changing their distance, orientation and the relation to each other. These actions directly control the topological structure and parameters of the sound synthesizer. A projector, also from underneath the table, draws dynamic animations on its surface, providing a visual feedback of the state, the activity and the main characteristics of the sounds produced by the audio synthesizer."

The Bubblegum Sequencer: Making Music with Candy


Jabberstamp: Embedding Sound and Voice in Children's Drawings(pdf)
(A TUI application to support literacy development in children)

Affective TouchCasting (pdf)

TapTap: A Haptic Wearable for Asynchronous Distributed Touch Therapy (pdf)

BodyBeats: Whole-Body, Musical Interfaces for Children (pdf)

Telestory is a Siftables application that looks like it would be quite useful for supporting children who have communication disorders or autism spectrum disorders.

Telestory Siftables application from Jeevan Kalanithi on Vimeo.

"Telestory is an educational, language learning application created by Seth Hunter. In this video, the child is looking at a television screen. He can control onscreen characters, events and objects with the siftables. For example, he has the dog and cat interact by placing the dog and cat siftables next to each other." TeleStory Project Website

Here is a video of how Siftables can be used as equation editors:

Siftables Equation Editor from Jeevan Kalanithi on Vimeo.

RESOURCES ABOUT TUI'S:

5 lessons about tangible interfaces, GDC Lyon, December 2007(pdf) Nicolas Nova

Special Issue on Tangible and Embedded Interaction (Guest Editors: Eva Hornecker, Albrecht Schmidt, Brygg Ullmer) Journal of Arts and Technology (IJART) Volume 1 Issue 3/4 - 2008

Reality-Based Interaction: A Framework for Post-WIMP Interfaces (pdf)

Here are a couple of abstracts of articles related to the use of TUI's in education:

Evaluation of the Efficacy of Computer-Based Training Using Tangible User Interface for Low-Functioning Children with Autism Proceedings of the 2008 IEEE International Conference on Digital Games and Intelligent Toys

"Recently, the number of children having autism disorder increases rapidly all over the world. Computer-based training (CBT) has been applied to autism spectrum disorder treatment. Most CBT applications are based on the standard WIMP interface. However, recent study suggests that a Tangible User Interface (TUI) is easier to use for children with autism than the WIMP interface. In this paper, the efficiency of the TUI training system is considered, in comparison with a conventional method of training basic geometric shape classification. A CBT system with TUI was developed using standard computer equipment and a consumer video camera. The experiment was conducted to measure learning efficacy of the new system and the conventional training method. The results show that, under the same time constraint, children with autism who practiced with the new system were able to learn more shapes than those participating in the conventional method."

Towards a framework for investigating tangible environments for learning Sara Price, Jennifer G. Sheridan, Taciana Pontual Falcao, George Roussos, London Knowledge Lab, 2008

"External representations have been shown to play a key role in mediating cognition. Tangible environments offer the opportunity for novel representational formats and combinations, potentially increasing representational power for supporting learning. However, we currently know little about the specific learning benefits of tangible environments, and have no established framework within which to analyse the ways that external representations work in tangible environments to support learning. Taking external representation as the central focus, this paper proposes a framework for investigating the effect of tangible technologies on interaction and cognition. Key artefact-action-representation relationships are identified, and classified to form a structure for investigating the differential cognitive effects of these features. An example scenario from our current research is presented to illustrate how the framework can be used as a method for investigating the effectiveness of differential designs for supporting science learning"