Dec 1, 2009

Virtual Carol Singing Experiment on Britain's ITV, via Tracy Swedlow

ITV's "This Morning" Teams with YouTube on "Virtual Choir" Promotion -Tracy Swedlow

ITV, the U.K. Independent Television Network, is inviting viewers to participate in a virtual Christmas choir. If you want to participate download the headphone track, and sing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas". When you are ready, get out turn on your videocam, keep your headphones in, and sing along to the track. When you have finished, you'll upload the video to YouTube.

If you can follow the headphone track and sing the carol in tune, you might just have a chance to be seen as part of a montage of videos, either singing the carol in all at once with your virtual choir-mates, or as part of one carol sung by many people, one at a time.

How to participate:


ITV This Morning website

ITV This Morning YouTube Channel

Nov 29, 2009

Tabletop Conference in Banff: Martin Kaltenbrunner's post on the Tangible Interaction Frameworks blog

I'd like to share with you a link to a great post covering the recent Interactive Tabletops and Surfaces conference in Banff, Canada. The post was written by Martin Kaltenbrunner, author of the Tangible Interaction Frameworks blog, and is packed with info and interesting links:

Tabletop Conference in Banff

Martin was impressed by the iLabat the University of Calgary.  He also mentioned the work of researchers from the Media Computing Groupat RWTH Aachen University known for SLAP, and the Media Interaction Lab at the Upper Austria University of Applied Sciences, known for CRISTAL.

Info about Martin from his website:

"Martin Kaltenbrunner, co-founder of Reactable Systems, is a Ph.D. candidate at the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, Spain. His research concentrates on tangible user interfaces and human computer interaction in general, topics he has been also teaching at the Kunstuniversität Linz, Universitat Pompeu Fabra and UCP Porto. Recently he has been mainly working on the human computer interaction concepts of the Reactable - an electronic musical instrument with a tangible user interface. He is author of the open source tangible interaction framework reacTIVision and the related TUIO protocol, which has been widely adopted for open source multi-touch applications."


RELATED

Previous Posts



For an overview of what Interactive Tabletops and Surfaces is about, take a careful look of the video from the 2008 conference, credits listed below:


Video Credits (in order of appearance, Tabletop 2008):
1. System Design for the WeSpace: Linking Personal Devices to a Table-Centered Multi-User, Multi-Surface Environment. Jiang, H., Wigdor, D., Forlines, C., Shen, C.
2. Group Coordination and Negotiation through Spatial Proximity Regions around Mobile Devices on Augmented Tabletops, Kray C., Rohs, M., Hook, J. Kratz, S.
3. Tabletop AgilePlanner: A Tabletop-Based Project Planning Tool for Agile Software Development Teams
Wang, X., Maurer, F.
4. TableTrays: Temporary, Reconfigurable Work Surfaces for Tabletop Groupware. Pinelle, D., Stach, T., Gutwin, C.
5. IntuPaint: Bridging the Gap Between Physical and Digital Painting. Vandoren, P., Laerhoven, T., Claesen, L., Taelman, J., Raymaekers, C., Reeth, F.
6. Experiences with Building a Thin Form-Factor Touch and Tangible Tabletop. Izadi, S., Butler, A., Hodges, S., West, D., Hall, M., Buxton, B., Molloy, M.
7. ShapeTouch: Leveraging Contact Shape on Interactive Surfaces, Cao, X., Wilson, A., Balakrishnan, R., Hinckley, K., Hudson, S.
8. PocketTable: Mobile Devices as Multi-Touch Controllers for Tabletop Application Development, Hafeneger, S., Weiss, M., Herkenrath, G., Borchers, J.
9. Presenting using Two-Handed Interaction in Open Space, Vlaming, L., Smit, J., Isenberg, T.
10. DepthTouch: Using Depth-Sensing Camera to Enable Freehand Interactions on and Above the Interactive Surface Benko, H., and Wilson, A.
11. Pokey: Interaction Through Covert Structured Light. Wren, C., Ivanov, Y., Beardsley, P., Kaneva, B., Tanaka, S.
12. Creating Malleable Interactive Surfaces using Liquid Displacement Sensing. Hilliges, O. Kim, D., Izadi, S.
13. Collaborative Interaction and Integrated Spatial Information and Services in Disaster Management, Fruijtiera, S., Dulkb, P., Diasc, E.


Nov 28, 2009

Via Stefano Baraldi's On the Tabletop Blog: Concept-mapping and Shared Sketching on a Multi-touch Table with EDiT, at 21minutes..

"Will playful and natural technology/design help people towards a better communication in order to understand each other? I do hope so, and the research continues." -Stefano Baraldi


Stefano Baraldi is the author of the On the Tabletop blog.  He recently blogged about 21 minutes, an open project event that involves 21 speakers discussing important passages in their lives in an attempt to share the essence of their research towards excellence. Stefano's post:  21minutes: a live interactive sketching experience



"EDiT has been used for shared sketching and note taking during the 21min event. Gilead Sher, the former Israeli negotiator was one of the guests, showed great interest in the technology and application."
Note:  Some of the video is in Italian.


Stefano was asked to produce an interactive sketching experience using multi-touch technology to assist the speakers and the chairman of the event (Patrizio Paoletti) in drawing knowledge structures.Pierpaolo Vittoria, a mind mapper, used Stafano's application to record the ideas shared during the 21 minutes event.
More about Stefano:
Stefano Baraldi's Ph.D. research topic was "TableTop Interaction for the Management of Cognitive Structures", in which he investigated 'the emergent world of TableTop devices and interaction techniques applied to groupware, knowledge management, enhanced meetings and constructive learning."


I am especially looking forward to reading his chapter in an upcoming book:
S.Baraldi, “Making the Classroom a play-ground for Knowledge”. Chapter in book “The Classroom of the Future”, curators M kitalo-Siegl, Kaplan, Zottman & Fischer. Pages 30-60 in section “Knowledge building in physical and virtual learning spaces”. Sense Publisher.




SOMEWHAT RELATED
The video below is a mixed-reality project Stefano worked on during his graduate studies. This project was a collaboration between the University of Florence, the University of Bologna, and other researchers, using a tangible user interfaces:
TANGerINE Inspirational Cube


Via Stefano Baraldi:

This post was moved to:
http://interactivemultimediatechnology.blogspot.com/2009/11/via-stefano-baraldis-on-tabletop-blog.html

Fantasy HCI! Dream Lab and Dream Team for the Future

Fantasy HCI!  

My wish is to have my own lab so I can create and test out various interactive applications that run on screens of all sizes, and play with new interactive gadgets and displays. I'd also like to provide mobile lab services so I can go out and see how emerging technologies play out in real-life situations and settings during the design & development process as well as after-market.

I'd like to focus on social-collaborative & cognitive aspects of emerging technologies. Because of my background in school psychology, I'd work towards ensuring that new applications, technologies, and systems follow the guidelines of Universal Design for Learning as well as Universal Usability. I have some ideas about the transdisciplinary characteristics I'd like to see for members of the lab's Dream Team, but I'm saving that for another post. Now I just need to win the lottery so I can hire my team and run with the ball. Team Charlotte, N.C., anyone?

FYI:
The HCI link is to a blog that corresponds to the Theory and Research in Human Computer Interaction class at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. 

For more information about HCI, visit the Human-Computer Interaction Resources website.

Quick Post: Video of Stantum's Multi-touch "Slate PC" Digital Resistive Touch Screen Netbook



The video is is of the Stantum Slate PC, via Netbooked's YouTube channel...The system in the video is running on a modded Dell Mini 10, and doesn't require calibration. Notice how the system easily handles a variety of interaction- fingers, thumbs, pinch, rotation, multiple finger swipes, brush strokes, fingernail action, stylus, and more.

At this time, the Stantum Slate is available for developers only.

RELATED POSTS

Stantum's Multi-touch Slate PC, Windows 7 Certified (11/17/09)
Interactive multi-touch for sound design, dj-ing, and music creation (10/25/09)
Stantum's Mobile Phone Multi-touch Interface:  Demonstration of precise interactions on a resistive touch screen (9/7/09)
Updates about NextWindow and Stantum; Upcoming Emerging Displays Technologies Conference (6/2/09)

FYI:   Netbooked's Netbook Blog