Touch, Multi-Touch & Gesture Responsive Web & Related Applications (helpful if you have a touch screen or IWB!)

I regularly share information about applications that work well on touch, multi-touch, and/or gesture-based screens.  Over the past few months, there have been updates and new developments that I'm still exploring. (Some of this information might be "old" news, but for many, it will be "new".)

Here's what I have to share today!

Be sure to explore the activities from the Kids section of the National Gallery of Art website, located at the end of this post.

MULTI-TOUCH FIREFOX

Sneak Peek on Multi-touch Events   Felipe Gomes, Felipe's Blog

Multi-touch on Firefox from Felipe on Vimeo.

Code Snippets from Felipe's Demo (Includes tracking divs, drawing canvas, image resizing, image crop, & pong) Mozilla Wiki
Bringing Multi-touch to Firefox and the Web
Christopher Blizzard, Mozilla Hacks

COOL IRIS
I have a hunch that someone out there is working on a multi-touch version of Cool Iris. Until I can find out the details, take a look at the videos below:


Cool Iris Overview on Google Chrome


 Here is a short video of what Cool Iris looks like on an iPhone:



Cool Iris Links
Cool Iris and iPhone
Cool Iris and Developers
Cool Iris Blog
Cool Iris Media/Press


About Cool Iris:   "Cooliris, Inc. was founded in January 2006 with a simple mantra: "Think beyond the browser". We focus on creating products that make discovering and enjoying the Web more exciting, efficient, and personal.Our core products include Cooliris (formerly PicLens), which transforms your browser into an interactive, full-screen "cinematic" experience for web media, and CoolPreviews, which lets you preview links instantly. Headquartered in Palo Alto, CA, our team consists of seasoned developers, entrepreneurs, and Stanford computer engineers. Each of us is passionate about serving our users without compromise and seeing that our products deliver the best experience."


BUMPTOP
Bumptop Gets Multi-touch Support on Windows 7


Bumptop Website
You can download Bumptop from the Bumptop website.  Here's the description:
"BumpTop is a fun, intuitive 3D desktop that keeps you organized and makes you more productive.  Like a real desk, but better.  Now with awesome mouse and multi-touch gestures!"
Anand Agarawala's Ted Talk

"Anand Agarawala presents BumpTop, a user interface that takes the usual desktop metaphor to a glorious, 3-D extreme, transforming file navigation into a freewheeling playground of crumpled documents and clipping-covered "walls.""

Discussion about Bumptop on the TED website

NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART KIDS
I've been compiling a list of websites that offer good touch-interaction.  One site that is good for children- and children at heart- is the National Gallery of Art's Kids pages.  There are a few entries that I had fun playing with students on the new SMARTboards at one of my schools:

FACES AND PLACES - LANDSCAPE




"FACES & PLACES encourages children of all ages to create portraits and landscape paintings in the style of American naive artists. By combining visual elements borrowed from more than 100 works in the National Gallery's permanent collection, this two-part interactive activity offers an overview of American folk art of the 18th and 19th centuries.(Shockwave, 6 MB)."


This one is so fun!  You can select different characters and make them dance, run, jump, or even fall.  You can design the landscape and add buildings, trees, and animals, and even change the sky pattern.  Press "go", and your character will travel around the panorama you've created.


DUTCH DOLL HOUSE


Dutch Dollhouse  (Shockwave, 4.6 MB)
"Mix and match colorful characters, create decorative objects, and explore the kitchen, living quarters, artist's studio, and courtyard of this interactive 17th-century Dutch House."


NGA KIDS JUNGLE



"Create a tropical jungle filled with tigers, monkeys, and other exotic creatures. Inspired by the art of Henri Rousseau, NGAkids Jungle is an interactive art activity for kids of all ages. (Shockwave, 930k)"


What I liked about the Jungle application is that each item can be easily customized.  On the SMARTBoard, as well as on my HP TouchSmart PC, it is very easy for a student who has limited fine-motor control to create beautiful pictures.


FLOW

"Flow is a motion painting machine for children of all ages. Enjoy watching the changing patterns and colors as you mix pictures on two overlapping layers. Choose  designs from four sets of menu icons, or add to the flow by clicking the pencil tool to create your own designs."


This application is a favorite of some of the students I work with who enjoy watching things spin. (You don't have to have an autism spectrum disorder to enjoy playing with Flow!)

National Gallery of Art Student and Teacher Online Resources

DYI multi-touch...

If you follow this blog, you know I like to share what people are doing with multi-touch and related natural user interfaces/interaction. In this post, I'd like to share an article about two students who decided to build and market a multi-touch table- the article below explains the story in-depth, and video shows the nuts and bolts.


Enterprising roomates build multi-touch LCD, market their business to West Coast*
Walter Valencia, Collegiate Times 12/1/09

According to the above article, Aaron Bitler and Brady Simpson they were inspired by CNN's Magic Wall during the 2008 election.  Bitler and Simpson learned more about natural user interface/interaction during a presentation in a business class that featured a video about the Microsoft Surface table and natural user interface technologies.  They formed a company, 3M8,  to build and market mutli-touch display/tables.

Vision x32 from Aaron Bitler on Vimeo.

From what I can tell, it looks like Bitler and Simpson relied on the DYI information and support from the NUI-group website to carry out their ideas. Bitler and Simpson met with representatives of 22Miles, a company located in San Jose that provides interactive solutions, including multi-touch, for web, mobile, and touch screen implementations.

I'll post more about 22Miles in an upcoming post.

Until then, take a look at 22Miles' promo video, featuring a huge 3D interactive multi-touch heart:

A few things from LM3Labs

I just noticed an interactive section of Lm3labs' website that demonstrates a range of interesting pictures that provide a nice overview of the company's work within the retail sector.  Lm3labs has offices in France and Japan.

The company, run by Nicolas Loeillot, is also involved in non-retail projects, such as museum exhibits, focusing on "touch-less" interactivity.  I've included a few pictures and videos below.

Microsoft's Photosynth on Lm3lab's touch-less Ubiq'window:

Photosynth + Ubiq'window Interactive Screen
by ubiqwindow

Demo of video-guide on a Ubiq'window:

Ubiq'window Demo in the US from Nicolas Loeillot on Vimeo.

Pictures of Lm3Lab's installations at Toshiba:
 





Somewhat Related
Nicolas Loeillot's Photos

Flowing Data's Best Visualizations of 2009 (Nathan Yau): "It was a huge year for data"

"Data has been declared sexy, and the rise of the data scientist is here."  -Nathan Yau, Flowing Data
I started following Nathan Yau's Flowing Data blog nearly 2 years ago, when I was in Robert Kosara's information visualization/visual communication class at UNC-C.  What a great blog!  


Here is the short list- visit Flowing Data for the pics and details:
Honorable Mention:  MTV VMA Tweet Tracker
Honorable Mention:  Crisis of Credit Visualized (animation)
5.  Microsoft's Photosynth
4. New York Times' The Jobless Rate for People Like You
3. Open Street Map: A Year of Edits
2. Stanford University's  Protovis
1. Ben Fry's On the Origin of Species: The Preservation of Favored Traces


RELATED
Ben Fry's Origin of the Species: The Preservation of Favored Traces

Protovis
NYT's Jobless Rate for People Like You
Photosynth Website (Christmas lights featured on main page today 12/25/09  "Mintz Family Christmas")

Open Street Map
Crisis of Credit, Visualized
MTV MTA Tweet Tracker


SOMEWHAT RELATED
Dr. Kosara's EagerEyes site is a great resource to follow- I especially like his link to the History of Visual Communication website.
The Three Sexy Skills of Data Geeks (Michael E. Driscoll Dataspora Blog, 5/27/09)
Michael Driscoll's Book Recommendation:
The Elements of Statistical Learning:  Data Mining, Inference, and Prediction, Second Edition

Stanford University Viz Group


NOTICE
I'm gathering information about good examples of user-friendly multi-user interactive information visualization applications, preferably on multi-touch or gesture-based systems. Leave a comment and a link if you can point me in the right direction!

About Digital Out of Home

"Digital out-of-home (DOOH) advertising is a dynamic, fragmented, and rapidly evolving space. It's one of the fastest growing media channels, with year-over-year growth pegged in the double digits through at least 2011....as with many emerging media channels, DOOH is a bit of a gray area in terms of what type of agency should own strategy, planning, and buying. A traditional agency because TV spots can be repurposed? The OOH shop because it's just a digital version of a billboard? The interactive shop because it's digital, often interactive, and highly measurable? Or will a new class of DOOH specialty shops emerge to deliver services explicitly for the channel? This lack of clarity creates uncertainty and
hesitation in advertisers."
-Jeremy Lockhorn, ClickZ  7/13/09 Digital Out-of-Home Landscape Brief (pdf)


This is an industry that is beginning to take off, just as internet-based advertising and web-design/user experience did during the 1990's. The number of players, and potential players, is growing.


For more information, resources, and links, see the rest of the post:  What is DOOH and Why Should We Care?
(The World Is My Interface)

More tech news I missed while I was out holiday shopping!

While I was shopping:
Via Boy Genius, 12/23/09: Apple tablet definitely coming in 7" size?
Via Andrew Lyle, Neowin.Net 12/23/09: Apple to Demo 7" tablet in January?
Via Dan Frommer, The Business Insider, 12/23/09: Apple to Demo Tablet in January, Asks Developers to Get Apps Ready
"We assume tablets -- or at least multi-touch screen technology -- will eventually penetrate more Apple product lines, including portable Macs and maybe even desktop Macs."
Via Neil Hughes, Apple Insider, 12/23/09: Piper:  75% Chance of Apple Jan. Even, 50% likelihood of tablet
"Numerous reports this week have claimed that Apple is in talks with CBS and Disney in an attempt to offer a subscription plan for TV shows. Sources have said that both companies are currently considering an offer from Apple that would provide them $2 to $4 per month for a subscriber to a broadcast network like CBS or ABC, and $1 to $2 per month for subscribers to a basic cable network."
Via Neil Hughes, AppleInsider 12/9/09: Tablet rumors:  February production start, 10-inch LCD Screen

MORE TOUCHSCREEN ALL-IN-ONES and LAPTOP/TABLETS
Packard-Bell's Viseo 200 Touch Edition Monitor






Packard-Bell's EasyNote Butterfly Touch Edition

The laptop has a screen size of 11.6 inches, and a 1366 x 768 screen resolution, running Windows 7 Home Premioum. Includes WiFi, microphone, VGA webcam, and has options for 3G, Bluetooth, a card reader, and HDMI i/o.
Via Electonista, 12/23/09: Lenovo netbooks surface with Pine Trail, multi-touch
Via Electronista, 12/23/09: 500,000 Nooks by March, New Orders due February
I was at Barnes & Noble yesterday and came across a touch-screen kiosk where customers could find out more about the Nook and put in their orders. There was a notice that said that the Nook would not be available until February.  It must have generated some interest, since I noticed people surfing the information on the kiosk during the time I was there.

The Nook

Via Electronista, 12/22/09: OLPC teases $75 tablet features, images: OLPC X0-3 may get camera, wireless power According to Electronista, the tablet uses a Pixel Qi display.
See my blog post for more information about the display: Mary Lou Jepsen, Inventor of Pixel Qi Technology, Discusses Screen Technologies & Multi-touch Tablets


Via Electronista, 12/10/09:  Dell Streak tablet due at CES? Dell Android tablet may debutSOMEWHAT RELATED
I was reading a review from Engadget about Lenovo's Pine Trail tablet, and found one of the comments amusing.  Manufacturers need to listen to the people, but often, they don't. Apparently the prototype had a glossy screen, which is something that might enhance the picture, but for some, has drawbacks.
Here is a comment by someone who calls himself "Old fogie late bloomer":
"God... listen, manufacturers... I don't want to see my hands reflected in my screen, I don't want to see my fat gut reflected in my screen, I don't want to see my (admittedly handsome) face reflected in the screen, I don't want to see the people behind me reflected in my screen; all I want to see is what the screen is displaying!  GO BACK TO MATTE!"