Magic Cube Laser-Projects Virtual Keyboard For Your iPhone or iPad
It has been decades now since rumors in the scientific communities revolve around the emerging concept of holograms integrated into our daily lives. If your mind can not yet grasp such novelties, the guys at Aatma Studios launched a kick ass video in which we can practically witness the rise of holograms, as the iPhone and iPad devices embrace holograms in displaying video and full size interactive keyboards.
As if this awesome mockup video was not groundbreaking enough, the concept has been taken to the next level. Have you ever thought of such a surrealistically designed phone that its display may at times become transparent? Designer Dakota Adney (Arizona, US) certainly has and created an incredibly cool video mockup where the main character is played by a next-generation iPhone and its main asset is a display that can at times become transparent! Speaking of innovation…
While all of these have remained in our imagination (and perhaps or not Apple’s as well), there is one company who decided to transform a concept that looks good on paper into reality. And nothing but real it is! Dear readers, we are presenting you with Cellulon’s Magic Cub.
To put all doubts aside from the very getgo, we are not discussing a potential product and it is not a proof-of concept, but as real as our existence is. All the functions advertised for this product do their job! While it acts as a virtual-touch mouse for your computer, the gadget also enhances your device with nothing else but an innovative laser projection keyboard! How it works is that the full-sized QWERTY keyboard will be projected (and in a highly successful manner we might add) onto any plat and opaque surface, replacing the traditional keyboard. Instead of the physical buttons, we can now play and type directly on the projected “virtual” keys. It is true that we might have come across a few similar gadgets in the recent past, however this one works in such an accurate manner that makes it different.
The Cube’s laser keyboard pattern projector has been created on the basis of the Electric Perception Technology of Cellulon and its functions are exactly those clearly stated in its name. Your fingers’ position can be immediately sensed once you type – by the central optical sensor which, in parallel, connects to the infrared layer, therefore instantly determining the position of your fingers. Now don’t imagine that the typing experience is the same as the one you have with “normal” keyboards – typing is now a slightly changed process, adding ingenuous factors to the table. To be more specific, you can turn on the power saving mode by a “key” combination and then turn it back on with a mere gesture.
What’s great about it is that you are not limited to using it in traditional spaces, such as an office or your home desk. Cellulon’s Magic Box is so small and adaptable that you can take it with you where ever you decide to go, so that you are always prepared. Its advantages are that it is so light and small that it will make it impossible to leave at home. It is simple to use due to its Bluetooth function and there are also no inconveniences to set it up: simply pair your iOS device or Mac onto a Magic Box and the problem is solved!
If you think this has been made for you, then yon can purchase if from a retail starting price of $149.99 straight from the Cellulon web store – along with the Magic Cube itself Cellulon presents us with an iPhone version case of the Cube too. As already mentioned, you can run the Magic Cube on iOS devices and Macs running iOS4 and, later perhaps, Android 2. As time goes by, it will more likely be compatible with Windows XP, and with probably any Bluetooth HID device you have in mind. The Cube’s designed colors are silver, red, white and black – so out of the four options you can choose the one that represents you best.
So that you don’t get the idea that we have over-acclaimed the gadget we will let you have the opinion of Seth Weintraud too who manages 9to5 sites and who has tested Cellulon’s Magic Cube over at CES. After playing with the Magic Cube for a while, Weintraud reported he was impressed by its accuracy from the very beginning and that the device really does what its advertising promises. Though he was reluctant to use such a device or even adapt to this virtual manner of typing prior to using the Magic Cube, Weintraud states this experience changed his perception of the virtual keyboards and that he could actually picture himself doing this on a daily basis and easily getting used to it.
If this didn’t blow you away, let’s take another invention and have a glimpse at it. Have you yet heard about the Vibrative Virtual Keyboard? It has been invented by a computing student at Goldsmith’s from University of London – his name being Florian Kräutli. He had an even bigger idea perhaps when he replaced the laser-projected virtual keyboard with the iPhone’s sensitive accelerometer sensor to measure both the strength and frequency of the microscopic vibrations transmitted when we type on a surrounding surface area. Depending on the surface area the device is used on, the app must automatically “learn” the vibration patterns applicable to each surface, as the app itself relies on a series of particular patterns.
In one of the student’s interviews, he mentions that this app runs however on jailbroken devices and is above all more of a proof of concept. He knows that an accelerometer with better sensitivity could make the software a lot more easier to implement and use, so we are only hoping that at some stage somebody will take a better look at the student’s work and take him on board (perhaps Apple).
As you can see, progress is nowadays constant and almost a characteristic feature of the word ‘today’ – so if you are up for discoveries and into as more challenging and innovative gadgets and apps, make sure you have your belt fastened while the future happens right under our eyes.
