Elastic touch screens -- redefining the touch screen experience

     When touchscreens first became widespread on our mobile devices, the main complaint from touchscreen detractors was that it felt weird to poke at a flat surface rather than tactile buttons. Eventually, most of the mobile phone audience grew to either love or live with the flat touchscreen. Now, with an elastic touchscreen you can pull and poke, a project out of MIT’s Media Lab aims to put tactile sensation back into using your devices.



How it works?
    The stretchable touchscreen, dubbed Obake, was created by Dhairya Dand and Rob Hemsley, both of MIT’s Media Lab. The touchscreen basically amounts to an interactive display on top of an elastic surface. When you poke or pull at the display, depth cameras measure your movements and tell linear actuators to manipulate the elastic surface accordingly. So, if you make a pinch-and-pull motion, the depth cameras will measure it, then the linear actuators will make elastic stretch and protrude in such a way as if you’re pulling it. The surface doesn’t just create little mountains of stretched elastic; it can also create resistance if you, for example, push inward rather than pull outward.
     Currently, Obake can recognize a handful of gestures, from simple pinches and pokes, to compressing two areas of the elastic surface together. The system can even recognize what amounts to multitouch gestures; you can pull one area of the surface while pushing the other, and Obake can even recognize if you combine the two sections when you get them close enough to one another.
      We most likely won’t have an elastic touchscreen in our smartphones anytime soon, but Obake could certainly find its way into the tech scene where it can really revolutionize the mapping and gaming experience.

                              This article is taken from extremetech.com