Gesture Cube, the magical, intuitive, theoretical 3D interface (video)
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted February 4th 2010 3:23PM
posted February 4th 2010 3:23PM
You know how it is -- another day, another "magical" and "intuitive" input device -- not unlike Immersion's Cubtile, which we first saw about a year ago. This time around the culprit is Gesture Cube, the heathen spawn of Ident's "GestIC" electric field sensing technology (for 3D spatial movement tracking) and a couple German design studios. GestIC detects movements and distances in 3D space, enabling touch free gesture control. If this sounds good to you, wait until you see the YouTube demonstration, complete with all sorts of "magical" and "intuitive" interface ideas! It will really make you with you were a designer living in Germany, starring in YouTube videos for "magical" and "intuitive" design firms. We don't know how much of a hurry we are to see this implemented in our fave hardware, but who knows? Maybe we'll come around eventually -- after all, Grippity did wonders for our words-per-minute. Video after the break.
Hmmm, I don't know why but it reminds me of Compiz-Fusion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CompizFusion-Ubuntu-7.04.png
@LowSky Combined with HTC's touch flo UI..
Hmm removeable stand would be nice
Very gimmicky!
@rturius
Yeah this is really dumb. I really don't think that waving at a cube is intuitive at all. Seriously. When do I wave at a cube (or anything for that matter) to get an action done. People touch and manipulate things in real life. There's no real analog for waving at stuff to make things happen. (unless maybe you're a semaphore flag dude)
@rturius
D@m right it is. But me like :)
@crapple
And I think having info on the side of a cube would be more of an annoyance, always glancing at the sides. They should make it so that whole table is one big flat intuitive "Surface".
Oh wait, that's right.
Maybe some concepts are better off staying concepts.
@LGH Proof of concept is nice, but I don't see it working in this form factor. Gesture control is cool but outside of video games and augmented reality, its just going to a device that will frustrate the user and never get used.
not very impressed, especially the sharing pictures portion, and in terms of gestures most people would want to move their hands faster otherwise if apps didn't move or work the way they wanted to, they would definitely start to get frustrated
@jfitz136 again i know this is very early stage dev but still from a consumer point of view
Certainly a cool concept. But, it looks like it would be too expensive to implement and too confusing with all the gestures for the conventional end-user. It's just that - a concept.
I dont like this concept, the big problem is form-factor and repetition of meaningless gestures.
The future is in mobile devices with projection (hologram), not in cube with stand:))
Cool, but why?
Looks like a tissue box
Use a mouse. Its better.
This is pretty awesome. I just hope the gestures will be natural enough so that we don't have to learn a whole hand language to use the thing.
wat...
This might be more useful if you ... never mind, it just looks annoying.
Looks nice, ... plays musics ... if it works like a
chumby. I would think about getting something like
that for the kitchen.
Looks kind of.. confusing
Why use gesture when you are right next to the device? Old fashion touch screen gives user more feed back. However, I can see it being useful for controlling devices that are farther away, like replacing TV remote.
When you have to do that much work with your hands to do something, you instantly know it's a fail product.
Us, the consumers, go by the KISS principle: Keep It Simple Stupid.
I see the picture above and all I can think of is "JUDO CHOP!"
I think this device looks awesome, but i cant help being skeptical. All i'm saying is a trick like this can easily be achieved through a bit of augmented reality code and a webcam.
Reminds me of Intel's Cube! I told you a smaller one version would seem cool. Wait to see how it comes into the market.
wow thats not gonna work at all.. sry my ignorance to the whole product.. but nono
This concept could be pretty cool.
i'm not crazy about the cube, however if it was say in a tablet/Microsoft surface table then it could be a really cool gadget.
UI look slick as well.
will keep my eyes open.
Personally, I like tactile response a little too much to consider this as a major part of my life.
Wow can I order a bunch of giant versions so I can setup a server room like the one in "Hackers".
wonder how is the accuracy going to be like. I certainly dont have the patience to each gesture slowly.
@sephorous Yeah, because I ate the last slice after beating p0rtal over 9,000 times.
I also think the same, the cube form is not very ergonomical or practical, just take a look at the view angle when standing in front of it, you can barely see one and a half screen, he has done almost everything on the upper one.
Let's keep it as concept and do some more brainstorming...
sound effects like from movies :D
Yes, bring back the Terrahawk's! At least those cubes could roll across the floor and play Tic-Tac-Toe. If someone has, what they think is a good 'Breakthrough' technological idea, ask me what I think, I can tell them instantly if it's the bomb, or a skidmark disaster, they can save thousands in R&D and we can all go about our business...