We grew up interacting with the physical objects around us. There is an enormous number of them that we use every day. Unlike most of our computing devices, these objects are much more fun to use.

This is the beginning of a ten minutes talk by Pranav Mistry, a PhD student in the Fluid Interfaces Group at the MIT Media Lab that will introduce to you his invention, SixthSense. I have to admit it: when I first watched this video I didn’t know about this technology and my only comment at the end of it was “this guy is a genius“. He has been able to create something exceptional starting with a simple tool we use everyday, a mouse. Then he added a second mouse. And, this way, with a series of small simple steps he has obtained a revolutionary device.

SixthSense, according with Wikipedia,

comprises a pocket projector, a mirror and a camera contained in a pendant like, wearable device. Both the projector and the camera are connected to a mobile computing device in the user’s pocket. The projector projects visual information enabling surfaces, walls and physical objects around us to be used as interfaces; while the camera recognizes and tracks user’s hand gestures and physical objects using computer-vision based techniques. The software program processes the video stream data captured by the camera and tracks the locations of the colored markers (visual tracking fiducials) at the tips of the user’s fingers. The movements and arrangements of these fiducials are interpreted into gestures that act as interaction instructions for the projected application interfaces. SixthSense supports multi-touch and multi-user interaction.

In few lines there is a new world explained.

My advice is to really watch this video to get to know the amazing possibilities brought by this wearable computing device: if you have seen Minority Report thinking that what you where seeing was just sci-fiction, you will change your mind soon. I especially love  the  conclusion of the talk, that sounds a bit as a mission:

So, as a last thought, I think that integrating information to everyday objects will not only help us to get rid of the digital divide, the gap between these two worlds, but will also help us, in some way, to stay human, to be more connected to our physical world. And it will help us, actually, not be machines sitting in front of other machines.

These is an excerpt from the talk just to give you an idea, if you are too lazy to watch the video. I am sure you will want to watch it after reading it:

You can carry your digital world with you wherever you go. You can start using any surface, any wall around you, as an interface. The camera is actually tracking all your gestures. Whatever you’re doing with your hands, it’s understanding that gesture.

Rather than getting your camera out of your pocket, you can just do the gesture of taking a photo and it takes a photo for you.

So, we are looking for an era where computing will actually merge with the physical world. And, of course, if you don’t have any surface, you can start using your palm for simple operations.

Here, I’m dialing a phone number just using my hand.

The camera is actually not only understanding your hand movements, but, interestingly, is also able to understand what objects you are holding in your hand. [...] For example, in this case, the book cover is matched with so many thousands, or maybe millions of books online, and checking out which book it is. Once it has that information, it finds out more reviews about that, or maybe New York Times has a sound overview on that, so you can actually hear, on a physical book, a review as sound

And you can of course play games.  Here, the camera is actually understanding how you’re holding the paper and playing a car-racing game.

Photo: Photoantique | Video: TED