Today I’m giving a paper presentation at Nordichi about a new type of interface, Tangible 3D Tabletops, that Kim Halskov and I have developed over the past year. As is implied by the name, the interface combines elements of tangible tabletops (e.g. Reactable) and 3D projection onto physical objects. This allows us to augment tangible objects with visual material corresponding to their physical shapes, positions, and orientation on a tabletop. In practice, this means that both the tabletop and the tangibles can serve as displays. In the paper, we present the basic design principles for this interface, particularly concerning the interplay between 2D on the tabletop and 3D for the tangibles, and present examples of how this kind of interface might be used in the domain of maps and geolocalized data. We then discuss three central design considerations concerning 1) the combination and connection of content and functions of the tangibles and tabletop surface, 2) the use of tangibles as dynamic displays and input devices, and 3) the visual effects facilitated by the combination of the 2D tabletop surface and the 3D tangibles.
The slides from my talk are embedded below, and a video is coming up as soon as the IT University of Copenhagen get their wifi up and running.
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[…] our most recent work, we’ve worked on so-called Tangible 3D Tabletops, which combine interactive tabletops with 3D projection onto tangible, movable objects. One of the […]