ThinSight is a thin form-factor interactive surface technology

based on optical sensors embedded inside a regular

liquid crystal display (LCD). These augment the display

with the ability to sense a variety of objects near the surface,

including fingertips and hands, to enable multitouch

interaction. Optical sensing also allows other physical items

to be detected, allowing interactions using various tangible

objects. A major advantage of ThinSight over existing

camera and projector-based systems is its compact form-

factor,

making it easier to deploy in a variety of settings. We

describe how the ThinSight hardware is embedded behind

a regular LCD, allowing sensing without degradation of display

capability, and illustrate the capabilities of our system

through a number of proof-of-concept hardware prototypes

and applications.

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In  Communications of the ACM

Publisher  Association for Computing Machinery, Inc.
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Previous Versions

Steve Hodges, Shahram Izadi, Alex Butler, Alban Rrustemi, and Bill Buxton. ThinSight: versatile multi-touch sensing for thin form-factor displays, Association for Computing Machinery, Inc., October 2007.