Tom Cruise used gesture sensing in the movie Minority Report. Now, you too might be able to do so very shortly if the researchers at MITs Media Lab manage to commercialize their latest gesture sensing display technology. This technology essentially converts gestures to electronic signals by using an array of optical sensors embedded in an ultra thin LCD display. The LCD screen will act like a lens and will direct light towards the optical sensors. Taking over from the LCD panel, the optical sensors will then sense the ambient light conditions. Gesturing at the LCD screen will change the light conditions thus allowing the optical sensors to sense it. Once this is done, the LCD can be suitably manipulated to respond to gestures. Right now, the MIT researchers are furthering their research by using cameras. In due time though, they are pretty confident of being able to develop a prototype that could be commercialized successfully. So stick around, playing Tom Cruise could be very much possible in the near future.
