Magic Finger Device Suggests New Day for Calling Up Content
From: Phys.Org - 10/15/2012
By: Nancy Owano 

Researchers at Autodesk Research, the University of Alberta, and the
University of Toronto have presented a new device called Magic Finger, which
enables a user's gestures to control smartphones or tablets. A small plastic
casing holds the components, and there is an attached micro camera and
optical flow sensor. The Magic Finger senses texture through the camera,
enabling actions to be carried out according to the surface being touched,
such as wood or cloth. The researchers emphasize that this instrumentation is
what makes the Magic Finger unique. "We propose finger instrumentation, where
we invert the relationship between finger and sensing surface: With Magic
Finger, we instrument the user's finger itself, rather than the surface it is
touching," they say. Results show that Magic Finger recognizes 22
environmental textures and 10 artificial textures with an overall accuracy of
98.9 percent, but at present the hardware still needs to be connected to a
nearby host PC. For the device to become completely standalone, the
researchers say they need to consider additional power and communication
requirements. 

Read the entire article at:
http://phys.org/news/2012-10-magic-finger-device-day-content.html

Links:
Autodesk researchers develop 'magic finger' that reads gestures from any surface
http://www.engadget.com/2012/10/22/autodesk-university-researchers-magic-finger-sensor/

Magic Finger: Always Available  Input through Finger Instrumentation (Video 5:09)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=WgR1358xZaY

Magic Finger: Always-Available Input through Finger Instrumentation
http://www.autodeskresearch.com/pdf/MagicFinger_CRC%20-%20final%20-%20new.pdf
 
Send Texts From Your Pocket With This Handy Ring
http://mashable.com/2012/10/18/magic-finger-text-ring/