There's one scene in the Tom Cruise-starrer Minority Report, which is hard to not be impressed with. It's the one where he interacts with a virtual glass wall, manipulating the information displayed with bare hands without touching it.

While it was an inspirational idea for people who love working with or tracking the development in Augmented Reality (AR), we've seen very little of the idea implemented in real life.

The closest we've gotten to using something like that in real like is probably the Microsoft Kinect. But petting virtual animals or driving a car by pretending you're at the wheels is as far as that goes. How about making it a tad bit more serious, more utilitarian?

Microsoft recently released papers on one of its ongoing projects, the MirageTable. To break it down in simple terms, it's an interface that lets you interact with 3D objects the same way as you would use physical ones around you.

The device has a camera that measures depth and track the user's eyes. It also captures both the shape and the appearance of an object placed in front of the camera (including the user's body and hands) in real-time which means you could actually “work” with this system.

The motivation behind the project was to work out a way in which technology could let the user interact with 3D digital objects alongside physical objects in real life. So, if this technology becomes mainstream, it might give a user the freedom to use MirageTable as a workstation to probably design products or work with 3D blueprints for a building.

The ability to interact with virtual objects through freehand action without any gloves, trackers or instruments will also work in its favour. And while, the applications and possibilities with the device are endless, all it matters is that the time we have to spend waiting for something like this, is not.

> mahananda@thehindu.co.in

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