Shelly Palmer Radio Report – October 17, 2014

While tablets can do just about anything you’d want them to do, few accessories push the limits of these devices even further. A new transparent film designed by Microsoft called FlexSense looks to change that. The film has thin sensors printed on its surface, and is designed to lay over tablets and e-readers to offer new forms of interaction. When you move, bend or deform the film, your device detects and translates those changes without needing any extra hardware, like cameras or external trackers. The researchers that developed FlexSense think it’ll be used to add new methods of interaction to existing apps, instead of requiring a new suite of programs. For example, say you’re editing a photo on your tablet. Peeling back the film could roll back the edits you’ve made, revealing the original image. For e-readers, peeling the film could be like flipping back or forward in a book or magazine. There’s no word how long it’ll be until we see FlexSense available to the public, but its possibilities are very exciting.