We’re all working more than ever from our mobile, but typing out emails and long messages is sluggish compared to using a keyboard.
Samsung has a solution: use AI and your phone’s camera to monitor your hands as they type in right in front of you on an invisible keyboard.
It’s called SelfieType, and in spite of being just a prototype at the moment, it’s a really interesting one. It was developed under the aegis of the C-Lab program of Samsung, a kind of in-house incubator for weird tech ideas, some of which eventually turn into commercial products.
We don’t know what plans Samsung has for SelfieType, but it might be a powerful device if it works as well as this promo implies. Samsung is demoing SelfieType as CES this week in Las Vegas, so we’re going to try and get a hands-on (if that term makes sense in this context).
However, the proof will certainly be in the typing. “Invisible keyboards” also exist using laser projection but they are not a serious device but a novelty. They tend to be slow and inaccurate, and if you’re carrying around a little laser projector brick you can go all the hog and swap it for a decent Bluetooth keyboard as well.
Because SelfieType works with the camera on your phone, it will at least eliminate the problem of carrying accessories around. Yet using machine vision to monitor your finger ‘s individual movement sounds difficult, and obviously you’ll have to hold your hands in one position for it to work properly — a tough problem without a keyboard’s physical input.
It’s still a solution that we haven’t seen before, and one that we ‘re curious to try. Throughout the years, developers have attempted to replace the tried and tested keyboard with lots of unusual designs. Maybe we can finally crack that problem with the help of AI.
