BIDI Screen
A thin, depth-sensing LCD for 3D interaction using light fields which supports both 2D multi-touch and unencumbered 3D gestures.
Project Description

About BiDi Screen

Rep. image from paperThe BiDi Screen is an example of a new type of I/O device that possesses the ability to both capture images and display them. This thin, bidirectional screen extends the latest trend in LCD devices, which has seen the incorporation of photo-diodes into every display pixel. Using a novel optical masking technique developed at the Media Lab, the BiDi Screen can capture lightfield-like quantities, unlocking a wide array of applications from 3-D gesture interaction with CE devices, to seamless video communication.

Paper

Paper thumbnails
Published in ACM Transations on Graphics, 2009 vol. 28

Press Converage

SIGGRAPH Asia 2009 e-Tech Prototype

The following are images of the BiDi screen prototype built for the SIGGRAPH Asia 2009 Emerging Technology exhibition. Case design by MIT UROP Emily Tow.

SIGGRAPH Asia 2009 e-Tech Prototype SIGGRAPH Asia 2009 e-Tech Prototype SIGGRAPH Asia 2009 e-Tech Prototype

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The re-lighting demo, shown running on our new prototype. The world-navigation demo, running on our new prototype. The model-manipulation demo, running on our new prototype.

Video

  
 

Check here for more videos.

Slides

FAQ

Section 1: BiDi Screen Concept

Q: What is BiDi screen?

Q: How does it work? How does it sense 3D information from a thin display?

Q: How is this different from Surface, SecondLight, Gesturetek, Perceptive Pixels and xyz?

Q: Will this replace webcams?

Q: Will this replace flat-bed scanners?

Q: What are some other applications of this technology?

Q: What are the limitations?

Q: What are the future directions?

Q: Isn’t this the same as something Apple did?

Section 2: About the current prototype

Q: How did you implement the light-sensing layer of the BiDi Screen?

Q: Isn’t this same as some other projects that use cameras in the back?

Q: What are the parameters of the current prototype?

Q: What components did you use for the prototype?

Q: Why isn’t the BiDi Screen prototype as thin as the LCD panel it uses?

Q: How does the tiled-MURA mask used in the BiDi screen produce equivalent imagery to a pinhole array?

Q: How does the BiDi screen estimate depth?

Q: Is flicker noticeable in the BiDi screen prototype?

Q: Is there noticeable lag between movement and display update?

Q: What type of tie fighter is featured in the videos?

Q: Does the BiDi Screen herald a dystopic Orwellian future, in which sinister government bureaucrats monitor our every move, and personal privacy is a distant memory?

Details

You can find more details about the construction and operation of the BiDi Screen in our supplementary materials section.

supplement

Citation

Here is our bibitex entry:

@article{Hirsch:2009:BiDiScreen,
author = {Matthew Hirsch and Douglas Lanman and Henry Holtzman and Ramesh Raskar},
title = {{B}i{D}i Screen: {A} Thin, Depth-Sensing {LCD} for {3D} Interaction using Lights Fields},
journal = {ACM Trans. Graph.},
year = {2009},
volume = {28},
number = {5},
publisher = {ACM}
}

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