Lab101, BUMP, and beyond.io recently teamed up to make Polar, an interactive, mapped table for display at a Hellospace in Brussels. The video says it all, as users navigate through menus and images by gesturing with their hands. Gestures might seem like overkill for interacting with a flat screen, and the actions in the video leave much to be desired, but according to the team this is just the tip of the iceberg with an updated version to be released soon. There’s also this tidbit from beyond.io, which is hard to deny:

“waving your hands in thin air [to interact with] the UI evokes a certain magical feeling for every visitor.”

You should also check out beyond.io’s excellent writeup on the technical specs and implementation details.

We’re seeing more and more of these kinds of interactive projection installations. With the improvements to projectors and other hardware (such as Leap Motion), how long will it be before we start seeing similar devices available for consumers?

This isn’t Lab101’s first experience with projection mapping. Be sure to check out some of their other mapping features here.