Silke Hilsing Makes Flexible Touchscreens a Reality

Manufacturers are working at amazing paces to create technology that was once reserved for fantasy-related movies. Perhaps the coolest development in the past couple of years has to do with touchscreen technology. Developers are working hard to bring the most efficient types of touchscreen technology to the consumers. Many companies have already developed basic models that can be purchased on the market today (see Apples IPAD). This is why it is important you learn about the future of touchscreens, more appropriately called flexible displays.

The creation of a flexible display seems like something quite amazing. Just take a moment and think about how long it took for the concept of touchscreens to become a reality. In order for someone to make a flexible display would require a lot of developments to happen first to screens. We would need these screens to be flexible before flexible displays can be even thought of as a reality. This is why the concept created by German designer Silke Hilsing is rather impressive.

As we move closer to flexible screens becoming a reality, Sony recently created a flexible LED screen and other companies have created flexible LED strips, Hilsing had to work outside of the box. What we have is a box that is filled with multiple layers of foam. Inside of these layers is multiple built in sensors. These sensors are able to sense when someone touches the foam. This information will then be transferred to an overhead projector.

Once the information reaches the overhead projector a beam of projected light will show on the foam. There are several pictures and shapes for the user to push upon. The harder in which the user pushes on the foam produces more light. This is because the sensors will pick up on the increased pressure and act appropriately. In this case appropriately means causing more light to come on.

The fact that this is just a concept should not be frowned upon. Hilsing shows the potential for someone to create a touchscreen device that is indeed flexible. The clever use of sensors can easily be incorporated into future computer models. However, like I stated earlier, technological advancements still need to be made in regards to flexibility of screens. Since this is already occurring, it is only a matter of time before flexible displays become a true reality.