What is Flexible Display Technology?
Flexible display has the potential to transform how we interact with the technology on our devices. The amazing displays can bend, and roll. It has an impressive level of flexibility that is impossible for traditional displays available on the market. However, some common flexible display technologies include Electronic paper displays, organic LED, and LCD.
The history of flexible display technology:
In the 2013 IFA international trade show in Berlin was specifically arranged for consumer electronics and home appliances. The electronic manufacturers played a crucial role in displaying the displays that were thin, and curved, but expensive. Following this, the IT experts of Saarbrücken took a further step and developed a Flexpad. The Flexpad has a cost-effective approach that can transform a standard sheet of paper into a moveable, flexible display. It can assist patients to get the results of the computer tomography.
Just imagine a sheet of paper displaying the human organs with shimmer in red or a longitudinal view of the human abdomen. A sheet of paper will display the spinal cord and pelvic bones from contrasting yellow islands. The most interesting part will be when the sheet of paper bends, the bones will come in the foreground when the soft tissues recede along with it. This might sound like science fiction but all of this is possible through the “Flexpad” project under the smart leadership of Jürgen Steimle in the Media Lab at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the US and the Max Planck Institute for Informatics in Saarbrücken, in cooperation with Kiel University.
“We routinely deform objects intuitively in many different ways. We bend back pages in books, deflate balls, fold paper, and sculpt clay”, said Jürgen Steimle. “And by projecting user interface elements onto tangible, deformable objects we can control computers and other technical devices better and more easily”, He added.
A camera to capture the motions of hands and paper:
Only a small technology will be required to use this innovation to sense the movement of hands and paper. Steimle explains the approach of this innovation that we use a projector to display or reproduces the image or video on the sheet of paper. He further explained: “For another, we work with a Kinect sensor from Microsoft. The depth camera permits people to use their movements to control computer games. In our case, it records the hands and paper to determine their position in space”. Now the question arises, where we will implant this depth camera? It will be mounted on the ceiling above the user to conveniently capture the movement of hands and paper.
How does the Flexpad work?
The flexpad works by capturing the movement of paper and hands of the user. The motion sensor captures the paper’s deformation and movement. The recording takes place in real-time no matter how coarse the image data by using a Kinect camera. The researchers have developed and implemented two algorithms for its efficient working. The first one involves subtracting out the interference caused by the fingers and hands of the user holding the paper. The camera senses the movement of the paper whether it is towards the left or right or bends it into an arc or wavy form. An efficiently developed computer model can describe this movement in seconds, hence the projector will reproduce the sheet in real-time.
Limitations of Flexpad:
Despite all these benefits, Flexpad has some limitations as the user needs to stand at a particular area that should be right under the camera so that the projector works properly. Hence, the user will not be able to move freely while holding the Flexpad.
Steimle explains that we can use this flexible display sheet just as we control a computer by using a mouse. However, other materials such as plastic sheets or deformable materials, display flex sheets instead of paper. The important thing that we should check is that the material should have a certain malleability and flexibility.
“The paper takes on two simultaneous functions in our system”, explains Steimle. “It is an input device and display at the same time.”
Future of Flexible Display:
There is no doubt that flexible displays are one step forward to the regularly used display technologies out there. However, the study of “OE-A Roadmap for Organic and Printed Electronics” by the Organic and Printed Electronics Association claims that it will be available for the end users in ten years. Steimle also discussed its bright future that: “Our concepts, which we are researching using Flexpad, can be transferred to this new type of display”.
Moreover, a more cost-effective technology is conceivable and there are higher chances that this application will soon come into life for use. For its amazing use in medical diagnosis and its other advantages, Steimle explains: “In medical diagnostics, the physician can quickly and easily discuss for instance the results of computer tomography with the patient. In addition, the system can operate as a kind of interactive children’s book in which certain figures, like a goldfish, can move”.
