What They Say
Invidis reported on the development by a Berlin-based start-up Garamantis of a laser-based sensor systems that can be used by viewers to act as a gesture control system for retail applications including interactive 360° turntables.
The system is used in a high end watch retailer in Hong Kong in the Landmark Shopping Center and is based around an ‘interactive shopping window of 7m x 3m (23′ x 10’) which is scanned by the LIDAR unit. The rotating turntables were developed by Garamantis.
The firm has larger turntables that can carry products up to 100kg and is working on systems to allow the use in street-facing windows.
What We Think
Touch-enabled mirrors were seen as a good feature in high end retail, but the issue is that the mirrors show marks very easily and they have to be cleaned very, very frequently to maintain the kind of pristine environment that the luxury retailers provide. This kind of gesture control could get around that, but as I have said before, gesture suffers from the lack of a ‘grammar’. The iPhone with pinch and swipe quickly set the grammar for touch interaction (and for several years, every trade show booth I seemed to go to seemed to be demonstrating that) but there is not an equivalent in gesture. Without it, many users are likely to be put off the idea as they will fear ‘looking silly’. Still, the technology of this use case is interesting! (BR)
