Batman-inspired software to add 3D touch to all smartphones

Smartphones are getting much smarter over the past few years with the inception of numerous new integrations. Out of all the innovations in the mobile space, one of the fanciest one was undoubtedly Apple’s 3D Touch feature. However, Apple’s technology was only confined to the device’s screen rather than the complete unit.

Now engineers from the University of Michigan have developed an innovative force touch software, dubbed ForcePhone, based on a scene from the 2008 Batman movie, The Dark Knight.

According to Gizmag, the software has the potential to bring to all phones; not just the screens but the complete unit. The latest Apple devices—iPhone 6s and 6s Plus—were built upon a mechanism that utilises the device’s capacitive sensors embedded beneath the glass. The new software, however, creates pressure sensitivity to all phones by utilising the phone’s microphone and speakers!

The report further pointed out that the new software works on the principles frequency: a tone is played out of the phone’s speaker at a frequency above 18 kHz, which is inaudible to a human ear.

Although humans cannot hear this sound, any kind of disruptions (vibrations) caused to the frequency through touch is picked up by the phone’s microphone. According to the engineers, the change in tone frequency is recorded by the software and subsequently converted into actions. For instance, you can squeeze your phone to dial an emergency number.

While there are numerous ambiguities regarding the software, the researchers must be given credits for this innovation. That said, the software system might face difficulty in numerous areas. Imagine a situation where the phone is in your pocket and it picks up a certain change in frequency. Also, a phone constantly playing a tone can cause much faster battery drainage in comparison to normal devices.  

Moving on, the co-inventor of the Forcephone software Yu-Chih Tung said that the main inspiration to create the software came from a scene in the 2008 blockbuster the Dark Knight where the caped crusader turned all the mobile devices in Gotham into a complicated Sonar system to track the Joker.

"I thought it was an interesting idea to turn smartphones into a sonar-based system and felt this could lead to new applications to address challenges faced by smartphone users," Tung said.

The ForcePhone software was created by Tung and another docotoral student Kang Shin, and have devices a number of innovative mobile phone software in the past. The duo will be presenting their software in Singapore during June 27-29 at MobiSys 2016. However, there is no exact time frame on when this software will be rolled out.

Meanwhile, you can check the video below to understand the concept better.