Chameleon Pen: Scan, Save & Draw Up to 16 Million Unique Hues

Five years ago it was an mind-boggling design concept, but today the idea color-changing pen has morphed into a working prototype that draws colors from objects and surfaces, natural or artificial, then lets you use them in all kinds of creative ways. This real-world version can make over 16,000,000 different tones and store over 100,000 unique colors in its memory.

Imagine the possibilities of Scribble, both artistic and practical: instead of trying to mix just the right paints to capture a landscape or replicate a color scheme for your interior remodel, you can scan the actual colors of environments and use those. Users can then upload, store, tag and share their color picks for future applications.

The Color Picker by Jinsun Park (shown below) was a purely conceptual design model at the time, but operated on the same principle (like the Photoshop eyedropper tool), made to contain a series of inks that (much like a printer) would mix in the appropriate amounts, reproducing colors scanned into it. This new variant on the device also converts the colors into other formats (like binary, decimal and hexadecimal) that can be saved and deployed for digital art. And with cartridge refills, you will never need to buy another color of pen.

The applications are myriad: “For the colour blind, kids, interior decorators, homeowners, teachers, artists, photographers, designers and students, the Scribble colour picker pen will make copying an exact colour, any colour from any object, an absolute breeze. With Scribble you can scan, match or compare colours, draw on paper or your mobile device.” Of course, you don’t have to scan in a new color – you can always mix your own on the computer and input that preferred tone too.

Here is the executive summary from the company: “Scribble is the first coloring device of its kind that can take the world of color around you and transfer it directly to either paper or your favourite mobile device. Simple hold the Scribble’s scanner up to any color, like on a wall, a book or magazine, a painting or even a child’s toy and within a second or two that color is stored in Scribble’s internal memory. You can now instantly draw on paper with the Scribble Ink Pen or draw on a digital device like an iPad or Wacom Tablet with the Scribble Stylus Pen.”

Source:

Read More

Gravity: Augmented Reality Tablet Lets You Draw Ideas in 3D

Using a handheld stylus and tablet set combined with an existing augmented reality headset, this invention allows users to sketch in three dimensions and see the results of their work unfold in realtime.

Created by a group of students from the Royal College of Art, the interface is made to be as intuitive as a sketchpad or 2D drawing tablet – anyone should be able to pick it up and simply start doodling. It can be connected to various visualization devices, including the virtual reality simulator Oculcus Rift.

Per Dezeen, “As the user draws above the clear acrylic sketchpad, radio signals are used to track the movements of the stylus from coordinates on the pad. These are sent to an Arduino board – an open source prototyping device containing a micro controller – which is contained in a black panel that forms one edge of the pad.”

A combination of gestures and buttons allows users to tilt their drawings to work on them from various angles and shift the planes being worked on as well. Critically, though, the basic tool set is familiar in its function and thus user-friendly – a pad and pen, essentially, with expanded functionality.

A great deal of physical modeling and prototyping went into the design of the device including physical stands that allowed Gravity’s creators to simulate the kinds of conditions they sought to replicate in digital space. In turn, the three-dimensional drawings created via the device can be input into 3D printers, completing the circuit.

Source:

Read More