1 of my favorite features of the Surface is the part where you can program ‘dominoes’ to interact with the Surface. Cut to reacTable, a very fancy & jaw dropping DJ console! Well, that was what was demoed at the IIT techfest, where the Microsoft Surface was also demoed.
The reactable is a collaborative electronic music instrument with a tabletop tangible multi-touch interface. Several simultaneous performers share complete control over the instrument by moving and rotating physical objects on a luminous round table surface.
On a reacTable, the performer places shapes that interact with the table & these shapes produce different sounds:
- Square objects – Sound Generator
- Rotation changes frequencies
- Finger rotation controls amplitude
- Rounded squares – Sound Filters
The demo performed was spectacular, it had the crowds jumping in their seats. Note, at this was a crowd of India’s brightest engineers. The Surface demo following this was a big fail even though this is can be implemented on the Surface too.
Here is a small interview by the developers after their performance:
2 videos of the performance, an amazing remix from the movie Rock On: