Clever design isn’t just slapping new features and functions into a gadget - it’s taking advantage of everything that’s already in that gadget and using it to its full potential.  That’s why Nokia’s latest patent tickles my fancy; it might on the surface look like yet another virtual keyboard, but it uses the camera already found in the cellphone to recognise where the user’s fingers are stabbing on the table behind the handset itself.

Aside from using the camera, the phone design also has sensors which recognise the sounds and vibrations of the user’s fingers impacting the table and converts them into inputs; in fact, Nokia apparently envisage people clicking and tutting at the phone if they haven’t a surface to type on, and it’ll recognise that as well.

Although the patent indicates a cradle so that the handset is freestanding, it can also be used in a single hand with the other providing input.

Virtual keyboards haven’t really taken off beyond the realm of novelty, and up until now they’ve mainly existed as add-on units rather than integrated into devices.  If Nokia can include a keyboard into their phones without extra bulk, price or complexity, that could give the concept the kickstart it needs.

[via Unwired View]