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Pantech introducing blow-controlled mobile phone

Feb 3, 2009 00:03

Pantech is one of three giant mobile phone manufacturers in Korea, among them Samsung and LG. Pantech sold over 10 million phones internationally in 2008, and under the "Sky" brand in the local market. Now, it's about to launch a blow-controlled mobile phone, the IM-S410K, which is also known as the Sky Wind.

What's that, you say? A blow-controlled mobile phone? It's actually another type of UI after the multi-touch control announced by Apple a few years back. Many portable device manufacturers, including mobile phone makers, have been searching for a new type of UI to differentiate themselves from multi-touch or touch UI which every device has recently adopted.

Pantech has announced that its new mobile phone will adopt the Emotion Engine that was developed by Fantalog Interactive, a small software company in Korea. The Emotion Engine is software-run with no hardware modification required. This requires only a microphone and camera, both of which are already standard features in today's handsets.

So what is the Emotion Engine? It can be separated into three types of major features.

Check out explanations that I captured from the Fantalog Web site below.





Wind recognition is based on a blow engine, which we can call blow control. With wind recognition you can possibly do various actions which will be available on the Sky Wind mobile phone. Below are some possible functions:

• Switching wallpapers: Blow, and it will change. No more touch or press buttons, just give it a gentle blow, that's all you need.


• Adjusting brightness: The screen's brightness also requires a blow to tone down.


• Steady shot with mobile phone's camera: You don't have to press the shutter button to take a picture from the mobile phone, just blow.

These are the some of the company's ideas which are being developed and will be included in the Sky Wind. If those features are through a microphone, what part does the camera play? I believe the camera sensor may ape one of the iPhone's applications, but I can't remember what it is.

The mobile phone's camera will recognize your motion and allow you to navigate the Web browser without touching or pressing buttons. It's also possible to play dice by shaking your mobile phone even if it doesn't have an onboard accelerometer.

What do you think? It's a fun and ideal UI which can be adopted by all kinds of portable devices that have a microphone and camera built-in. Pantech has done up a contract with Fantalog for a three-year exclusive use and the Emotion Engine will be applied to all upcoming Pantech handsets. Since the program can act as an accelerometer, the manufacturer will be able to save on costs, but related features remain.



We have already seen wind recognition games from Nintendo DS and similar types of games will be added and developed by Fantalog and Pantech, I guess.

Some of you may assume that this mobile phone may operate ridiculously, particularly if you are in a highly windy environment. But Fantalog has confirmed that the Emotion Engine can recognize a blow that comes from a human and actual wind. So no worries about that kind of situation. My only concern is how the engine will be able to recognize by smell. Well, let's see how Fantalog keeps improving its Emotion Engine to compete with and differentiate itself from Apple's multi-touch user interface, since the Cupertino company has the patent rights to that UI.

Once Pantech applies this technology to its mobile phones, I'm sure one of the PMP or MP3 manufacturers will try to implement this into its products, too. Who would that be? Cowon? iriver?

There is no information as yet on the price of the Sky Wind mobile, but the release date will be the middle of February.

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