SMART CUBE 3d model
3dmdb logo
GrabCAD
SMART CUBE

SMART CUBE

by GrabCAD
Last crawled date: 1 year, 9 months ago
SMART CUBE

Hello! This is my entry for the Nokia Lumia Accessory Design Challenge. It is basically a wireless charger that does many other functions combined. It also functions as a small ambient light on its own and a media centre, alarm clock and as a handsfree calling device in conjunction with the Nokia Lumia smartphone.

I relied heavily on the existing Lumia design when I was designing the look of the device. I have made the outside surfaces to be curvy and flowing exactly the same as on the Lumia casing. The only straight surface on the device is the tray where the phone is placed to be charged. The same way as is the screen on the Lumia telephone. The tray is coated with a rubbery plastic of course, so it doesent scratch the LUMIA casing when placed on it.

It is called the SMART CUBE because I wanted to mimic the same smarphone logic when interacting with it, which is used on todays best smartphones: hand gestures. The device has 2 small cameras which give it a stereoscopic view placed in the niche on the top edge of the front side. Those are it`s eyes. It constantly monitors its front facing surface, waiting for the interaction with the user.

With these two cameras the device can interpret an array of hand movements. All that is required from the user is to slide the fingers on the surface. Those BUILT-IN CAMERAS do the rest: SMART CUBE interprets those gestures with its stereoscopic "view" and it knows what it is required to do, based on the mode it is in.

Why go through all the trouble to achieve something the phone already has, you may ask. Well, when I started to think about wireless charging, I realised that the charging cycle is interferred every time you pick the telephone up from the charging panel to interact with it. Then I came to the conclusion it would be best to make »something«, that would allow you to interact with the smartphone and use it, once you put it out of your hands and »forget« about it.

The device runs on electricty via AC of USB connector. When used with an USB connector, it can also synchronise the smartphone and computer. It can also update the phone software and so on. It connects to the telephone via NFC/Bluetooth.

Lets take a look at the functions it can perform:

AMBIENT LIGHT MODE:

This is basically an autonomus mode which isn`t reliant on smartphone. When it is plugged into electricity, all you have to do is hold a finger on the front surface for 2 seconds and the light turns ON. Hold it again for 2 seconds and it turns OFF. This also works when playing music and so on, since this gesture is not repeated. This gesture is assigned only for this function. The size of the device is roughly 15x15x15 cm so it does not use up much space. It could easily be placed on any decent sized working desk.

HANDFREE CALL MODE:

This function would probably be used most prominently. It is basically intended to take the calls. When user gets an incoming phone call, the light in the device starts to blink, and the ring-melody starts to spread out of the built-in speaker. The user has to take a look on the smartphone to see who is calling him. Then he decides to take it or not. If he wants to take it he only has to tap the front side and then the phonecall starts. The device also has a built in microphone, in the same spot where the cameras are. If he decides not to take the call, he slides a finger on the surface from left to right, effectively putting the ringing to silence. To make an outgoing call, the user has to interface with the phone over the touchscreen directly, and select the person to call. Once the call is made, its goes into handsfree mode automatically. Should the user want to have a private conversation once the dialogue is engaged, all hea has to do is pick up the phone. Once the charging mode gets disengaged (because the phone is phisycally removed from the charging unit) it switches the phone to use its own speaker/microphone.

MUSIC MODE:

This is basically same mode as listening to music over the headphones. The sound comes out of the built-in 5 inch speaker. And all interaction is made again via the hand gestures. Drawing a circle puts the phone into playmode and the music starts streaming. To pause and resume play again, all youhave to do is tap the front panel. The sideway gesture (left-right and right-left) plays the next/previous song from the playlist. To increase/decrease the volume you slide fingers together or apart, same as with zooming pictures on the smartphone. To exit the play mode, youhave to draw a circle on the surface. If there is an incoming phonecall while playing to music, the music mutes same as on headphones.

ALARM-CLOCK MODE:

This is basically an upgrade of the phones alarmclock to use the lighting signals from the SMART CUBE (device starts to blink or it turns its light on until the user turns it off) and to use its inbuilt speaker to sound the alarm. That would be usefull for everyone that oversleeps because the telephone alarm is not loud enough to wake them up.

SIGNALS:

SMART CUBE can interact with the user via both visual and sound signals. That makes it capable of giving various signals for all sorts of events that happen on thelephone. It could give various audible and visual signals, for missed calls, SMS, MMS and e-mail mesages. Even if the telephone is set on silent mode, the user knows something is going on with it, because of the blinking.

The SMART CUBE tries to be very simplistic on the outside, but it combines the very best of the smartphones on the inside. It totally changes the interaction proces, the same as smartphones did once they started using hand gestures instead of buttons. It is not so much the design of the product that matters, its more about the design of the user experience.

It is one SMART package, that combines many different functionalities.

Tags