Abstract: Multitouch surfaces are becoming prevalent, but most existing technologies are only capable of detecting the user’s actual points of contact on the surface and not the identity, posture, and handedness of the user. In this paper, we define the concept of extended multitouch interaction as a richer input modality that includes all of this information. We further present a practical solution to achieve this on tabletop displays based on mounting a single commodity depth camera above a horizontal surface. This will enable us to not only detect when the surface is being touched, but also recover the user’s exact finger and hand posture, as well as distinguish between different users and their handedness. We validate our approach using two user studies, and deploy the technology in a scratchpad application as well as in a sketching tool that integrates pen and touch for creating beautified sketches.
