The Gravity LCD watch concept was created by Sam Jerichow. The watch has a small internal tilt sensor that will measure the orientation of the watch. This in turn will make the numbers tumble all over the place as you move your wrist. The numbers will fall back into place once the watch face is touched. A longer touch with half of your finger will activate the backlight, so that you can tell the time in the dark.

The design is quite minimal and sparse, but I like the overall look. This cool watch concept is currently up for voting on the TokyoFlash Design Blog and if it gets enough votes, it might be made into a real watch.

One alternative is to change your monitor and get Philips’ ErgoSensor display. Aside from offering a vibrant 24″ LCD screen, it’s also equipped with a sensor that detects if you’re sitting in the correct and ergonomic position.

In addition to alerting you to maintain good posture, the ErgoSensor also keeps track of the time you’ve spent in front of your monitor and reminds you to take a break every one in a while. The monitor’s green too, since it automatically goes into power-saving mode if it detects that you’ve stepped away from your desk.

You can check out Philips UK for more information about the ErgoSensor display.

[via Wired via Oh Gizmo!]

Based on a user-submitted design concept by Heather Sable, the Stencil’s case is made out of stainless steel and it comes with a leather strap. The LCD face shows the time in negative space, which can be cryptic when you first glance at it, but very easily deciphered when you understand it. The hours are in the upper half of the screen, while the minutes are at the bottom. Besides the LCD time display, it has an EL backlight, alarm and date modes.

There are two versions available. The normal version (available in several LCD colors) will light up the digits while the mirror version will light up the space separating the digits. Both watches offer a stainless steel case can be ordered with a black or white leather band. You can get yours over at TokyoFlash for $99(USD) until February 22nd at 11PM (EST). After that, the price goes up to $139.

Designed as a collaborative effort between Heather Sable & Samuel Jerichow, the V-BL47 watch is supposedly based on “Blutonian technology” from a vessel which crash-landed on Earth back in 1947. Left behind in the crash was a device determined to be a Blutonian timepiece – the inspiration for this watch. Heck, Heather even says she’s half Blutonian, and her given name is Hea’thër. Sam, on the other hand, is from Germany. Whether you buy the story or just like cool watches, you’ll want to read further.

As conceived, the V-BL47 watch would use a combination of LCD and LED technology to tell time. The glowing TRON-like display would use an always-on LCD to block out the appropriate areas of the display, while the LEDs would illuminate the display from behind. Additional LEDs would provide the glowing fiber-optic-like lines on its soft black silicone strap. I wonder if some sort of electroluminescent display would better provide the brightness shown in the concept drawings though.

At first glance, you may think this is another one of those difficult to read timepieces, but it really isn’t. Check it out. Each of the four quadrants on the face of the watch simply display a digit. The digits are distorted onto polar coordinates to fill a quarter-circle, but can be easily read once you understand what they each look like.

Simply read the display in a clockwise fashion, starting on the bottom, and you can easily read the time. Your friends, on the other hand, will be completely befuddled.

The same paradigm can be used to display day and date, and a tiny dot in the middle of the display indicates when the time is PM. Now look at the watches below and see how easy it is to read them?

I’m sure if you wore one, you’d get used to it enough where you could tell time at a glance.

Again, the V-BL47 is still just a concept – but a very good one in my opinion. If you’d like to see the V-BL47 watch actually get produced, head on over to the Tokyoflash Design Blog now and cast your vote. I already did.

The watch is digital, and has a dual-zone time LCD face with date, alarms, timer, tachometer, pedometer and a “sailing option,” though it’s not clear what added info that mode displays. Proceeds from sales of the watch will be put toward the restoration program of music milestones at the GRAMMY Museum, so at least it’s for a good cause.

The I-Gucci GRAMMY special edition watch sells for $1,395(USD) over at the Gucci online store. There are other models starting at a “low” price of $1,250 and going up to $7,900 for the diamond encrusted one.

[via Pursuitist via Ubergizmo]

That’s what I initially thought of Tokyoflash Design Studio’s Sudoku Puzzle Watch Concept, but you don’t actually have to solve the entire puzzle from scratch with the watch – just a small portion of it.

The design itself is easy to understand enough: the face of the watch is actually a digital display showing a Sudoku puzzle grid. At least two grids from each column will have two blank spaces each. Just fill each grid up with the missing digit from 1 to 9, and you’ve got your answer. Once you figure it out, read the figures from left to right to figure out what time it is.

The Sudoku Watch Concept seems pretty complicated at first glance, but it’s a whole lot simpler than you think – especially if you’re used to solving Sudoku puzzles. And if it gets made, I’d definitely want to get my hands on one.

[via Tokyoflash]

The limited-edition Kisai Optical Illusion is a touchscreen alarm watch, with time, date, alarm, and EL backlighting. You’ll need keen eyes to make out the time, as it’s hidden in diagonally reversed lines among a maze of confusing squiggles.

If that’s too hard on your peepers, you can just press the reveal button and the watch will show the time. It comes with an animation mode as well, which alternates between the puzzling illusion and revealing the time ever 20 seconds.

While it might not look that technologically advanced, the display has one of the most complex LCD screens ever on a watch, with over 1500 tiny LCD segments which need to be addressable by its time circuits. The watch is made out of stainless steel, and it’s available in either black or silver with a natural or green display. For the next two days, you can order the Kisai Optical Illusion watch for $179 (USD). After this, you’ll end up paying $199.

Samsung has teamed up with Absolut Vodka to show off the screen on a commercial cooler for its liquor. The screen is the front of the glass cabinet door. The buyers can see advertisements on the door of the cooler and still look inside to see if the cooler is stocked.

The 46-inch LCD screen has a contrast ratio of 4500:1 and a resolution of 1366 x 768 allowing it to show (720p) HD content. The downside is that the see-through design makes the display have worse than normal color reproduction with a 70% color gamut. Still, it’s pretty cool.

Samsung showed off a similar transparent display demo at last week’s CES, which was used to create what they called a “Smart Window.” What other cool uses do you see for a clear display like this?

It’s able to detect up to 32 simultaneous touch points, so multiple users can interact with it, and it offers full 1080p HD resolution. The giant LED backlit LCD screen is fully 3D capable, and is bright enough to work even in well-lit environments, like museums, offices and classrooms.

The MT65 Presenter isn’t just a display – it’s a fully self-contained Windows 7-based system (a Linux version is coming in March.) Under the hood, it’s got a speedy quad-core Intel Core i7 2720QM CPU, along with 8GB of RAM, a 256GB SATA SSD hard drive, and a GeForce GTX 460 GPU, so it’s powerful enough to run just about anything you can throw at it. Ports include Ethernet, HDMI (in and out for mirroring), USB 2.0, and 3.5mm audio in and out jacks.

The whole system is loaded into a durable 4″ thick vandal-proof aluminum frame, so it can be used in public places without too much worry. They’ve also attached a small HD webcam and stereo microphone on top of the display, so those can be used as inputs for interactive projects. Also included is GestureWorks 3, which lets you easily create interactive touch-based apps using Adobe Flash, Flex or Air. The package also includes software components for quickly integrating and interacting with photos, videos, and audio files in touch-based projects.

The ideum MT65 Presenter is available now, with prices starting at $17,450 (USD), and can be ordered in custom colors for $1,000 more. Sure, you might not be able to afford one for your living room, but it’s a pretty good deal for professional users, given its size and capabilities.

Developed by Sanden, in cooperation with Okaya Electronics and Intel, this concept vending machine has a 65-inch full HD vertical display on front. The transparent touchscreen display can not only show animated graphics, but provides product information and merchandising, and even acts as a clock while waiting for its next customer.

The prototype machine even offers facial recognition technology so it could display customized menus based on the individual user as they walk by.  And if it doesn’t know you, it can display products based on what demographic it THINKS you fit into based on your age or gender. How Minority Report of them.

[via DigInfo.TV]

For example, the watch above is displaying 3:45. Get it now? Fine. Here are more examples:

In keeping with its minimalist design, the watch face has four touch-sensitive zones – the top, bottom, left and right – for setting the time, date, alarm and light, all of which are activated by a prolonged touch. The On Air watch is yet another design which started out on TF’s Design Studio Blog, and based on a concept by Iskender and Adilet Asanaliev.

It’s available in either silver or black stainless steel, and in natural grey LCD with blue LED backlighting, green LCD with matching green LED backlighting, red LCD with matching red LED backlighting, or gold LCD with orange LED backlighting.

If you like what you’re (not) seeing, set an alarm within the next 13 hours reminding you to order the On Air watch from Tokyoflash. Wait longer than that and you’ll miss out on its $169 to $179 (USD) launch price, which is $20 less than its regular price.

First up is the Optimus Popularis, a compact keyboard with everything but numeric keys. The Popularis is one awesome looking keyboard, with each key offering full programmability, and a tiny, full color screen.

Each key is made up of a 64×64 pixel grid, which can support 262,144 unique colors, and a frame rate of 10fps. That’s right, you can display animation on these keys!  Each one can be set up with custom images for different languages, or special keys to launch specific applications or functions when switching applications. Lebedev says it’s “A million keyboards in one,” and he’s totally spot on. Here are just a few sample configurations:

One thing to note is that the keys this time are made using a backlit LCD screen instead of individual OLED screens, which seems like a better approach these days. Though it’s not clear if each key has it’s own individual LCD panel or if there’s just one large LCD behind the keyboard, and the area between the keys acts as a mask. Either way, it still looks awesome. I also love how the new keys are more like those rounded keys found on a Mac keyboard, which is more what I’m used to these days anyhow.

A quick glance reveals a fully customizable display bar between the function keys and the main keyboard, which can be used to display pertinent info like what track you’re listening to, or how many emails you have waiting.

Programming is accomplished with a sophisticated configuration app included with the keyboards – and it’s compatible with Windows XP, Vista, 8 and Mac OS 10.5.1 or higher too.

So now that you’ve wiped the drool off of your current keyboard… the pricetag. The Optimus Popularis isn’t cheap. The pre-order price is 31,500 rubles, which works out to be about $1086 (USD) or 747 (EUR) at today’s exchange rates. Pricey, but sexy as all get out. If that’s too rich for your blood, and you still love the concept, check out the Optimus Mini Six add-on keyboard instead:

The Mini Six is exactly what it sounds like – a small external keyboard with six programmable LCD keys on it. It supports the same programmability,  and animation capabilities of the full-size keyboard – though it only can handle 65,536 colors. The Mini Six is selling for for 10,900 Rubles, or about $376(USD) or $258 (EUR). Both the Popularis and Mini Six are built from aluminum and plastic components, and have a nice slim profile.

Art Lebedev Studio started to take pre-orders for both the Optimus Popularis and Optimus Mini Six today, with the Popularis shipping June 1, 2012, and the Mini Six not shipping until November 1, 2012. But there is an advantage to that long pre-order wait, as the retail prices will be more than 30% higher once released. Yeouch! Lebedev, does plan on showing off the prototypes at the 2012 CES show next month. I definitely plan on stopping by their booth to see these awesome looking things up close and personal.

Dimovi was able to pull this off by removing the polarized film within the LCD monitor and attaching it to a pair of sunglasses. You have to be familiar with polarization to understand how this algebraic trick works. I trust in your Googling skills but for now just know that a polarizer – such as the polarized film commonly found in monitors – is designed to allow only a portion of light waves to pass through it. Watch and be amazed:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

The PlayStation 3D monitor works in a similar fashion to allow individual players to see just their half of a two-player game.

Unfortunately the polarization mod is as complicated as the property of polarization. It involves a laser cutter, some solvent and a gerbil. Okay I was kidding about the last part. Go undercover and sneak to Instructables to get the details on the mod. This post will not self-destruct.

The 16.1MP Samsung MV800 features a 3-inch flip-out adjustable LCD screen, that can rotate up to 180 degrees so you can even look at yourself for self-portraits. The camera comes with a Schneider lens and three shutter options. The optical zoom is 5× and has image stabilization built-in. It can capture and watch 720p/30fps HD video, and pipe it out via its HDMI port. There are a number of integrated filters, special effects, and customizations available directly in the camera’s OS.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

It can even shoot 3D photos, which is kind of cool, but pointless if you don’t have a 3D HDTV set. The MV800 camera sells for $279.99 (USD) directly from Samsung.

[via designboom]

The watch is called the Sparc MGS by Ventura Watches. It has a LCD display on the face and above the watch face is another crystal that covers a little mechanical nano generator. The generator creates the power that is needed to run the watch when you move around.

It has a way to store the power that allows the watch to run for 45 days without moving. The face displays the time, date, and has dual time zone capability. It also has a LED backlight. The watch runs some sort of OS leaving the chance for upgrades open as well. The only bad part about his watch is that the black version you see here costs $5,500(USD).

[via WristWatchReview]

Following in the footsteps of Apple’s sharp iPhone 4/4S Retina display, Toshiba is now showing off a 6.1-inch display with an astounding 2560 x 1600 resolution. If you do the math on that, it works out to a whopping 496 ppi. In comparison, Apple’s Retina displays are already a razor-sharp 326ppi. The image above is an example screen from the display. Here’s a zoomed in section from the image to give you a sense of how much detail it holds:

Enough resolution for you? The prototype LCD/TFT display offers a contrast ratio of 1000 to 1, a 176-degree viewing angle, and support for a full 16-million colors. Not too shabby for a display which could almost fit in your pants pocket.

No word on when we’ll actually see these displays in a production device. I’m still waiting for the TV in my living room has the same resolution as a 4K digital cinema.

[Toshiba [JP] via Newlaunches]

The top two rows display the hours, while the third one is reserved for minutes. The fourth one shows the seconds. The unique thing about this watch is that it’s got a refracted surface on its crystal, which distorts the view of the face. The faceted patterns is continued throughout the band of the watch, which is available in either titanium or blue.

The strap is fashioned out of silicone, and the watch is all angles and squares. Both colors are available on pre-sale for $375 (USD), and ships starting on October 24th.

[via designboom]

The Rogue Touch display is right out of science-fiction, so telling the time can seem a bit complicated. The outer ring tells time in one time zone, while the inner ring displays a secondary time zone.

You interact with the watch using a touchscreen face to change modes or set the watch, but it automatically locks after 60 seconds, and then you need to swipe your finger across the screen to reactivate it – a smart design choice.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

The case has a polished gunmetal finish, and the display, illuminated by bright LEDs is available in four colors. The time-telling LCD is always on, so you don’t have to activate the LEDs to view the time, just to illuminate it in the dark.

Through 9/29, you’ll get free shipping and $20 off if you order the Kisai Rogue Touch from the TokyoFlash web store. After that, the watch jumps up to its regular retail price of $199 (USD).

These cool Click watches not only incorporate DIP or turn switches into their faces, the switches actually serve a purpose. Each one of the mechanical switches on the watch activates various watch functions and display modes.

Flipping the switches to the proper positions will display time in 12 or 24-hour modes, show the date, day of week, or even flip into a special bar graph time mode if digits aren’t geeky enough for you.

Each CLICK watch is crafted from stainless steel, and also offers a backlight (yet again activated by a dip switch). I suppose you’ll need tiny fingers or the tip of a small screwdriver to really get the best use out of the switches, although I seem to remember getting pretty good with flipping them even with my fat digits after dealing with my fair share of misconfigured SCSI drive terminations.

As an added bonus, each CLICK watch ships in an awesome package made from a circuit board. I wonder what it’s a circuit for? It seems to have spots for USB, display and serial connectors, but I’m betting even if you soldered a bunch of parts to it, you wouldn’t get anything functional. Or I could be wrong.

CLICK watches are available in a variety of face and switch color, as well as black or silver stainless metal finishes. Each comes with either a band reminiscent of an old ribbon cable or with a stainless band. The ribbon strap version goes for $149.99(USD), while the stainless band model sells for $169.99. All models of the CLICK watch are available now over at Watchismo.

Well, if you’ve got $3500 to spare, have I got something for you! This animatronic door is one of the best scares I’ve seen in a while, and there’s one for sale right now over on Etsy.

As you can see from the photo above, this door has a nasty surprise hidden inside of it. Here, watch the video and you’ll see what I mean:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

Nice effect, eh? Especially that part when it looks like the axe is chopping through the door, right? The effect is achieved with a 22-inch LCD monitor, along with a special DVD from Hi-Rez Designs which has DTMF tracks which cue the pneumatics behind the door at just the right time. They even offer up build instructions for customers who want to build one for themselves.

While you could try and build your own door, it’s probably way easier to pick up this one that’s already built over on Etsy, from the appropriately named “999deadpatricia”. And if you don’t have $3500 to spare, you could always just pick up the DVD, and just play that on a monitor (without the pneumatics).

I so want to replace my front door with this for Halloween this year.