CapWidgets: tangile widgets versus multi-touch controls on mobile devices

Abstract

We present CapWidgets, passive tangible controls for capacitive touch screens. CapWidgets bring back physical controls to off-the-shelf multi-touch surfaces as found in mobile phones and tablet computers. While the user touches the widget, the surface detects the capacitive marker on the widget's underside. We study the relative performance of this tangible interaction with direct multi-touch interaction and our experimental results show that user performance and preferences are not automatically in favor of tangible widgets and careful design is necessary to validate their properties.