Not content with announcing one genuinely cool tech story this week, Japanese car manufacturer Toyota has unveiled a new augmented reality car window and a thought-controlled bicycle.
Toyota's new "Window to the World" project is all about developing new interactive touchscreen car windows, which will let children (and bored adult passengers) draw doodles on the picture of the world outside the back seat.
It's a novelty idea, for sure, and one we hope to see other car manufacturers also implement in future cars.
Toyota Motor Europe's Kansei1 Design Division and the consultancy arm of the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design (CIID) are responsible for the new AR window tech, which will let your passengers scrawl on the world outside.
Window to the World
Toyota's "Window to the World" tech was created to allow passengers to draw pics on the window – a concept Toyota cleverly tags as "Drawing in Motion" - in which doodles stay on the window attached to the real-world objects outside, until the user deletes them or wants to draw a new one.
Passengers can also use the touchscreen tech to zoom in on objects outside of the car, to get a clearer picture of things they want to see on their journey.
It is also very easy to see how this type of tech would work with satnavs and location-based social networking services, to allow the user to get more information on the picture outside of their window.
You can see more on Toyota's Window to the World project over at CIID
Though-controlled bike
Elsewhere in Toyota's labs, there is news of a new Prius-branded bicycle with a though-controlled gear system.
Toyota Prius Bike: thought-controlled gears
The Toyota Prius PXP bike has been developed in partnership with ad agency Saatchi & Saatchi, Parlee Cycles and Deeplocal.
The minimalistic bike's frame is made from the latest carbon fibre, using electrodes connected to your brain waves in order to allow you to shift up or down a gear by simply thinking it!
The new bike thought-control helmet tech has been created by interface specialist Deeplocal and we hope to see it available in our local cycle store some time very soon.
