Line Phone concept uses extra-clever gestures thanks to its touch-sensitive rim

Judging by some of the newly announced phones, you might get the idea that we’re living in the future. But every once in a while, a concept of a phone comes along that makes it very clear that it’s not the future yet.

The Line Phone, which won the 2010 Furong Cup in ‘Digital Product and Service Design Competition’ in China, is one such concept...

The Line Phone is a full touch phone in the extreme – the front is a touchscreen edge to edge. Also, the defining feature of the concept is the touch sensitive rim, which plays a key role in controlling the user interface.

Watch this awesome video to get a better idea of what I’m talking about:



This rim serves a double purpose – it has a dynamic backlight, which is used as an indicator, but it’s also used for gestures. From simple scrolling to more complex gestures like changing the volume, skipping songs, image rotation and even going back to edit a text before it has been sent. All based on where and how you touch the rim and the currently active app.

The touchscreen also boasts a variety of multitouch gestures – who needs physical buttons when you have a well thought-out touch UI, right?

Anyway, it’s a great concept though there are some things I’m not quite certain about (the whole front face of the phone is a touchscreen, so where’s the earpiece?). Not that it matters – avantgard concepts like this rarely see the light of day as an actual product.

The Synaptic Fuse concept has a similar touch-enabled rim, have a look at that too. It even has pressure-sensitive sides that react to a squeeze as well.

It’s not hard to imagine what the world would be like if Ferrari did come out with a successor to the venerable Enzo supercar. As one of the meanest and most awesome supercars to come out of Maranello in history, the Ferrari Enzo certainly has no equal – that is unless a successor to it comes along down the road.

In the event that our fantasy does come true, concept designer Peter Simon already has an idea of what he thinks the Enzo successor is going to look like.

Featuring a far more aggressive nose and front end than the real Enzo, Simon’s concept work is the personification of a car that certainly poses a design identity that’s all its own.

According to Simon, the inspiration behind his work was taken from – get this – human and animal bones. Simon took his inspiration, weird as it sounds, and combines with the flair of Maranello to create a striking study that boasts of swooping angles that we’ve never seen from an actual Prancing Horse.

We have to give props to Peter Simon for the ingenuity and the rather out-of-the-box approach to his work. We just don’t think that an Enzo successor – if or when it does come out – would look anything like this.

So maybe it’s not as obvious and toy-like as the BMW X1 or the Bugatti Veyron built straight from Lego blocks, but this Rolls Royce Apparition Concept bears some strong resemblance to the construction toys we used to play with when we were young. Except a Rolls Royce is nothing to play around with so we are not sure what Jeremy Westerlund was thinking when he put together this boxy contraption.

Then again, he provided a little synopsis of the inspiration behind his creation. He sees the Apparition Concept as "An ultra luxurious chauffeur driven limousine evoking the glamor and sophistication of chauffeur driven cars in the past that has since been lost. This vehicle is about being seen, but at the same time being invisible or an "Apparition" in the sense that you’re safely tucked away in its palatial and private interior. Exterior model-milled foam from Alias data."

Thankfully, this is just a 1:4 scale model concept, so the chances of anyone building this Phantom-based vehicle is slim to none. Actually it’s more like none to none, since it looks like the driver would be the only person able to ride around in it and he may only be able to jump in it to sit down. Radio, navigation system, and even simple luxuries such as cupholders seem to be completely out of the question for this ride. This car would only exist to make a statement, and that statement would be: "Because I can."