A Forest Row-based innovation company has won a government-sponsored award to develop a new form of computer control.

4D Technology Systems received the £45,000 Smart Award from the Department of Trade and Industry's small business service.

The award scheme provides grants to help individuals and small and medium-sized enterprises to make better use of technology and develop innovative products and processes.

The company, formed three years ago, has been researching ways of replacing mouse, keyboard and game controllers since 1996.

The six-month project funded by the award will help it accelerate development of an untethered games controller, taking the company several steps closer to coming to market.

The controller will use hand movements rather than joysticks and buttons.

Eugene Bustamante, technical director, said:

"Users have had to use cumbersome helmets or wired-up gloves to interact with computers in 3-D.

"The new system lets us bring the 3-D world to the user, rather than the other way around, without the need for extra gadgets."

The award will help to develop a cross-shaped games controller, which users hold, and two cameras to track movements around the room.

Tilting the cross produces a corresponding tilt on the screen and users can also "hold" and manipulate objects.

The system does not require wireless communications, which means it can be used inside technology-

sensitive environments like hospitals.

Mr Bustmante said explaining the system had become easier with the release of Steven Spielberg's film, Minority Report, which showed Tom Cruise controlling a computer using hand movements.

He said: "We've been compared to Minority Report quite a lot since it came out but the system in the film was gesture based, while, with our system, you can push and pull, poke and grasp."

www.4dtechnologies.com
www.go-se.gov.uk