If your phone is lacking one thing, it’s a display that covers multiple sides of its boring little rectangular frame. At least, that’s according to Samsung, because Bloomberg is reporting that the company has plans to produce a phone with a curved OLED screen which wraps around three of its sides.
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As if we needed any further convincing of the wonderful potential of flexible displays, a Japanese company called SEL has developed a high-resolution screen that can be rolled to a tight four-millimeter radius, allowing it to wrap around the edge of a smartphone while still working.
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LG unveiled the "world’s first flexible OLED panel for smartphones" on Monday morning and bragged about how products with "enhanced performance and differentiated designs" would follow next year. A fully flexible smartphone is probably not going to be among those exciting new things, however.
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As often as companies love to toy with flexible displays, we’re seldom told how we’d control that newfound freedom. Are we supposed to make e-paper cranes? Credit LG for some forward thinking — it’s just receiving a US patent for a 2008-era user interface invention that would use a bending screen to its advantage. The implementation includes two displays, one of which flexes while the other accepts touch; bend or fold the first display, and the touchscreen changes to suit the context. Having two closely linked displays would also let the panels run either in unity or independently. Suffice it to say that the technology is unlikely to roll out as-is on a smartphone, if ever: LG’s attention has swung towards having one big touchscreen as of late. However, the interface does give the Korean firm a place to start if it develops devices to match its new flexible batteries.
Filed under: Cellphones, Displays, Mobile
LG gets patent for mobile UI that reacts to flexible displays, encourages origami originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 19 Sep 2012 13:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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