The Apple Watch may be able to read a user’s hand gestures if the technology included in a recent patent application by Apple — spotted by Patently Apple and aggregated by 9to5Mac — ever makes it to market. At the moment, the Apple Watch is capable to telling when a user lifts their arm to activate itself.
Gestures that such as putting two fingers down into the palm of your hand, or twisting turning your wrist, could control actions on the Apple Watch should voice activated inputs commands not be possible. This also opens the gates for using the Apple Watch as a control input for other devices, like a holographic computer display manipulatable in 3D space.
Any potential possibilities include the Apple Watch being the controller for an Apple virtual reality ecosystem, whose existence is still only speculative at this point, but for which Apple has assembled a team of researchers to develop.
The patent include a list of potential commands that the technology could up on, include a hand movement toward the user activating a ringer to find a lost iPhone, moving a hand in certain direction to shift the volume controls (or fast to mute a device), making the internationally known “talking on the phone” hand gesture to make a phone call, or even unlock a car by putting fingers in a fixed position.
Another possibility would be the Apple Watch automatically interpreting sign language, and translating into text. Such a feature would allow screenless text messaging, and if paired with a virtual reality goggles, could be the basis for a form of voiceless communication in a VR ecosystem.
