Apple has been granted a patent for a “Stylus With Adjustable Features.” It involves potential future iterations of the Apple Pencil.
About the patent
The patent relates generally to handheld devices, such as styluses, and, more particularly, to touch-based input devices that can provide adaptive feedback to a user. Obviously, a stylus such as an Apple Pencil can be utilized to provide input by contacting a touch panel of an electronic device.
Apple apparently is considering an Apple Pencil with adjustable features. For example, a user could manipulate the orientation and position of it relative to an interface surface of the external device to convey information to the external device such as, but not limited to, writing, sketching, scrolling, gaming, selecting user interface elements, moving user interface elements, and so on.
What’s more, the size and/or shape of portions of the Apple Pencil (e.g., the tip) could be altered during use to accommodate a user. For example, the size and/or shape of a tip of the stylus can be altered to mimic characteristics of a writing or drawing tool (e.g., pen, pencil, chalk, marker, or paintbrush). Such characteristics can include shape, stiffness, flexibility, friction, and the like. Other characteristics, such as multiple bristles, center of gravity, and rotational moment of inertia, can also be modified as desired.
Summary of the patent
Here’s Apple’s abstract of the patent: “An input device, such as a stylus, can include adjustment capabilities that changes a size, shape, stiffness, or other characteristics of a portion of the stylus, such as the tip. The size, shape, stiffness, or other characteristics of a tip of the stylus can be altered to mimic characteristics of a particular writing or drawing tool. For example, the stiffness at the tip, the weight distribution, and/or moment of inertia of a particular tool can be simulated by altering the features of the stylus.”
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