Touch-Free Gesture Recognition Patent Granted To BlackBerry

BlackBerry is always looking for ways to innovate. And with BlackBerry 10 being the start of transforming the world of mobile computing technology, it's not surprise to see some rather sci-fi-like patents making their way into the USPTO. Here is the abstract on the most recent patent:

"Object detection and selection for use in a device having digital camera functionality is described. The mechanism detects the occurrence of a gesture by a pointing member in an image frame captured by an IR image sensor. The gesture is then recognized and an object pointed to is detected. The object detected is then selected as a result of the gesture recognition."

The patent describes a method for selecting images on a screen using finger or hand motions above the display. With the help of IR (infrared) and images taken, the software would be able to figure out where/what the user intended to select on the display.

The document also goes onto say, "a mobile communications device, comprising: a digital camera... [and] a cellular subsystem." So the technology could potentially be implemented on future BlackBerry smartphones and tablets. I can think of many reasons why this would be useful. First thought comes to mind is if your hands are messy and you don't want to dirty your display.

Can you think of any other uses for this touch-free gesture recognition technology?