Remote Sensing Tools

The Art Lebedev Studio, in Russia, had released on the 15th of this month that the description and specifications will be published for the Optimus Maximus Keyboard, on March 20, 2007 at 3:00 pm Moscow time. On that same day, they’ll begin accepting limited pre-orders.

This had been a design that I’d been tracking for a couple years since its initial announcement of development. It’s not everyday you get excited about a piece of hardware, unless it’s doing exactly what this piece is aiming to do. The concept is relatively simple — but highly attractive to anyone working with programs and applications that demand a higher level of flexibility in control interfacing between user and software.

The concept itself isn’t new — as being around the music recording industry my entire life, keyboards for applications such as Protools are rather common. The difference, is that recording console keyboards are hard-screened and colored for specific short-cuts and functions. This keyboard is a bit more flexible in this regard as it isn’t so specific due to its unique method for supporting a wider range of software.

The keyboard itself becomes lit with specific short-cut keys for common industry-standard software that it supports using LED technology. Photoshop®, in example, is one of those applications where it would become value-added in training, and add efficiency to anyone’s existing work-flow by having a visual reference to work with between the interface controller (the keyboard) and the software.

The information on the support specifications do not appear to be available, or have become buried in the site at this time, but previously it demonstrated quite a range of applications that would be supported. On March 20th, we’ll get to understand exactly how far reaching program support will be, or how it can specifically help to enhance anyone’s computing and work experience.

So far, from the media press clippings, the keyboard will be at an estimated cost of $1500.00 USD. That doesn’t seem like a very manageable price-point for most upon initial review, but if you’re in the business of production of any kind, I can imagine that the cost would very quickly be made up due to the added advantages of the overall efficiencies associated. The long-run economics, dictating a highly attractive component for anyone to consider, adding practical value to any work-flow.

They’ve established a countdown clock in the link provided to the March 20th release, and of course I’ll continue to keep an eye on the progress as it develops.