In recent years, we have seen huge leaps forward in the technology of digital display, from Apple’s high-resolution Retina technology, which presents crisp and clear images to Apple computers and mobile devices, to 4K televisions, which offer the most detailed video presentation technology yet to make its way into home entertainment sectors. However, while displays have become more beautiful over the years, they’ve hardly gained dimensions. Sure, most mobile devices are now marked by touch screens that push the boundaries of what a 2D screen can accomplish, but no one has truly broken down walls and gone for a 3D display.

That is, no one until now. This week, MIT’s Tangible Media Group announced a new technology – a “Dynamic Shape Display” called InFORM – that can supposedly “render 3D content physically.” The new technology isn’t exactly a replacement for modern computer screens, though. Instead, InFORM works best as a supplement for regular 2D displays, but certainly helps to flesh out interactions with digital communications and content to a much greater degree.

According to a report from the Verge, MIT’s new display isn’t vertical the way we expect computer screens or TV displays to be, but horizontal. InFORM is a surface that uses “pins, actuators, and linkages” to render digital content in a 3D manner. In essence, it’s like those interactive pin table often seen in children’s museums, though instead of a hand or object physically pushing the pins up to create a 3D image, the pins are governed by digital commands through the actuators. Each actuator is assigned a different pin, so when a command elicits an actuator movement, the pin connected to that actuator will also move.

A demonstration video of the InFORM technology shows one of the members of MIT’s Tangible Media team manipulating the 3D display via video conference. When hooked up to a Microsoft Kinect sensor, the InFORM actuators can be manipulated remotely. In the video, the MIT specialist’s head and body appear in a regular 2D display, with his hands rendered by InFORM as he moves a ball around with the pins.

However, InFORM has more applications than just adding some 3D fidgeting to a video conference. MIT’s Tangible Media Group views the technology as the beginning of a broader and more tactile relationship between people and their digital data. In particular, the MIT team thinks that InFORM could be great for 3D design professionals like architects or urban planners.