Patent ID: 8780088

Claim:
A touch panel system comprising: a touchable surface; a backlight including visible light sources and at least one infrared source, wherein the at least one infrared source is configured to direct infrared radiation through the touchable surface for illuminating objects that are in contact with or adjacent to the touchable surface with infrared radiation; a touch panel display configured to illuminate pixels for visibly displaying an image, the touch panel display comprising: a matrix circuit including pixel circuit elements; and infrared sensors that are integrated in the matrix circuit with the pixel circuit elements and distributed parallel to the touchable surface, wherein: the infrared sensors are configured to detect reflected infrared radiation incident on the infrared sensors, infrared radiation directed by the at least one infrared source through the touchable surface is not detected by the infrared sensors, and the infrared sensors are shielded from visible light emitted by the visible light sources and visible light radiated by the pixels via filters located between the touchable surface and each of the infrared sensors; and a computing device coupled to the touch panel display for processing reflected infrared radiation detected by the infrared sensors, wherein the computing device is configured to: cause a multi-player game to be displayed by the touch panel display, process reflected infrared radiation detected by the infrared sensors that is directed through the touchable surface by different physical game pieces which are in contact with the touchable surface and which are associated with different players of the multi-player game, identify and distinguish between the different physical game pieces, detect locations of the different physical game pieces, and alter display of the multi-player game based on the locations of the different physical game pieces.