Visual Tracking of Bare Fingers for Interactive Surfaces

Julien Letessier and François Bérard.

In ACM User Interface Software and Technology (UIST), 2004, Santa Fe, USA.

Abstract

Visual tracking of bare fingers allows more direct manipulation of digital objects, multiple simultaneous users interacting with their two hands, and permits the interaction on large surfaces, using only commodity hardware. After presenting related work, we detail our implementation. Its design is based on our modeling of two classes of algorithms that are key to the tracker: Image Differencing Segmentation (IDS) and Fast Rejection Filters (FRF). We introduce a new chromatic distance for IDS and a FRF that is independent to finger rotation. The system runs at full frame rate (25 Hz) with an average total system latency of 80 ms, independently of the number of tracked fingers. When used in a controlled environment such as a meeting room, its robustness is satisfying for everyday use.