FINGER-POINTER - POINTING INTERFACE BY IMAGE-PROCESSING

We have developed an experimental system for the 3D direct pointing interface ''Finger-Pointer,'' which can recognize finger pointing actions and simple hand forms in real-time by processing the image sequences captured by stereoscopic TV cameras. The operator is not required to attach any peculiar device such as the Data-Glove or a magnetic sensor. Simple and fast image processing algorithms employed in the system enable real-time processing without any special image processing hardware. By introducing the notion of ''VPO (Virtual Projection Origin),'' the system can recognize pointing actions stably and accurately regardless of the operator's pointing style. The system also synchronizes and integrates the audio and the visual channels by introducing the ''Timing Tag'' technique.