Non Immersive Control of Virtual Environments

Abstract

Three-dimensional representations of real environments form a new means of communication between man and machine, making explicit use of mechanisms which humans have learned and experienced during their whole lives in moving themselves and manipulating objects. Two central observations regarding human communication and behaviour can be made: people have a natural ability to move and act in their three-dimensional environment, and they naturally use hand gestures as a means of communication. We present a non-immersive three-dimensional input device that allows applications to be controlled by gestures of the human hand. Hand position, orientation and finger gestures are obtained using a video camera and image processing techniques. The system works in real-time and controls a three-dimensional virtual environment. Our input device has proven to be very reliable and is more natural to use than other conventional computer input systems.