Applications

 

Although interesting by itself, the full implications of real-time human tracking only become concrete when the information is used to create an interactive application. Pfinder has been used to explore several different human interface applications. This section describes some systems that have been developed in conjunction with fellow researchers. They are presented here to help illustrate the potential of Pfinder as an interface device.

Pfinder provides a modular interface to client applications. Several clients can be serviced in parallel, and clients can attach and detach without affecting the underlying vision routines. A wide range of data is exported through this interface:

• polygon representation of the support map
• blob model statistics
• semantically labeled feature positions (e.g. head, right hand, etc.)
• gestures (e.g. standing, sitting, pointing, etc.)

Before this information can be useful for applications, a mapping must exist between Pfinder output and the interface idiom. This mapping must be carefully chosen, because it defines the metaphor that the user is forced use when they interact with the system. The desired level of abstraction, tolerance to interface accuracy and lag, even the prior expectations of the user must be taken into account when designing this mapping.

 
• SURVIVE
• Visually-Animated Characters
• NetSpace
• American Sign Language
• DanceSpace
• ALIVE