Steerable AR Hand-Tracking Camera for Focused Gesture Capture
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Solution Overview
Problem
Head-worn AR systems lack effective user input modalities, making it difficult for users to indicate intent and invoke actions due to the absence of physical input devices like touchscreens or keyboards, and existing image sensors waste resources by capturing unnecessary areas outside the user's hands.
Innovation Solution
A steerable camera system that adjusts its optical axis to focus on the user's hands, using actuators, SLMs, or MEMS mirrors to capture high-resolution images of hand gestures within a narrow field of view, allowing for accurate hand tracking and input recognition.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If a wide-field-of-view camera is used to capture the entire surrounding environment, then the user can see more of the environment, but the camera wastes resources capturing unnecessary areas outside the user's hands for hand tracking
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a steerable camera system where the camera's field of view is dynamically adjusted based on detected hand positions. The camera steers its optical axis to track the user's hands in real-time, transitioning from a static wide-field view to a dynamic focused view that follows hand movements. This allows the system to maintain high hand tracking accuracy while reducing the captured area to only what is necessary for hand recognition.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a hand detection module as an intermediary that first detects hand positions in the captured images, then uses this information to control the camera steering mechanism. This intermediary layer enables the system to intelligently adjust the camera's field of view based on actual hand location, resolving the contradiction between capturing enough area for accurate tracking and minimizing wasted processing resources.
2Ease of operation
If physical input devices like touchscreens or keyboards are added to the head-worn device, then users can easily input commands and text, but the device complexity and weight increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces mechanical physical input devices with a computational hand gesture recognition system. Instead of adding physical keyboards or touchscreens, the system uses cameras to capture hand gestures and processes these gestures through image processing algorithms to recognize user commands. This substitution eliminates the need for additional mechanical components while maintaining or improving input capabilities.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates a virtual representation of hand gestures through image processing. Rather than requiring physical buttons or screens, the system captures the user's physical hand movements and creates corresponding digital command representations through recognition algorithms. This allows users to interact with the system through natural hand gestures without adding physical input hardware.
3Measurement precision
If the camera captures a narrow field of view focused on hands, then hand tracking accuracy improves, but the user may feel distracted from the AR experience
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements periodic switching between wide-field and narrow-field camera modes. The camera alternates between capturing the surrounding environment for AR display and focusing on the user's hands for gesture recognition. This periodic action allows the system to maintain hand tracking accuracy while ensuring the user remains engaged with the AR experience, as the camera returns to environmental viewing between hand-tracking intervals.
Data Source
AI summary
A system for hand tracking for an Augmented Reality (AR) system. The AR system uses a camera of the AR system to capture tracking video frame data of a hand of a user of the AR system. The AR system generates a skeletal model based on the tracking video frame data and determines a location of the hand of the user based on the skeletal model. The AR system causes a steerable camera of the AR system to focus on the hand of the user.