VR Interactive Controls Using Camera-Based Hand Tracking
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing VR systems require complex and expensive equipment to track user movements and provide intuitive interactive controls, making them inaccessible to average users.
Innovation Solution
The implementation of interactive control processes that utilize simple controllers to detect movement, determine angles of rotation and magnitudes of force, and map these movements to paths within a VR environment, allowing for intuitive user interaction without the need for expensive hardware.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If complex tracking equipment like omnidirectional treadmills is used to track user movements in VR environments, then measurement precision and reliability of user movement tracking are improved, but device complexity and cost increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses a camera to capture visual images of the user's hands and creates a digital copy or representation of hand movements in the VR environment. Instead of complex physical tracking equipment, the system copies visual information from the real world and processes it to achieve movement tracking, thereby reducing device complexity while maintaining tracking precision.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces mechanical tracking systems (like omnidirectional treadmills) with a visual-based system using cameras and image processing. The mechanical system that physically tracks and translates user movements is substituted with an optical system that captures images and processes them computationally to determine hand positions and movements in the VR environment.
2Ease of operation
If simple controllers are used for VR interaction, then ease of operation and accessibility are improved, but measurement precision of user movements deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediary processing system that bridges the simple controller and the VR environment. The camera acts as an intermediary that captures detailed visual information about hand movements, and image processing algorithms serve as intermediaries that translate this visual data into precise movement coordinates for the VR environment, thereby maintaining measurement precision despite using simple controllers.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent transitions from tracking movement in physical space (three-dimensional real world coordinates) to tracking movement in visual/image space (two-dimensional image coordinates). By capturing hand movements through a camera and processing image data, the system extracts precise positional information from the visual dimension, allowing simple controllers to achieve accurate movement detection through dimensional transformation.
Data Source
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AI summary
A virtual reality (VR) system supports improved interactive control processes/services. These interactive control processes/services include detecting movement of a controller associated with a virtual reality (VR) environment, determining an angle of rotation based on the movement, determining a magnitude of force associated with the movement, determining a path in the VR environment that corresponds to the angle of rotation and the magnitude of force, and projecting the path in the VR environment.