Computer vision for computer games

The appeal of computer games may be enhanced by vision-based user inputs. The high speed and low cost requirements for near-term, mass-market game applications make system design challenging. The response time of the vision interface should be less than a video frame time and the interface should cost less than 50 Dollars U.S. We meet these constraints with algorithms tailored to particular hardware. We have developed a special detector, called the artificial retina chip, which allows for fast, on-chip image processing. We describe two algorithms, based on image moments and orientation histograms, which exploit the capabilities of the chip to provide interactive response to the player’s hand or body positions at 10 msec frame time and at low-cost. We show several possible game interactions. 2nd International Conference on Automatic Face and Gesture Recognition, Killington, VT, USA This work may not be copied or reproduced in whole or in part for any commercial purpose. Permission to copy in whole or in part without payment of fee is granted for nonprofit educational and research purposes provided that all such whole or partial copies include the following: a notice that such copying is by permission of Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories, Inc.; an acknowledgment of the authors and individual contributions to the work; and all applicable portions of the copyright notice. Copying, reproduction, or republishing for any other purpose shall require a license with payment of fee to Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories, Inc. All rights reserved. Copyright c ©Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories, Inc., 1996 201 Broadway, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139