Patent ID: 7071914

Claim:
A method for generating signals to effect one of translational movement, rotational movement, and both translational and rotational movements of an object on a graphical display using one of human arm position data, human arm movement data, and both human arm position and movement data, comprising: providing an image processor and a device for capturing a video sequence; capturing, from the video sequence, a frame that does not include a person; isolating a view comprising a foreground subject image view by performing an algorithm on the video sequence and the frame that does not include the person, wherein the algorithm includes subtracting the frame that does not include the person from individual frames in the video sequence; determining whether the isolated view includes an image of a person by ensuring that a number of nonzero pixels in the foreground image is within a range indicative of a presence of the image of the person; determining a horizontal extent of a torso in the image of the person so as to isolate arm portions of the person in frames of the captured video sequence; computing arm angles by calculating angles of principle moment of nonzero pixels in the arm portions of the image of the person; and generating an arm position data signal responsive to arm angles for effecting one of translational movement, rotational movement, and both translational and rotational movement of an object on a graphical display.