Pan-and-tilt self-portrait system using gesture interface

Digital cameras are widely used in desktop and notebook PCs. Taking self-portraits is one of the important function of such cameras, which allows users to capture memories, create art, and improve photography techniques. A desktop environment with a large display and a pan-and-tilt camera provides users with a good area for exploring more angles and postures while taking self-portraits. However, most of the existing camera interfaces of this type are limited to device-based systems (i.e., mouse and keyboard) that prevent users from efficiently controlling the camera while taking self-portraits. This study proposes a vision-based system equipped with a gesture interface that control a pan-and-tilt camera for taking self-portraits. This interface uses gestures, particularly slight hand movements (i.e., sweeps, circles, and waves), to control the pan, tilt, and shutter functions of the camera. The gesture-recognition achieved good efficiency in performance (less than 2ms) and the recognition rate (0.9 on average in lighting conditions range 100 - 200). Experimental results indicate that the proposed system effectively controls the options in a self-portrait camera, this approach provides significantly higher satisfaction, particularly in terms of the intuitive motion gestures, freedom, and enjoyment, than when using a hand-held remote control or a conventional mouse-based interface. The proposed system is a promising technique for taking self-portraits in a desktop environment.