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A camera-based approach to remote pointing interactions in the classroom

University of British Columbia

Modern classrooms are brimming with technological resources, from sound systems and multiple large wall displays to the individual computers and cellphones of students. Leveraging this technology presents interesting opportunities in human-computer interaction to potentially create a richer experience that improves the effectiveness of classrooms both for lecturers and students. A key enabler of this experience is the ability for lecturers to manipulate objects on the screen by direct pointing, allowing them to be away from a computer for input. We designed and implemented a remote pointing technique that makes use of a web-camera and a pattern of shapes on the wall display to perform target tracking. A controlled study to evaluate performance and compare the camera-based technique to a traditional mouse for a target selection task in a classroom setting revealed that both devices have comparable error rates but that users are almost twice as fast with the mouse. The increased freedom of movement and immediacy of interaction provided by direct pointing makes the trade-off between speed and convenience reasonable. The technique does not require specialized hardware: the ubiquity of personal pocket cameras and computers makes target tracking with a camera a feasible future option for enabling direct pointing interactions on large wall displays in classroom settings.

Text

2015-10-24

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 Canada

http://hdl.handle.net/2429/54880

Computer Science

University of British Columbia

UBCV

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/ca/