Using Nintendo Wii Remote Controller for Finger Tracking,Gesture Detection and as HCI Device

Seminar Informationssysteme WS 08/09

Selver Softic
selver.softic@student.tugraz.at
Institute of Information Systems & Computer Media,
Supervisor: DI Dr. Martin Ebner
martin.ebner@tugraz.at


Project description

The main goal of this seminar was to investigate the Wiimote as potentially interesting platform for finger tracking, gesture recognition and as HCI device. Wiimote outnumbered nowdays considering the recent sales information all other input devices. In spite of this fact and the bunch of sensors Wiimote contains motivated even more this venture.All observation were made targeting the e-Learning and e-Teaching as main area of appliance.

As practical result a primitive software kit named Wiimote Controll Desk was developed in C# based originally on J.C. Lee's Wii Whiteboards sourcecode and Brian Peek's WiimoteLib running on .NET Framework 2.0. All relevant links considering mentioned software can be found in "Material and Resources" and "Links" section of this site.

This Software can run in two different modes wih adequate hardware setup depicted in figures below including Wiimote and IR LED Array:

Controller Mode enables usage of Wiimote as presenter and long distance mouse.

presenter_mode (56K)

Presenter Mode allows you to navigate through MS PowerPoint , Open Office's Impress presentations or common image galleries using finger tracking.

presenter_mode (56K)

For detailed technical description and overview of modes and expiriences made in this seminar, also to get all information about how to run the tests with Wiimote please refer the text of seminar that can be downloaded here or from link in section "Materials and Resources".



Materials and Resources

Windows Controller Desk Application Download - Installer
Windows Controller Desk Application Download - Source
Full version of seminar can be downloaded here

Links

J.C. Lee Wii Projects and Resources:

Wii Project Homepage
Original Whiteboard Software

Wiimote Info Sites in General:

Wii Brew
Linux Related Site about Wii
WiimoteLib

Bluetooth Driver and Info:

Wiki Page about Blue Soleil
Official Blue Soleil Page
Blue Soleil Driver v. 2.3 Download - Used in Seminar also

Visual Studio and .NET:

Visual Studio .NET Wiki Page
Visual Studio 2005 Express Editions
Visual StudioExpress Editions German
.NET Framework 2.0 download page

IR Diodes data sheet:

Siemens IR Emitter SFH 485 - Data Sheet

References

  1. J. C. Lee. Hacking the nintendo wii remote. Pervasive Computing, IEEE, (3):39 - 45,2009.
  2. M. Rehm, N. Bee, and E. Andre. Wave Like an Egyptian Accelerometer Based Gesture Recognition for Culture Specific Interactions. In Procedings of HCI 2008 Culture, Creativity, Interaction, 2008.