GravitySpace: tracking users and their poses in a smart room using a pressure-sensing floor

  • Authors:

  • Alan Bränzel;Christian Holz;Daniel Hoffmann;Dominik Schmidt;Marius Knaust;Patrick Lühne;René Meusel;Stephan Richter;Patrick Baudisch

  • Affiliations:

  • Hasso Plattner Institute, Potsdam, Germany;Hasso Plattner Institute, Potsdam, Germany;Hasso Plattner Institute, Potsdam, Germany;Hasso Plattner Institute, Potsdam, Germany;Hasso Plattner Institute, Potsdam, Germany;Hasso Plattner Institute, Potsdam, Germany;Hasso Plattner Institute, Potsdam, Germany;Hasso Plattner Institute, Potsdam, Germany;Hasso Plattner Institute, Potsdam, Germany

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
  • Year:
  • 2013

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Abstract

We explore how to track people and furniture based on a high-resolution pressure-sensitive floor. Gravity pushes people and objects against the floor, causing them to leave imprints of pressure distributions across the surface. While the sensor is limited to sensing direct contact with the surface, we can sometimes conclude what takes place above the surface, such as users' poses or collisions with virtual objects. We demonstrate how to extend the range of this approach by sensing through passive furniture that propagates pressure to the floor. To explore our approach, we have created an 8 m2 back-projected floor prototype, termed GravitySpace, a set of passive touch-sensitive furniture, as well as algorithms for identifying users, furniture, and poses. Pressure-based sensing on the floor offers four potential benefits over camera-based solutions: (1) it provides consistent coverage of rooms wall-to-wall, (2) is less susceptible to occlusion between users, (3) allows for the use of simpler recognition algorithms, and (4) intrudes less on users' privacy.