Non-contact human-computer interactions (HCI) based on hand gestures have been widely investigated. Here, we present a novel method to locate the real-time position of the hand using the electrostatics of the human body. This method has many advantages, including a delay of less than one millisecond, low cost, and does not require a camera or wearable devices. A formula is first created to sense array signals with five spherical electrodes. Next, a solving algorithm for the real-time measured hand position is introduced and solving equations for three-dimensional coordinates of hand position are obtained. A non-contact real-time hand position sensing system was established to perform verification experiments, and the principle error of the algorithm and the systematic noise were also analyzed. The results show that this novel technology can determine the dynamic parameters of hand movements with good robustness to meet the requirements of complicated HCI.
Keywords: electrostatics field; non-contact HCI; real-time hand positioning.