Gesture Components for Natural Interaction with In-Car Devices

The integration of more and more functionality into the human machine interface (HMI) of vehicles increases the complexity of device handling. Thus optimal use of different human sensory channels is an approach to simplify the interaction with in-car devices. This way the user convenience increases as much as distraction decreases. In this paper the gesture part of a multimodal system is described. It consists of a gesture optimized user interface, a real time gesture recognition system and an adaptive help system for gesture input. The components were developed in course of extensive usability studies. The so built HMI allows intuitive, effective and assisted operation of infotainment in-car devices, like radio, CD, telephone and navigation system, with handposes and dynamic hand gestures.