Robust Visual Person Tracking for Interactive Displays

We present an approach to real-time person tracking in crowded and/or unknown environments using integration of multiple visual modalities. We combine stereo, color, and face detection modules into a single robust system, and show an initial application in an interactive, faceresponsive display. Dense, real-time stereo processing is used to isolate users from other objects and people in the background. Skin-hue classification identifies and tracks likely body parts within the silhouette of a user. Face pattern detection discriminates and localizes the face within the identified body parts. Faces and bodies of users are tracked over several temporal scales: short-term (user stays within the field of view), medium-term (user exits/reenters within minutes), and long term (user returns after hours or days). Short-term tracking is performed using simple region position and size correspondences, while medium and longterm tracking are based on statistics of user appearance. This is a short version of the report in [1].