Parallel use of hand gestures and force‐input device for interacting with 3d and virtual reality environments

User interfaces of current 3D and virtual reality environments require highly interactive input/output (I/O) techniques and appropriate input devices, providing users with natural and intuitive ways of interacting. This paper presents an interaction model, some techniques, and some ways of using novel input devices for 3D user interfaces. The interaction model is based on a tool‐object syntax, where the interaction structure syntactically simulates an action sequence typical of a human's everyday life: One picks up a tool and then uses it on an object. Instead of using a conventional mouse, actions are input through two novel input devices, a hand‐ and a force‐input device. The devices can be used simultaneously or in sequence, and the information they convey can be processed in a combined or in an independent way by the system. The use of a hand‐input device allows the recognition of static poses and dynamic gestures performed by a user's hand. Hand gestures are used for selecting, or acting as, tools and for manipulating graphical objects. A system for teaching and recognizing dynamic gestures, and for providing graphical feedback for them, is described.