A waist-mounted ProCam system for remote collaboration

We propose a waist-mounted projector-camera (ProCam) system for asymmetric remote collaboration. A wearable camera is often used to transmit a worker´s situation to a remote instructor, however 3D structure of the worker´s environment is not always available and the instructor has a minimal flexibility in changing the camera´s viewpoint. A stationary 3D measurement system is also commonly used for remote collaboration, however a narrow measurement area and occlusion from a worker´s body can be a severe problem. Our waist-mounted ProCam system reconstructs worker´s environment in real-time without occlusion from the worker´s body. The remote instructor can give instructions simply by drawing annotations on the reconstructed environment on screen, and they are properly projected in front of the worker. Structured-light based reconstruction, vision-based localization, and visual annotation projection, are processed synchronously with a camera and modified shutter glasses so that both the camera and the worker observe only the information they need. Experimental results show that users prefer our system to a stationary ProCam system.