ECE 4760: Final Project

Hand Sign Lock

Unlocking Systems with Hand Signs

Rex Chen (rc735)

Ziqi Yang (zy259)



Introduction    top

Security using technology is a growing and expanding field to protect against the user's identity or property. As more advanced tools are developed, security has begun to expand to utilize a person's physiology as a key instead of a password; for example, newer models of IPhones by Apple have fingerprint sensors as an option instead of a passcode. However, one drawback is that a person's physiology cannot be changed, and in the example with the fingerprint sensors, once multiple users is able to obtain reproduce the fingerprints to gain access, it is difficult to determine the correct user. To deal with this disadvantage, some security systems may utilize a password as well as biological information for identification.

For this final project, the goal is to utilize a series of hand signs as a method of authentication. Because the size and shape of the hand are different for each person, hand signs will also depend on the user's physiology. The combination and the pattern of hand signs serves as the password component of the authentication process. Using a CMOS image sensor, the PIC32 microcontroller will analyze pictures to match the appropriate hand sign to each picture and determine whether the sequence of hand signs or gestures are correct. At the current state, the hand signs are only limited to a fist and an open hand to provide for binary values as a key. However, the project is functional and can reliably determine whether the input sequence is correct and if the system allows access to the user.