Anonymized Human Body Tracking

Number: 20260310288
Published: 2026-10-08
Filed: 2025-04-08
Assignee: Disney Enterprises, Inc.
Inventors: Becker; Michael Yaakov, Fornelli; Ashley Rose, Beauchamp; Reuben A., Narey, JR.; Thomas O., Pagtaconan; Eric John Carmen, Harrison; Tiffany Lee
CPC: G06F3/012; G06F3/017
Verdict: Low Notable software
First reported: 2026-W41 (2026-10-08)
Source: Google Patents · FreePatentsOnline

The keeper's note

Uses a sensor to spot a person's body parts and track an anonymized, skeleton-like position in real time -- markerless motion tracking an animatronic or interactive droid could react to.

Abstract

A system includes a computing platform communicatively coupled to a sensor and a display, the computing platform having a hardware processor, and a memory storing software code and a database comprising images corresponding to human physical features. The hardware processor executes the software code to detect, using sensor data, the presence of a user, identify, using the database and the sensor data, respective locations of physical features of the user, merge the locations of the physical features to determine a position data for at least one anonymized body segment of the user, track, using the sensor data, changes in the position data, and determine, based on tracking, at least one of the location of the user in relation to the sensor, or a posture or gesture by the user. The hardware processor further executes the software code to generate, using the display, an interactive effect responsive to the user.

Background

BACKGROUND

Providing interactive user experiences in public environments or in private environments in which guests have not been asked to waive privacy rights requires the careful balancing of two objectives that do not necessarily align. One of those objectives is to provide an interactive experience that is responsive in a relevant way to actions by a user participating in the interaction, without noticeable latency, that is to say, in “real-time.” The second objective is to ensure that the data utilized and/or retained in the process of providing such an interactive experience omits any personally identifiable information (PII) of any user participating in the interactive experience.

Although conventional feature recognition solutions make it possible to achieve the first objective, those solutions typically violate the constraints imposed by the second objective, i.e., user anonymity. Consequently, there is a need in the art for a fast and accurate human body tracking solution enabling real-time interactive responsiveness to human behavior while ensuring the anonymity of users participating in an interactive experience.

Claims

1. An interactive system comprising: a computing platform communicatively coupled to a sensor and a display; the computing platform having a hardware processor and a memory storing a software code and a database comprising images corresponding respectively to human physical features; the hardware processor configured to execute the software code to: detect, using sensor data received from the sensor, a presence of a user; identify, using the database and the sensor data, respective locations of a plurality of physical features of the user; average the respective locations of the plurality of physical features to determine a position data for at least one anonymized body segment of the user; track, using the sensor data, changes in the position data for the at least one anonymized body segment of the user; determine, based on tracking, at least one of a location of the user in relation to the sensor, a posture of the user, or a gesture by the user; and generate, using the display, an interactive effect responsive to the at least one of the location of the user, the posture of the user, or the gesture by the user. || 11. A method for use by an interactive system including a computing platform communicatively coupled to a sensor and a display, the computing platform having a hardware processor and a memory storing a software code and a database comprising images corresponding respectively to human physical features, the method comprising: detecting, by the software code executed by the hardware processor and using sensor data received from the sensor, a presence of a user; identifying, by the software code executed by the hardware processor and using the database and the sensor data, respective locations of a plurality of physical features of the user; averaging, by the software code executed by the hardware processor, the respective locations of the plurality of physical features to determine a position data for at least one anonymized body segment of the user; tracking, by the software code executed by the hardware processor and using the sensor data, changes in the position data for the at least one anonymized body segment of the user; determining, by the software code executed by the hardware processor, based on tracking, at least one of a location of the user in relation to the sensor, a posture of the user, or a gesture by the user; and generating, by the software code executed by the hardware processor and using the display, an interactive effect responsive to the at least one of the location of the user, the posture of the user, or the gesture by the user.