Hand Gesture Controller

Control your PC with hand gestures using MediaPipe and OpenCV.

Features

• ☝️ Volume Up - Index finger up
• 👆 Volume Down - Index + Middle fingers up
• ✋ Scroll Up - Open hand (all 5 fingers)
• 🤚 Scroll Down - Closed fist (0 fingers)
• 👌 Pause/Resume - OK sign (thumb + index touching)

Installation

# Create virtual environment (recommended)
py -3.13 -m venv .venv
.venv\Scripts\activate

# Install dependencies
pip install -r requirements.txt

Note: The hand detection model (hand_landmarker.task) is automatically downloaded on first run (~8 MB).

Usage

python gesture_controller.py

Controls:

• Show your hand to camera
• Use gestures to control volume and scroll
• Press 'q' to quit

Requirements

• Python 3.10 - 3.13 (Python 3.14 not supported — MediaPipe compatibility issue)
• Webcam
• Windows (for volume control)

Troubleshooting

Problem	Solution
Camera not found	Check webcam connection
Gestures not detected	Ensure good lighting, keep hand 1-2 ft from camera
Volume not changing	Run as Administrator
Slow performance	Close other applications
function 'free' not found error	Use Python 3.13 or lower (not 3.14)

Tips

• Use good lighting
• Keep hand clearly visible
• Make distinct gestures
• Small pause between gestures for better recognition