Blind and Visually Impaired Community
↑
2
↓
My friends and I are designing a device to help seeing impaired persons read more easily. (self.Blind)
submitted by the_throwaway_banana
As the title states, my friends and I are doing something related to helping seeing impaired people read normal text that is not available via recording/pdf and not available in braille. We are all computer engineering students so this will be somewhere in that realm.
Our idea at the moment is some device that you can slide over english/whatever text to capture and translate into braille via rising braille cells (think a single line of mechanical, changeable braille text). My friends and I don't know anyone who would need such a thing, so I come to this sub to hopefully get some feedback. Mostly, is this something that may be helpful? If you are blind, or know someone who is seeing impaired, are you aware if there is a struggle to read things not very available in terms of other readings? Or maybe you've found most things are available online or by recording rather easily? Also, any ideas on the form factor of such a device would be nice.
If you've any other ideas that may prove convenient please feel free to also leave them here if you want. Thanks for any help!
Our idea at the moment is some device that you can slide over english/whatever text to capture and translate into braille via rising braille cells (think a single line of mechanical, changeable braille text). My friends and I don't know anyone who would need such a thing, so I come to this sub to hopefully get some feedback. Mostly, is this something that may be helpful? If you are blind, or know someone who is seeing impaired, are you aware if there is a struggle to read things not very available in terms of other readings? Or maybe you've found most things are available online or by recording rather easily? Also, any ideas on the form factor of such a device would be nice.
If you've any other ideas that may prove convenient please feel free to also leave them here if you want. Thanks for any help!
fastfinge 3 points 7y ago
The $1 app for IOS kind of does this: take a picture, and it will use OCR to read the text out to you. And some Braille Displays can pair with the iPhone by bluetooth. There's also the $1, that looks like exactly what you're talking about, just with speech not Braille. Personally, I use the KNFB Reader app on IOS, so I'm not likely to carry around a different device just for reading printed text. Plus, the inclusion of Braille means the battery life will probably be not that good, meaning it'll never be charged and ready to go when I need it.
But if you can figure out how to make cheap and tiny Braille displays, I don't think you could go wrong making a Braille display case for the iPhone. IE put the iphone in the case, and then your iPhone has maybe two lines of eight braille cells each, just as though they were built into the iPhone. Connect it directly to the lightning port, meaning no hastles with bluetooth pairing. Plus, when I connect the case to the charger, it will recharge itself and recharge my iPhone, meaning I only need to remember to plug in one device, not two. Yes, it would make the phone a little larger and a little bulkier, but that would be a sacrifice worth making; most people use bluetooth headsets these days anyway, so it isn't like we need to hold the phone up to our faces anymore. And then we have the best of both worlds: an iPhone with whatever apps we want, with a Braille display nearly built-in.
But if you can figure out how to make cheap and tiny Braille displays, I don't think you could go wrong making a Braille display case for the iPhone. IE put the iphone in the case, and then your iPhone has maybe two lines of eight braille cells each, just as though they were built into the iPhone. Connect it directly to the lightning port, meaning no hastles with bluetooth pairing. Plus, when I connect the case to the charger, it will recharge itself and recharge my iPhone, meaning I only need to remember to plug in one device, not two. Yes, it would make the phone a little larger and a little bulkier, but that would be a sacrifice worth making; most people use bluetooth headsets these days anyway, so it isn't like we need to hold the phone up to our faces anymore. And then we have the best of both worlds: an iPhone with whatever apps we want, with a Braille display nearly built-in.
[deleted] 1 points 7y ago
[deleted]
geoffisblind 1 points 7y ago
I'm not a Braille reader as of yet, I have some functional central vision that I can read with if I magnify and contrast adjust. What I will say is that you seem to be looking to combining two preexisting technologies. They may have already been combined but I don't know for sure. Braille displays have been around for some time although I have no experience with these at all. However I do use OCR which would be the other part of your idea.
The way my OCR systems work is I take a picture either on my CCTV or iPad and it reads the text out loud.
I can say that OCR isn't may favorite thing in the world right now and it tends to cause me more problems with accuracy than it's worth, so that's something to consider.
Otherwise hopefully one of our Braille readers can give you their input. Good luck!
The way my OCR systems work is I take a picture either on my CCTV or iPad and it reads the text out loud.
I can say that OCR isn't may favorite thing in the world right now and it tends to cause me more problems with accuracy than it's worth, so that's something to consider.
Otherwise hopefully one of our Braille readers can give you their input. Good luck!
This nonprofit website is run by volunteers.
Please contribute if you can. Thank you!
Our mission is to provide everyone with access to large-
scale community websites for the good of humanity.
Without ads, without tracking, without greed.
scale community websites for the good of humanity.
Without ads, without tracking, without greed.
©2023 HumbleCat Inc • HumbleCat is a 501(c)3 nonprofit based in Michigan, USA.