Blind and Visually Impaired Community
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University engineering project to create an assistive device (self.Blind)
submitted by alphavision_kean
Hey everybody,
My name is Kean, pronounced like "key in". I am a designer part of a team of 5 students in our final year of our engineering undergrad program. During our final year, we are tasked with what is called a Capstone Project that is a two-semester long course that requires students to take on a self-directed project. We've decided to work on a device that assists those who are visually impaired. We are looking to get some feedback from the community to help guide our focus.
Your feedback is greatly appreciated and we would love it if you could take the time to answer some, or all of our questions. Thank you!
* What challenges do you experience when travelling from place to place?
* Hypothetically, what activities would become more accessible to you if you had a device that could read you text (commonly referred to as OCR - Optical Character Recognition)?
* What method of wearing such a device sounds the most comfortable and something you could see yourself using: mounted to glasses frames, mounted over the ear, mounted on a hat, incorporated into a full pair of glasses, or something else?
* How important are the aesthetics of the device? Should the device be sleek and unassuming, or loud n' proud?
* There are currently similar devices on the market such as $1 and $1. These devices are reported to cost over 4500 USD. What price point makes sense for this type of device?
Lastly, (thanks again if you've come this far) we'd love to reach out to you! Let us know if you are okay with us messaging you directly for more conversation.
Cheers
My name is Kean, pronounced like "key in". I am a designer part of a team of 5 students in our final year of our engineering undergrad program. During our final year, we are tasked with what is called a Capstone Project that is a two-semester long course that requires students to take on a self-directed project. We've decided to work on a device that assists those who are visually impaired. We are looking to get some feedback from the community to help guide our focus.
Your feedback is greatly appreciated and we would love it if you could take the time to answer some, or all of our questions. Thank you!
* What challenges do you experience when travelling from place to place?
* Hypothetically, what activities would become more accessible to you if you had a device that could read you text (commonly referred to as OCR - Optical Character Recognition)?
* What method of wearing such a device sounds the most comfortable and something you could see yourself using: mounted to glasses frames, mounted over the ear, mounted on a hat, incorporated into a full pair of glasses, or something else?
* How important are the aesthetics of the device? Should the device be sleek and unassuming, or loud n' proud?
* There are currently similar devices on the market such as $1 and $1. These devices are reported to cost over 4500 USD. What price point makes sense for this type of device?
Lastly, (thanks again if you've come this far) we'd love to reach out to you! Let us know if you are okay with us messaging you directly for more conversation.
Cheers
fastfinge 2 points 5y ago
Personally, I'm just not all that interested in different devices. My phone already does GPS, it reads ebooks and audiobooks, it plays music, it manages my calendar, etc. With apps like KNFB Reader, it even does OCR already. Also, have you looked into the Seeing AI app for iphone? That seems to do what you're thinking of. Another advantage to doing everything on the phone is that it's much cheaper. Now all I need is an iPhone for $1,000. Previously, I needed an accessible note taker for $6,000, an accessible gps device for $200, an accessible book player for $600, etc. Could you maybe do some sort of glasses-mounted camera that would pair with the phone? That way you could probably make it really cheap, and use some of the existing libraries and apps that are already on the phone.
CynicalDropper 1 points 5y ago
Here are my ideal pieces of travel software and hardware. Maybe it's all impossible, but maybe it'll spark a better idea.
I'd like to see a simpler interface to all the various apps, or one app that does a bunch of things. It's just a convenience thing, but it would be neat to be able to program a journey into one app and have it use all of the possible information to intelligently switch between different modes. I'm thinking walking directions, transit info, OCR, product identification, use of the various types of bluetooth beacons for in-door navigation, possibly Apple Maps new Airport directions. Especially when flying, it can be difficult to take advantage of the technology when one hand is usually taken up with a cane or guide dog harness and the other is hauling luggage. Or if it's -40 and touchscreen gloves aren't cutting it.
For hardware, I'd go for a $1000 or less set of glasses with a camera that gives as good of results as possible in any light situation, has good stabilization, supports some sort of open protocol for apps to use if such exists, and includes a pair of bone conduction headphones so I don't have to wear two devices on my face. It would be nice if there was a way to integrate an ultrasonic proximity detection system like the iGlasses or similar mobility aids. 6 hours of battery would be a minimum, more would be nice. Charging via USB C would be a big bonus.
I'd like to see a simpler interface to all the various apps, or one app that does a bunch of things. It's just a convenience thing, but it would be neat to be able to program a journey into one app and have it use all of the possible information to intelligently switch between different modes. I'm thinking walking directions, transit info, OCR, product identification, use of the various types of bluetooth beacons for in-door navigation, possibly Apple Maps new Airport directions. Especially when flying, it can be difficult to take advantage of the technology when one hand is usually taken up with a cane or guide dog harness and the other is hauling luggage. Or if it's -40 and touchscreen gloves aren't cutting it.
For hardware, I'd go for a $1000 or less set of glasses with a camera that gives as good of results as possible in any light situation, has good stabilization, supports some sort of open protocol for apps to use if such exists, and includes a pair of bone conduction headphones so I don't have to wear two devices on my face. It would be nice if there was a way to integrate an ultrasonic proximity detection system like the iGlasses or similar mobility aids. 6 hours of battery would be a minimum, more would be nice. Charging via USB C would be a big bonus.
BARDLover 1 points 5y ago
A cheeper and sleeker ESight?
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