Supporting everyday activities for persons with visual impairments through computer vision-augmented touch

Abstract

The HandSight project investigates how wearable micro-cameras can be used to augment a blind or visually impaired user's sense of touch with computer vision. Our goal is to support an array of activities of daily living by sensing and feeding back non-tactile information (e.g., color, printed text, patterns) about an object as it is touched. In this poster paper, we provide an overview of the project, our current proof-of-concept prototype, and a summary of findings from finger-based text reading studies. As this is an early-stage project, we also enumerate current open questions.