Blind bowling support system which detects a number of remaining pins and a ball trajectory

Abstract

Blind bowling is known as one of the popular sports for the visually impaired people. They can enjoy the bowling with sighted assistant who tells them a number of remaining pins, a ball trajectory, and scores. Bowling is such a well-adapted sports for the visually impaired people, nevertheless they want to acquire all of the information by themselves without support by the assistant. To fill this need, a prototype system was developed as a first step. The system detects the remaining pins and ball trajectory in the area of arrow marks using simple image processing. Severe visually impaired player tested the function of remaining pins and the results proved that the system works well and it is useful and helpful for them. Addition to it, unexpected advantage was discovered. With the prototype system, bowling game became more enjoyable for the blind player since they can also acquire information of remaining pins of other players. © 2014 Springer International Publishing.