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• Analyzing Visual Questions from Visually Impaired Users

  Erin L. Brady · 2011 · The Proceedings of the 13th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS)

  This doctoral consortium paper presents an analysis of the types of visual questions that visually impaired users ask through VizWiz, a mobile phone application that provides near-realtime answers to visual questions. VizWiz allows users to take a photo with their phone, speak a…

  blindness and low vision · crowdsourcing · computer vision · mobile accessibility · visual question answering

• Situation-based Indoor Wayfinding System for the Visually Impaired

  Eunjeong Ko, Jin Sun Ju, Eun Yi Kim · 2011 · The Proceedings of the 13th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS)

  This paper presents an indoor wayfinding system for visually impaired people that uses situation-aware color codes affixed to building walls to guide users to destinations in unfamiliar environments. The key innovation is a situation-based approach: rather than providing all…

  blindness and low vision · indoor navigation · wayfinding · computer vision · assistive technology

• Brazilian Sign Language Multimedia Hangman Game: A Prototype of an Educational and Inclusive Application

  Renata Cristina Barros Madeo · 2011 · The Proceedings of the 13th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS)

  This doctoral consortium paper presents a prototype educational game — a hangman game that uses Brazilian Sign Language (BSL/Libras) as its input method. Instead of typing letters on a keyboard, players perform fingerspelling signs from the Libras manual alphabet in front of a…

  sign language · sign language recognition · deaf accessibility · educational technology · game accessibility

• Navigation and Obstacle Avoidance Help (NOAH) for Older Adults with Cognitive Impairment: A Pilot Study

  Pooja Viswanathan, James J. Little, Alan K. Mackworth, Alex Mihailidis · 2011 · The Proceedings of the 13th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2011)

  This paper describes NOAH (Navigation and Obstacle Avoidance Help), an intelligent powered wheelchair system designed to provide adaptive navigation assistance to older adults with cognitive impairment in long-term care settings. An estimated 60-80% of residents in long-term…

  intelligent wheelchair · dementia · cognitive impairment · collision avoidance · wayfinding

• Toward 3D Scene Understanding via Audio-description: Kinect-iPad Fusion for the Visually Impaired

  Juan Diego Gomez, Sinan Mohammed, Guido Bologna, Thierry Pun · 2011 · Proceedings of the 13th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2011)

  This demonstration paper presents a computer-vision-based framework that combines a Microsoft Kinect 3D depth sensor with an iPad touchscreen to enable visually impaired users to understand the spatial layout of indoor scenes through audio. The system works in several stages:…

  sonification · visual substitution · Kinect · computer vision · blindness

• EasySnap: Real-time Audio Feedback for Blind Photography

  Samuel White, Hanjie Ji, Jeffrey P. Bigham · 2010 · Adjunct Proceedings of the 23rd Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST 2010)

  This demonstration paper presents EasySnap, an iPhone application that enables blind and low-vision users to take high-quality photographs by providing real-time audio feedback as they point their camera phones. The system addresses a key barrier: blind people want to take…

  blind and low vision · computer vision · mobile accessibility · assistive technology · photography

• Text Locating in Scene Images for Reading and Navigation Aids for Visually Impaired Persons

  Chucai Yi · 2010 · Proceedings of the 12th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2010)

  This paper presents a computer vision algorithm for locating text in natural scene images — a key capability needed for camera-based reading assistants and navigation aids for people who are blind or visually impaired. While existing reading assistants could handle text in…

  computer vision · text recognition · blindness · navigation · reading assistant

• Detecting Objects and Obstacles for Visually Impaired Individuals Using Visual Saliency

  Benoît Deville, Guido Bologna, Thierry Pun · 2010 · Proceedings of the 12th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2010)

  This demo paper presents the detection module of See ColOr (Seeing Colors with an Orchestra), a mobility aid for visually impaired people developed at the University of Geneva. See ColOr transforms visual information from the environment into musical instrument sounds — a…

  visual impairment · obstacle detection · mobility aid · computer vision · sensory substitution

• A Tool to Promote Prolonged Engagement in Art Therapy: Design and Development from Arts Therapist Requirements

  Jesse Hoey, Krists Zutis, Valerie Leuty, Alex Mihailidis · 2010 · Proceedings of the 12th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2010)

  This paper describes the design and evaluation of a customisable touch-screen tool that assists creative arts therapists working with older adults with dementia. The system uses a partially observable Markov decision process (POMDP) controller to autonomously monitor a client's…

  dementia · art therapy · computer vision · adaptive systems · user modeling

• A System of Clothes Matching for Visually Impaired Persons

  Shuai Yuan · 2010 · Proceedings of the 12th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2010)

  This short paper presents a proof-of-concept computer vision system designed to help blind and visually impaired people determine whether two clothing items match in both color and pattern. The system addresses a common daily living challenge: selecting appropriate clothing…

  computer vision · blindness · visual impairment · daily living · independent living

• Spatial and Temporal Pyramids for Grammatical Expression Recognition of American Sign Language

  Nicholas Michael, Dimitris Metaxas, Carol Neidle · 2009 · Proceedings of the 11th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '09)

  This paper presents a novel computer vision framework for recognizing grammatical facial expressions and head gestures in American Sign Language (ASL) video. While most sign language recognition research has focused on manual components (hand shapes and movements), this work…

  sign language recognition · American Sign Language · non-manual markers · computer vision · facial expression recognition

• Instant Tactile-Audio Map: Enabling Access to Digital Maps for People with Visual Impairment

  Zheshen Wang, Baoxin Li, Terri Hedgpeth, Teresa Haven · 2009 · Proceedings of the 11th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '09)

  This paper presents an automated system for converting standard digital map images into interactive tactile-audio maps that people who are blind can explore independently. The core problem addressed is that while online map services like Google Maps provide rich geographical…

  tactile maps · visual impairment · multimodal interaction · audio feedback · navigation

• A Camera Phone Based Currency Reader for the Visually Impaired

  Xu Liu · 2008 · Proceedings of the 10th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '08)

  This paper presents a camera phone-based system for identifying U.S. paper currency denominations for people who are blind or visually impaired. The work addresses a specific accessibility gap: unlike currencies in many other countries, U.S. paper bills are identical in size and…

  visual impairment · computer vision · assistive technology · mobile accessibility · object recognition

• Technology for Just-in-Time In-Situ Learning of Facial Affect for Persons Diagnosed with an Autism Spectrum Disorder

  Miriam Madsen, Rana el Kaliouby, Matthew Goodwin, Rosalind Picard · 2008 · Proceedings of the 10th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '08)

  This MIT Media Lab paper presents a wearable technology system designed to help adolescents with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) learn to recognize and interpret facial expressions during real-time social interactions with their everyday companions. The system combines a…

  autism · affective computing · facial affect · emotion recognition · wearable technology

• Enabling the Legally Blind in Classroom Note-Taking

  David Hayden, Dirk Colbry, John A. Black Jr, Sethuraman Panchanathan · 2008 · Proceedings of the 10th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '08)

  This paper demonstrates the CUbiC Note Taker, a portable assistive device developed at Arizona State University that enables students who are legally blind to independently take notes in classroom settings. The system addresses multiple limitations of existing accommodations:…

  low vision · legal blindness · assistive technology · education · note-taking

• Note-Taker: Enabling Students Who Are Legally Blind to Take Notes in Class

  David Hayden, Dirk Colbry, John A. Black Jr, Sethuraman Panchanathan · 2008 · Proceedings of the 10th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '08)

  This full paper from Arizona State University presents the CUbiC Note-Taker in detail, including its motivation, design principles, and results from two extensive case studies totaling over 200 hours of in-class use. The paper opens with a compelling first-person account from…

  low vision · legal blindness · assistive technology · education · note-taking

• Improving the Efficacy of Automated Sign Language Practice Tools

  Helene Brashear · 2007 · SIGACCESS Accessibility and Computing

  This paper describes dissertation research on improving automatic sign language recognition for CopyCat, an interactive computer game that helps young deaf children practice American Sign Language (ASL). The work addresses a critical need: 90% of deaf children are born to…

  sign language · sign language detection · gesture-based interaction · computer vision · machine learning

• Improving Accessibility of HTML Documents by Generating Image-Tags in a Proxy

  Daniel Keysers, Marius Renn, Thomas M. Breuel · 2007 · Proceedings of the 9th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '07)

  This paper from the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) and Technical University Kaiserslautern presents a system that automatically generates ALT tags for images on web pages by analysing image contents through a web proxy. The system addresses the…

  automatic alt text · image accessibility · web accessibility · computer vision · image retrieval

• Accessible spaces: navigating through a marked environment with a camera phone

  Kee-Yip Chan, Roberto Manduchi, James Coughlan · 2007 · Proceedings of the 9th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '07)

  This short Assets '07 demonstration paper from UC Santa Cruz and the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute describes a camera-phone-based wayfinding system for blind travellers. The core idea is to deploy small, cheap, pie-shaped colour markers in an environment — on walls,…

  wayfinding · navigation · blindness · visual impairment · computer vision

• Variable frame rate for low power mobile sign language communication

  Neva Cherniavsky, Anna C. Cavender, Richard E. Ladner, Eve A. Riskin · 2007 · Proceedings of the 9th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS '07)

  This paper from the University of Washington MobileASL team — Neva Cherniavsky, Anna Cavender, Richard Ladner, and Eve Riskin — addresses a then-emerging problem: enabling Deaf people in the United States to hold real-time American Sign Language conversations over the cellular…

  American Sign Language · sign language · fingerspelling · Deaf community · video phone

• Photonote evaluation: aiding students with disabilities in a lecture environment

  Gregory Hughes, Peter Robinson · 2007 · Proceedings of the 9th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS '07)

  Hughes and Robinson at the Cambridge Computer Laboratory present Photonote, a lecture-capture system designed specifically for students with disabilities, and a controlled user study comparing it to human note-takers. Where existing lecture-capture systems (eClass, Lecture…

  lecture capture · note-taking · educational accessibility · academic accommodation · sign language interpreter

• American Sign Language Recognition in Game Development for Deaf Children

  Helene Brashear, Valerie Henderson, Kwang-Hyun Park, Harley Hamilton, Seungyon Lee, Thad Starner · 2006 · Proceedings of the 8th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '06)

  This paper presents CopyCat, an educational computer game that uses gesture recognition technology to help young deaf children (ages 6-11) practice American Sign Language (ASL) skills. The project addresses a critical language development challenge: 90% of deaf children are born…

  deaf education · sign language recognition · ASL · gesture recognition · computer vision

• Improvements in Vision-based Pointer Control

  Rick Kjeldsen · 2006 · Proceedings of the 8th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '06)

  This paper presents the HeadTracking Pointer (HTP), a vision-based head tracking system developed at IBM's T.J. Watson Research Center that uses a standard webcam to allow people with motor disabilities to control a computer pointer through head movements. The system addresses…

  head tracking · pointer control · computer vision · assistive technology · motor disabilities

• A Multi-domain Approach for Enhancing Text Display for Users with Visual Aberrations

  Miguel Alonso, Armando Barreto, Julie A. Jacko, Malek Adjouadi · 2006 · Proceedings of the 8th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '06)

  This paper from Florida International University and Georgia Institute of Technology presents an algorithm for enhancing text displayed on computer screens for users with high-order visual aberrations such as keratoconus — conditions that cannot be fully corrected with standard…

  low vision · visual aberrations · image processing · pre-compensation · refractive errors

• Interactive Tracking of Movable Objects for the Blind on the Basis of Environment Models and Perception-Oriented Object Recognition Methods

  Andreas Hub, Tim Hartter, Thomas Ertl · 2006 · Proceedings of the 8th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '06)

  This paper from the University of Stuttgart presents advances to an indoor navigation and object identification system for blind and deafblind users. The system combines a stereo camera and 3D inertial sensor mounted on a bicycle helmet with detailed 3D environment models of…

  indoor navigation · object recognition · blind users · computer vision · assistive technology