What if smartphone tech could help the seeing-impaired see better?

Ever wondered what it would be like if we could take all the fun-stuff tech that gets packed into our smartphones and use it to help people with sight deficiencies lead a better life?

Well that is what the researches at the Department of Clinical Neuropathy have decided to try and do with a new project that combines, imaging, display, and sensing technology that has already been honed for smartphones, game consoles and Microsoft’s Kinect to create a high tech pair of glasses to could make a world of difference to people with vision impairment.

The idea is that a pair of glasses could have cameras built into the frames and would observe the scene in front of the wearer and process the images so that it could detect tings like obstacles, people, as well as make judgments about how far away things are. Then there would be a simple LED light based display which accesses what parts of the person’s vision remains, then is updated realtime to help with navigation and interaction with people.

The display could even be see-through from an outsider’s point of view, which aids in interpersonal relations thanks to the power of eye contact.

The notion is incredibly clever, and highly possible using today’s tech. With enhancements, the camera’s sensors could even recognize more sophisticated data like barcodes or text (with real-time text recognition connected to real-time speech synthesis for direct feedback). That would be possible using technology we’ve seen developed in several just-for-fun iPhone apps, but when used in these applications could enable patients to shop, navigate, or easily interact with an ATM.

via FastCompany

At this point in time these are just prototypes but the team developing the system believe that could bring the first generation systems to market for under a $1,000.00.