Hi Stuart
Are the blinks feeding straight into the alarm system or going via a computer?
About few years back, when I was at Canterbury Medical Physics, I was working with a couple of researchers from the Inference Lab (the developers of Dasher) at Cambridge. They'd developed a handy bit of software that did a fairly good job of using a cheap webcam (with a laptop running Linux) to detect and interpret blinks (and gross eye movements) for switch control. The advantages of this system compared to one that requires frequent messing about with a sensor are fairly obvious. The code was very light and could probably now be ported to a smaller cheaper (Android?) device. Of course, we were looking at its use with relatively lower risk applications. Since you're looking at an Alarm system, I think further risk analysis would need to be done comparing it to other existing solutions.
The name of the researcher is Emli-Mari Nel and she used to work with David Mackay at the Cavendish Lab.
Regards,
Aejaz Zahid
Head of Research & Development
MADA - Qatar Assistive Technology Center
-----------------------------
Aejaz Zahid
Head of Assessment Services
The information in
this email and any attachments thereto, may contain information that is confidential, protected by intellectual property rights, and may be legally
privileged. It is intended solely for the addressee(s). Access to this email by anyone else is unauthorized. Any use, disclosure, copying, or distribution of
the information contained herein by persons other than the designated addressee is unauthorized and may be unlawful. If you are not the intended recipient, you
should delete this message immediately from your system. If you believe that you have received this email in error, please contact the sender or MADA at +
974 (4) 935 922 or [log in to unmask], any views expressed in this email or its attachments are those of the individual sender except where the sender, expressly and
with authority, states them to be the views of MADA.
-----------------------------
-----Original Message-----
From: A discussion list for Assistive Technology professionals. [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Stuart Marsden
Sent: Tuesday, February 04, 2014 6:34 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Blink monitoring/switching
Hi All,
Does anyone have any experience with capturing blinks as an input to a switch?
We have a client requiring a high degree of supervision and who has severely limited function. He has limited control of the direction of his gaze but has good control of blinking. We'd hope to monitor blinking and perhaps alarm when blinking stops.
As is often the case, money is tight, but we do have some resources to build or adapt software, or electro-mechanical gadgets.
Thanks in advance for any ideas or suggestions.
Best
Stu
Dr Stuart Marsden CEng
Clinical Measurement Section
Medical Physics Department
The James Cook University Hospital
South Tees Hospitals NHS Trust
Middlesbrough, TS4 3BW
[log in to unmask]
Tel: 01642 282847 (internal: 52847)
|