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A project log for Digital White Cane

The Digital White Cane can prevent frequent head injuries and provide intuitive navigation assistance for the blind and visually impaired.

george-albercookGeorge Albercook 09/03/2017 at 23:450 Comments

Time to show it off.  We were only given 3 minutes to give our presentation, but during the transition while computers, projectors and microphones were being connected, nobody said that I couldn't walk around in the front of the room. 

While the rest of our amazing team gave the presentation, I continued to wander around demonstrating the device.

The experience of wearing the device was rather striking.  I have seen other systems, for example, that converted images to sound, which required a lot of concentration.  

Using the Digital White Cane, I was able to carry on a conversation with only occasional hesitations when I needed to really focus. While "feeling" the world through this system for the first time, I was trying to narrate my experience.  

I think that since the system was on my head, some of the circuits in my brain that create a map of the world were able to work in a "native" way.  Once I "felt" my teammates standing against the back wall, even after turning away,  I didn't have to try to remember that they were there.  

It "felt" like they were there just as if I had seen them and turned away. (It also felt like they would probably try to mess with me while I was blindfolded.)  In addition, I had no problem remembering where the table was once I had turned away from it. 

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