New Cell Phone Helps with Poor Eyesight

February 15th, 2008 | Category: Tech Talk

Even those of us who don’t gab on cell phones appreciate having one for an emergency. For a blind or visually impaired person, the Nokia N82 promises much more: It’s a liberating day-to-day tool that grants access to printed materials not otherwise easily available.

A sightless person can use the phone to snap a picture of a menu, book, printed receipt or business card. Software on the phone processes the words on those items and reads the text aloud in a synthesized voice. The device can even let a blind person know whether paper currency is a $5 or a $20 bill.

As you might expect, the candy-bar-shaped Nokia houses an extremely capable digital camera — 5 megapixels, auto-focusing, high-intensity flash. But it’s the character-recognition and text-to-speech software from KNFB Reading Technology that makes it so compelling. KNFB is a joint venture of the National Federation of the Blind and Kurzweil Technologies.

A brief history: In the 1970s,

noted inventor Ray Kurzweil developed a machine that could scan text, convert it to audio and effectively read ordinary books out loud to a blind person. It was the size of a washing machine. By 2006, the technology harnessed a digital camera and could fit into a commercially available $3,500 personal digital assistant. The PDA was portable but not pocket-size like a cellphone.

Late last month, the knfbReader Mobile was launched with the N82. It’s currently the only cell phone to work with KNFB’s software.

The cell phone reader is less expensive than the PDA version. But the software alone will still set you back $1,595, and the Nokia phone an additional $500 or so. (You’ll plus need thin, plastic filters, or polarizers, that reduce glare on the phone.) You can find a dealer at www.knfbreader.com.

There are other potential constraints beyond the size of your wallet. The…

Orginal post by Computer blog from technology-blog.com

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