Equipped with RealSense modules, .lumen assistive glasses allow the blind to move confidently for greater independence and enhanced navigation capabilities.
The challenge
There are approximately 40 million blind people in the world who face mobility challenges. Due to the high cost of training guide dogs and the significant responsibility placed on dog owners, there are currently only 28,000 guide dogs available—approximately one dog for every 1,400 blind people.
The solution
By fusing the unique capabilities of RealSenseTM cameras with an intelligent hardware and software platform, .lumen is revolutionizing the way the blind interact with their worlds.
The results
In the pursuit of creating a more inclusive and accessible world, .lumen, a Romanian technology company, has harnessed the power of RealSense cameras to develop assistive glasses for the visually impaired. Similar to a car’s Advanced Driver Assistance System (ADAS), .lumen’s glasses use sensors and cameras to detect objects and help avoid collisions.
Revolutionizing
accessibility with AI
In the pursuit of creating a more inclusive and accessible world, .lumen, a Romanian technology company, has harnessed the power of RealSense cameras to develop assistive glasses for the visually impaired. Similar to a car’s Advanced Driver Assistance System (ADAS), .lumen’s glasses use sensors and cameras to detect objects and help avoid collisions.
Explore safely
Just as a dog guides a blind person by gently pulling the leash, .lumen glasses apply force and vibration to guide the wearer’s head in the right direction, using a proprietary haptic interface. RealSense machine vision technology allows the glasses to identify safe walking surfaces and avoid potential hazards. Key technologies include point cloud processing, semantic segmentation, and visual-inertial odometry —driven by a machine learning model that has been tested in over 20 countries.
Intelligent perception
Environmental awareness is a crucial aspect of the .lumen system. The glasses must understand the world in 3D, including identifying suitable walking surfaces and avoiding hazards. They must also predict the movement of other people, vehicles, and potential obstacles, and plan ahead accordingly. RealSense cameras provide a sophisticated visual perception system, enabling .lumen’s advanced software to analyze the environment and generate detailed 3D representations of the physical world.
Artificial Intelligence meets computer vision
lumen’s compact glasses mimic the capabilities of a self-driving car via a computational module that is just 10 percent of the size so it can fit into an AI powered headset. The development team used the RealSense Software Development Kit (SDK) 2.0 to create the machine vision system and integrate it with the headset’s other hardware and software components.
The heart of .lumen’s assistive glasses
Equipped with dual RealSense depth modules D450 for far-field and near-field data, the glasses offer comprehensive 3D understanding of the environment, ensuring safe and confident navigation for the visually impaired.
“After researching every technology that could fit into a headset, we determined that no other camera system could provide the all-around performance of RealSense.”
— Cornel Amariei, CEO and Founder