Related papers: Flying Guide Dog: Walkable Path Discovery for the …
Quadruped robots have the potential to guide blind and low vision (BLV) people due to their highly flexible locomotion and emotional value provided by their bionic forms. However, the development of quadruped guide robots rarely involves…
A robot guide dog has compelling advantages over animal guide dogs for its cost-effectiveness, potential for mass production, and low maintenance burden. However, despite the long history of guide dog robot research, previous studies were…
Dynamic bipedal walking on discrete terrain, like stepping stones, is a challenging problem requiring feedback controllers to enforce safety-critical constraints. To enforce such constraints in real-world experiments, fast and accurate…
This work introduces Guardian Angel, an Android App that assists visually impaired people to avoid danger in complex traffic environment. The system, consisting of object detection by pretrained YOLO model, distance estimation and moving…
Navigational perception for visually impaired people has been substantially promoted by both classic and deep learning based segmentation methods. In classic visual recognition methods, the segmentation models are mostly object-dependent,…
Persons with visual impairments (PwVI) have difficulties understanding and navigating spaces around them. Current wayfinding technologies either focus solely on navigation or provide limited communication about the environment. Motivated by…
Indoor navigation is challenging due to the absence of satellite positioning. This challenge is manifold greater for Visually Impaired People (VIPs) who lack the ability to get information from wayfinding signage. Other sensor signals…
The introduction of Highly Automated Vehicles (HAVs) has the potential to increase the independence of blind and visually impaired people (BVIPs). However, ensuring safety and situation awareness when exiting these vehicles in unfamiliar…
A quadruped robot is a promising system that can offer assistance comparable to that of dog guides due to its similar form factor. However, various challenges remain in making these robots a reliable option for blind and low-vision (BLV)…
Ensuring accessible pedestrian navigation requires reasoning about both semantic and spatial aspects of complex urban scenes, a challenge that existing Large Vision-Language Models (LVLMs) struggle to meet. Although these models can…
Approximately 200 million individuals around the world suffer from varying degrees of visual impairment, making it crucial to leverage AI technology to offer walking assistance for these people. With the recent progress of vision-language…
By the year 2023, the global population of individuals with impaired vision has surpassed 220 million. People with impaired vision will find it difficult while finding path or avoiding obstacles, and must ask for auxiliary tools for help.…
Indoor built environments like homes and offices often present complex and cluttered layouts that pose significant challenges for individuals who are blind or visually impaired, especially when performing tasks that involve locating and…
Millions of blind and visually-impaired (BVI) people navigate urban environments every day, using smartphones for high-level path-planning and white canes or guide dogs for local information. However, many BVI people still struggle to…
In today's society, where independent living is becoming increasingly important, it can be extremely constricting for those who are blind. Blind and visually impaired (BVI) people face challenges because they need manual support to prompt…
This paper introduces DogSurf - a newapproach of using quadruped robots to help visually impaired people navigate in real world. The presented method allows the quadruped robot to detect slippery surfaces, and to use audio and haptic…
In this paper, we address an issue that the visually impaired commonly face while crossing intersections and propose a solution that takes form as a mobile application. The application utilizes a deep learning convolutional neural network…
Interactive streetscape mapping tools such as Google Street View (GSV) and Meta Mapillary enable users to virtually navigate and experience real-world environments via immersive 360{\deg} imagery but remain fundamentally inaccessible to…
Autonomous navigation by drones using onboard sensors, combined with deep learning and computer vision algorithms, is impacting a number of domains. We examine the use of drones to autonomously follow and assist Visually Impaired People…
Blind and low-vision (BLV) people rely on GPS-based systems for outdoor navigation. GPS's inaccuracy, however, causes them to veer off track, run into obstacles, and struggle to reach precise destinations. While prior work has made precise…