PRE2020 3 Group6
Sign to text software
Group Members
| Name | Student ID | Department | Email address |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ruben Wolters | 1342355 | Computer Science | r.wolters@student.tue.nl |
| Pim Rietjens | 1321617 | Computer Science | p.g.e.rietjens@student.tue.nl |
| Pieter Michels | 1307789 | Computer Science | p.michels@student.tue.nl |
| Sterre van der Horst | 1227255 | Psychology and Technology | s.a.m.v.d.horst1@student.tue.nl |
| Sven Bierenbroodspot | 1334859 | Automotive Technology | s.a.k.bierenbroodspot@student.tue.nl |
Problem Statement and Objective
At the moment 466 million people suffer from hearing loss, it has been predicted that this number will increase to 900 million by 2050. Hearing loss has, among other things, a social and emotional impact on ones life. The inability to communicate easily with others can cause an array of negative emotions such as loneliness, feeling of isolation and sometimes also frustration !!!!!!!!!!!("Deafness and hearing loss", 2021)!!!!!!!! . Although there are many different types of speech recognition technologies for live subtitling that can help people that are deaf or hard of hearing (DHH), these feelings can still be exacerbated during online meetings. DHH individuals must concentrate on the person talking, the interpretation, and of any potential interruptions that can occur !!!!!!!!(Peruma & El-Glaly, 2017)!!!!!!!!!!. Furthermore, to be able to take part in the discussion, they must be able to spontaneously react in conversation. However, not everyone understands sign language which makes communicating even more difficult. Nowadays, especially due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it is becoming more normal to work from home and therefore the number of online meetings is increasing quickly !!!!!!!("Microsoft Teams reaches 115 million DAU—plus, a new daily collaboration minutes metric for Microsoft 365 - Microsoft 365 Blog", 2021)!!!!!!!!. This leads us to our objective: to deveop software that translates Sign Language to text to help DHH individuals communicate in an online environment. This system will be a tool that DHH individuals can use to communicate during online meetings. The number of people that have to work or be educated from home has rapidly increased due to the COVID-19 pandemic (European Commission, 2020). This means that the number of DHH individuals that have to work in online environments also increases. Previous studies have shown that DHH individuals obtain lower score on an Academic Engagement Form for communication compared to students with no disability (Richardson, Long, & Foster, 2004). This finding can be explained by the fact that DHH people are usually unable to understand speech without aid. This aid can be a hearing aid, technology that convert speech to text, or even an interpreter, however the latter is expensive and not available for most DHH individuals. To talk to or react to other people, DHH individuals can use pen and paper, or in an online environment by typing. However, this is a lot slower than speech or sign language which makes it almost impossible for DHH individual to keep up with the impromptu nature of discussions or online meetings (Glasser, Kushalnagar, & Kushalnagar, 2019). Therefore, by creating software that can convert sign language to text, or even to speech, DHH individuals will be able to actively participate in meeting. To do this, it is important to understand what sign language is. The following section of this wiki page, will explain the different elements of sign language and what it is.
Sign Language: what is it?
Sign language is a natural language that is predominantly used by people that are deaf or hard of hearing, but also by hearing people as well. Of all the children who are born deaf, 9 out of 10 are born to hearing parents. This means that the parents often have to learn sign language alongside the child (Scarlett, 2015).
Sign language is comparable to spoken language in the sense that it differs per country. American Sign Language (ASL) and British Sign Language (BSL) were developed separately and are therefore incomparable, meaning that people that use ASL will not necessarily be able to understand BSL (Scarlett, 2015).
It does not express single words, it expresses meanings. For example, the word right has two definitions. It means correct, and opposite of left. In spoken English, right is used for both meanings. In sign language, there are different signs for the different definitions of the word right. A single sign can also mean a whole entire sentence. By varying the hand orientation and direction, the meaning of the sign, and therefore the sentence, changes. (Perlmutter, 2013)
Having said that, all sign languages rely on certain parameters, or a selection of these parameters, to indicate meaning. These parameters are (Tatman, 2015):
- Handshape: the general shape ones hands, and fingers make;
- Location: where the sign is located in space, body and face are used as reference points to indicate location;
- Movement: how the hands move;
- Number of hands: this naturally refers to how many hands are used for the sign, and it also refers to the ‘relationship of the hands to each other’ ;
- Palm orientation: this is how the forearm and wrist rotate when signing;
- Non-manuals: this refers to the face and body. Facial expressions can be used for different meanings, or lexical distinctions. They can also be used to indicate mood, topics and aspect.
According to the study by Tatman, the first three parameters are universal in all sign languages. However, using facial expressions for lexical distinctions is something that is not used in most languages. The use of parameters also depends on cultural and cognitive context and feasibility of that parameters (Tatman, 2015).
Design concepts
Technical specifications
Realization
Testing
Design evaluation
Week 1
Week 1 mostly consisted of putting together a group and decide upon a topic. We settled on the topic of emotion recognition on children with ASD. Research has been done on this topic and references to similar projects have been gathered. The focus for next week is to explore what is possible to achieve within this topic.
| Name | Student ID | Hours | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sven Bierenbroodspot | 1334859 | description | |
| Sterre van der Horst | 1227255 | description | |
| Pieter Michels | 1307789 | 8,5 | meeting with group - deciding subject (1h 30m), gathering and reading sources (2h), summarizing and further reading of sources (5h) |
| Pim Rietjes | 1321617 | description | |
| Ruben Wolters | 1342355 | description |
Week 2
In week 2 we decided after discussing the possible deliverables and came to the conclusion that it is difficult to find a dataset which we could use. The creation of a dataset is nearly impossible due to the slim target group and the current corona measures. for these reasons we abandoned the subject and discussed a new topic. The selected topic is to develop software which can convert sign language into text using video as an input.
| Name | Student ID | Hours | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sven Bierenbroodspot | 1334859 | description | |
| Sterre van der Horst | 1227255 | description | |
| Pieter Michels | 1307789 | 10 | meeting with supervisor (1h), reading on old subject (2h), looking for databases on old subject (2h), meeting deciding on new subject (1h), reading about new subject (4h) |
| Pim Rietjes | 1321617 | description | |
| Ruben Wolters | 1342355 | description |
Week 3
Research into the functioning of people suffering for hearing loss: http://www.werkenmeteenbeperking.nl/downloads/werkgeversboekje-dove-werknemer-pdf.pdf https://www.tolkcontact.nl/tolkcontact-app/wat-kun-je-met-de-app/ https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/3373625.3418032?casa_token=qBFFHzT_TIYAAAAA:5J8VJu4e5kn85EA339sWPTJ5NPrzG3dfX6VY5-DBertEQeKUk9xDEnSorUJ8S6svFsBRnxgdOI23M9U
| Name | Student ID | Hours | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sven Bierenbroodspot | 1334859 | meeting with supervisor (1h) | |
| Sterre van der Horst | 1227255 | meeting with supervisor (1h) | |
| Pieter Michels | 1307789 | 11 | meeting with supervisor (1h), reading and summarizing sources (4h), setting up coding environment (3h), Getting familiar with Tensorflow (3h) |
| Pim Rietjes | 1321617 | meeting with supervisor (1h) | |
| Ruben Wolters | 1342355 | meeting with supervisor (1h) |
Week 4
| Name | Student ID | Hours | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sven Bierenbroodspot | 1334859 | description | |
| Sterre van der Horst | 1227255 | description | |
| Pieter Michels | 1307789 | 4 | meeting with supervisor (1h), adding timetables to wiki (30m), investigate into tensorflow and Keras (2h 30m) |
| Pim Rietjes | 1321617 | description | |
| Ruben Wolters | 1342355 | description |
Week 5
| Name | Student ID | Hours | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sven Bierenbroodspot | 1334859 | description | |
| Sterre van der Horst | 1227255 | description | |
| Pieter Michels | 1307789 | description | |
| Pim Rietjes | 1321617 | description | |
| Ruben Wolters | 1342355 | description |
Week 6
| Name | Student ID | Hours | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sven Bierenbroodspot | 1334859 | description | |
| Sterre van der Horst | 1227255 | description | |
| Pieter Michels | 1307789 | description | |
| Pim Rietjes | 1321617 | description | |
| Ruben Wolters | 1342355 | description |
Week 7
| Name | Student ID | Hours | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sven Bierenbroodspot | 1334859 | description | |
| Sterre van der Horst | 1227255 | description | |
| Pieter Michels | 1307789 | description | |
| Pim Rietjes | 1321617 | description | |
| Ruben Wolters | 1342355 | description |
Week 8
| Name | Student ID | Hours | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sven Bierenbroodspot | 1334859 | description | |
| Sterre van der Horst | 1227255 | description | |
| Pieter Michels | 1307789 | description | |
| Pim Rietjes | 1321617 | description | |
| Ruben Wolters | 1342355 | description |