Computer Vision for Supporting Visually Impaired People: A Systematic Review

Abstract

Globally around the world in 2010, the number of people of all ages visually impaired is estimated to be 285 million, of whom 39 million are blind according to the study of World Health Organization (Global Data on Visual Impairments, 2010). Visual impairment has a significant impact on individuals’ quality of life, including their ability to work and to develop personal relationships. Almost half (48 %) of the visually impaired feel “moderately” or “completely” cut off from people and things around them (Hakobyan, Lumsden, O’Sullivan, & Bartlett, 2013). We believe that technology has the potential to enhance individuals’ ability to participate fully in societal activities and to live independently. So, in this paper we focused to presents a comprehensive literature review about different algorithms of computer vision for supporting blind/vision impaired people, different devices used and the supported tasks. From the 13 eligible papers, we found positive effects of the use of computer vision for supporting visually impaired people. These effects included: the detection of obstacles, objects, door and text, traffic lights, sign detections and navigation. But the biggest challenge for developers now is to increase the speed of time and improve its accuracy, and we expect the future will have a complete package or solution where blind or vision impaired people will get all the solution together (i.e., map, indoor-outdoor navigation, object recognition, obstacle recognition, person recognition, human crowd behavior, crowd human counting, study/reading, entertainment etc.) in one software and in hand-held devices like android or any handy devices.