Student develops technology to held deaf and mute people

Manama

Integrating the lives of the deaf with the rest of the community is the ultimate goal of Meshal Mohammed, who invented a unique technology to help the deaf and mute.

With the help of a university professor, Mohamed developed a unique technology that translates sign language into English and Arabic.

He used the motion-tracking hardware of Xbox gaming device as the main camera in his own device.

Speaking about how the device functions, he said, "It is very easy to operate. The device should be placed facing the person who will gesture the sign language. The camera would pick it up and the programme would decipher the meaning. It would then translate the message into English or Arabic and display it on the screen.”

“This is perhaps the first time such a technology being developed anywhere in the world and I was so eager to complete it," he told DT News.

Mohammed created the technology as part of a project for his college, Bahrain Polytechnic, with the help of Professor Malcolm Mckenzie.

He said deaf or mute people suffer due to communication barrier, which his technology would solve. "Be it a casual or formal situation, deaf and mute people find themselves in a fix when they need to communicate with people.

Sign language cannot be sufficient as it not only requires the listener to understand the language (and its relevant sub-languages). Moreover, learning and understanding sign language is a difficult and time consuming process."

He said that he aims to improve the technology . "With more time and resources, more features would be included, such as the ability to add custom gestures, more language options, more accurate gesture recognition, the ability to translate text into sign language, the ability to navigate application and change language options using voice command," he said.

Mohammed said he earned many skills working on the project. “ I had a much better understanding of C+ language, learnt more of motion tracking devices, mainly  relating to the Xbox Kinect camera and how it functions." he added.