Augmented Reality in the Classroom

Low vision can have an exceptionally negative impact on a student’s ability to learn, especially when subjected to the conventional education system. In this environment, students are expected to adhere to a lecture that delivers most information visually via a whiteboard or a projector screen. The goal of this project is to create a customizable application for a smartphone that implements selective processing in order to make it easier for visually impaired students to engage with and learn from lectures.

Specifically, this application is written in the Java language for the Android platform. The application uses OpenGL ES, a C-like language for the mobile platform, in order to perform image processing. Filters written in OpenGL ES are used to modify the image read by the phone’s camera. Using these filters, the application can modify an image by stretching, magnifying, and enhancing the color and contrast. The specific processes included in the application include Sobel Edge Detection, Dilation, Zoom and Contrast. Hardware acceleration is also performed using OpenGL ES.

A direct consequence of this project is solving a problem in the classroom for visually impaired students not yet addressed by current technologies. While this project needs further development to substantially help students with severe peripheral vision, it was successful in implementing the desired augmentation and can serve as a foundation for future usability improvements.