Premium
Real‐time image enhancement of television for the visually impaired – pilot study
Author(s) -
Wolffsohn James S
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
ophthalmic and physiological optics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.147
H-Index - 66
eISSN - 1475-1313
pISSN - 0275-5408
DOI - 10.1111/j.1475-1313.2006.00402_4.x
Subject(s) - computer vision , computer science , artificial intelligence , display size , clips , visually impaired , image (mathematics) , clarity , image processing , computer graphics (images) , display device , biochemistry , chemistry , human–computer interaction , operating system
Purpose: To determine whether a universal image enhancement could be conducted in real‐time to enhance the viewing clarity of television images by the visually impaired. Method: One minute clips of television news and advert footage were digitally captured and converted to AVI format. These were displayed to five subjects with low vision (<0.5 logMAR binocular visual acuity) at the same time as a real‐time image of the edges detected (white on black image) and the original colour image overlaid by the detected edges coloured in red. Results: Forced choice comparison resulted in the image enhanced colour image being preferred over the original and edges only image for both video clips in all subjects. This image analysis could be performed on a live television image and displayed at 25 Hz (PAL format). Conclusion: Current technology allows real‐time image enhancement of television images and a universal edge enhancement overlaid on the original footage appears to benefit the visually impaired. If larger trials support this finding, it is envisaged that a small signal processing box could be connected to a television to enhance the viewing clarity for the visually impaired.