Hi, I’m Kate – one of Vision Support’s digital skills team. In July, I went along to Sight Village in Birmingham to find out what’s going on in the world of VI technology.
Sight Village is a two-day showcase event which takes place every year in Birmingham. It’s a chance for lots of organisations and companies to gather and promote their services to people in the VI community. You can try out everything from electronic magnifiers to apps that improve the accessibility of your phone or tablet; it’s a great event for finding out what’s happening in the world of accessible technology and low vision aids.
I started the day (after several cups of tea and a busy train journey!) by going to a talk by Envision. For those who have not come across it, Envision is a piece of software similar to Seeing AI, able to read documents, recognise images and more. It is available via an app which can be installed onto your phone or tablet, or for more sophisticated features it is available via the “Envision” glasses. Though it has been available for some time now, Envision has already gone through three significant updates this year and more exciting changes are on the horizon.
The Envision glasses can now use AI (artificial intelligence) to ask specific questions about a document you have scanned (for instance, “Are there any burgers on this menu?”) as well as to translate documents. They are also now able to scan and read documents without connecting to the internet. Envision are also hoping to develop a question-and-answer feature for image recognition (i.e. “Are there any keys in this picture?” “What colour is the vase in this image?”) as well as making the above described features available on their Envision AI app as well as via the glasses.
The Envision app is free, whereas the glasses range from around £1700 to £2699.
After hearing from Envision, I grabbed yet another cup of peppermint tea and headed to the exhibition hall. In between dodging around what seemed like hundreds of guide dogs, I was able to chat to people from many organisations and companies about their services and products. Here are just a few of the things I got to try out:
Hark Reader: HumanWare were promoting the Hark Reader, a simple device which is able to scan and read paper documents. It has a foldable design and reads automatically as soon as it detects print, so there is no need to worry about learning how to work it or remembering which buttons to press. It also has options for pausing or rewinding text. For people who do not want to use digital technology, this can be a helpful option for reading documents such as mail.
SmartVision3 Phone: Sight and Sound Technologies were promoting the SmartVision3 phone, It has a both a touch screen and a keypad, and has a screen reader (will read aloud what is on the screen). It also has voice command and recognition and is hearing aid compatible. SmartVision phones are a more versatile alternative to Synapptic phones, and are a good option for people who are looking for an accessible phone with buttons as well as touch screen “smart” features.
Cobolt Speechmaster USB: This portable USB player is small enough to fit into the palm of your hand and only has a few buttons to navigate. It also has an inbuilt radio, and a headphone jack for listening on the go. For anyone who does not want to access their audiobooks digitally, this can be a great option.
Talking Newspaper Foundation: The Talking Newspaper Foundation now have an Alexa skill which can be used to listen to your local talking newspaper. They also now have a feature on their website which you can use to find out whether your area has a talking newspaper and/or where your nearest talking newspapers are based.
There were so many other fantastic pieces of technology and equipment on display at Sight Village this year, so please do get in touch with us if you would like more information or have questions about any of the things I talked about here. My day exploring Sight Village turned out to be a great one—despite the pouring rain I got caught in on my way home!
