Develop an object detector for the upper body

About Alain

Alain is 52 years old and lives in Geneva. He is jurist. He likes reading books, especially crime novels, science fiction and fantastic. He also likes winter and water skiing, and paragliding. He loves everything that is related to technology and innovation, and thus has participated to several computer science projects at Geneva University, HEPIA and HEIG. When he was a kid, he slowly lost sight. At age 12, he could only perceive light. Now, he doesn’t see anything anymore.

Challenge

To walk around, Alain (as most visually impaired people) heavily relies on his white cane: Canes, however, only detect objects that develops vertically, without a hollow space between the ground and the object itself. This means that Alain continuously risks hitting his upper body—and especially his head—with obstacles. To address this issue, this challenge aims at developing a wearable device that detects these cane-invisible obstacles and warns Alain when those are dangerously close. Alain counts on you!