Proximity Pack

Later in the fall of 2019, I worked on a fanny pack that used ultrasonic distance sensors and haptic feedback motors to show the wearer how far away an object might be from them. More than 285 million people in the world are visually impaired, and the white cane continues to be the most common tool for the blind to navigate. While some blind and more visually impaired people may be able to afford to train seeing eye dogs, the vast majority cannot afford to do so. Our pack was intended to be a cheap alternative with style, something that would afford privacy and normalcy while still providing "sight."

We went about this proximity pack by examining existing technologies, comparing to the "seeing eye" tool attached to a user's hand, various "smart canes" that buzzed when near objects, and vests with motors, but ultimately determined that a fanny pack would be cheaper, more discrete, and more stylish. Using the Arduino Lilypad as inspiration - electronics integrated with clothing - we sewed three ultrasonic distance sensors in to the fanny pack with accompanying haptic feedback motor sets, all driven by a central Arduino and powered via. interface with a solar-charged battery pack. We sewed everything in to provide the most discrete & organized cabling possible.

Ultimately, more sensitive distance sensing technology would be required in order to make it an adequate replacement. We found that while the proximity pack worked great for walking forward, it had trouble sensing walls on the side due to the offset created by a walking user; as a user walks, the sound waves sent out by the distance sensors miss the sensing part of the distance sensors. Additionally, it would not be usable for stairs. Perhaps LIDAR would be a good replacement, and were we to integrate it and iterate, I'm sure this product could've become commercially available.