Institute of Art Design + Technology Dún Laoghaire
Ireland’s campus for the Creative Industries
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Cormac Rice 

BSc [Hons] Creative Media Technologies

My name is Cormac Rice, and I am a final year student in BSc Creative Media Technologies. Throughout the last four years, I have been given the chance to explore my passions in electronics and technology, while also learning more about the Audio-Visual world. In the past year and a half, I have been teaching myself sign language, as I feel it is a good skill to have. While learning sign language, I came up with the idea of developing a glove that could translate sign language gestures into text and felt it was an idea worth pursuing.

Flex Sensors are sensors that can read the amount of bending occurring throughout the component. The resistance of the component increases when the component is bent, while having a low resistance when straight. A Flex Sensor was placed on each finger of the glove, and the positioning of the finger is determined based on the resistance value in the component when bending or straight.
An Arduino Nano is a programmable microcontroller that allows a circuit to perform a wide variety of functions. In this circuit, all the components will be connected to the Nano. The Nano receives the Flex Sensors Positioning values, references them in the library of sign language gestures written, confirms the gesture being made in text, and feeds this translated sign language gesture to the HC-05 Bluetooth Module, to display the translated gesture.
A HC-05 Bluetooth Module is a component that allows Bluetooth Communication between two devices. This component will receive the translated sign language gesture from the Arduino Nano in text, and sends it to the device hosting the app for the gesture to be displayed on the user’s device.
This breadboarded prototype was built to prove that this circuit, code, and concept does in fact work before attaching components to the glove itself.
Final Prototype for the Sign Language Translation Glove
Screenshots of the different sign language gestures being displayed in text on the app.
Video of the project and app working alongside each other
Sign Language Translation Glove and App

This project is a Sign Language Translation Glove, that when worn by the user, translates Sign Language gestures being made into text. The glove takes advantage of Flex Sensors to accurately detect finger positioning when performing sign language gestures, which feeds its data into the Arduino Nano, where the finger positioning is referenced to the library of sign language gestures to determine what gesture is being made. This data is communicated to an app developed to display these gestures via a HC-05 Bluetooth Module.

The purpose of this project is to break down the communication barrier between those who are deaf and those who are not, acting as a conversational tool that can help build confidence and social skills in deaf people. The glove also works in an educational setting, as it serves the purpose of being an interactive method of learning Sign Language.



Sign Language for All: The Development of a Sign Language Translation Glove for Conversational and Educational Practices

This thesis delves into the conception, research, construction, and development of this sign language translation glove, and how it can operate in both conversational and educational settings. This thesis also gives insight into the User-Testing of this project, giving insight and feedback for future advancements that could be made in the future.


Creative Media Technologies
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