RE: p2rd
- From: "Rose Combs" <rosecombs@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 23 Jan 2005 11:30:36 -0700
From the sounds of it, my Kurzweil will do a better job than this device
at this stage in development.
Rose Combs
rosecombs@xxxxxxxxx
-----Original Message-----
From: optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of philwh@xxxxxxxx
Sent: Saturday, January 22, 2005 3:32 PM
To: optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: p2rd
Hi.
I was able to catch up with Oleg Tretikaoff at the ATIA conference in
Orlando fl on Friday. I got about an hour demo from oleg with the p2rd.
first, I will attempt to give a discription of the hardware. the
computer was a small laptop or notebook. it had a full laptop type of
keyboard, with a mouse pad in front of hte keys. it had 2 usb ports, and
a 30 gb hard drive, and sound. oleg plugged in an external speaker for
the demo. the camera was about 6 inches long, and a few inches wide. you
can get the exact specs from the catechnologies.net web site. the camera
can be either attached to a book holder, mounted on four removeable
legs, or attached to a tripod. the book holder comes in 2 models. the
one oleg had was the single page model, costing about $600. the 2 page
model costs about twice as much, $1200. now, i will attempt to describe
the book holder and how it works. the book holder is about 8 inches
wide, and about 11 inches tall. it is triangular in shape. it comes to a
fairly thin point on top, or rahter a rather sharp edge on top, slopping
down on either side to a base. you place the book over hte top, with the
binding on the top edge, witht he 2 sides of the book handing down on
either side or the book holder. the holder is supposed to handle a book
8 and one half by 11 inches. the camera is somehow attached to the front
side or face of the book holder near the base, int he middle. the lens
of the camera faces the surface of the book holder. at first i couldn't
figure how the image fromt he book got to the camera, but oleg explained
in some detail how it works. the front face of the book holder is
transparent.
the image of the page gets bounced down to a mirror ont he bottom of the
book holder. then it gets bounced to the back surface or face, and then
into the lens of the camera. the 2 mirrors are at right angles to one
another. in the 2 page model, there is an additional mirror to get the
image of the back page to the camera. this process is not automatic, the
user has to move a lever to put the third mirror in position.
all commands to the software are given using a menu system
with all choices being done wthe number row of hte computer. when the
software starts up, it gives some dyonastic messages, and then gives the
first menu choice. you must press 1 if you want to use a camera, or 0 if
not. all commands are terminated with the enter key. after choosing the
camera, the software gives some more messages concerning hte detection
of the camera. now, the user must make a number of choices to set up the
camera. I forget all the choices, but there must have been 6 or 7. one
setting is the zoom. another is the choice between white on black or
black on white. still another was the whiteness of the page. I don't
remember all of them as I say, but it seemed very unuser friendly.
next, the user must supply a name for the file where the image of the
page will be stored. each page is stored in a separate file, which the
user must name. next, the user presses a key to actually take a snap
shot of the page which only takes a few seconds. you can hear the camera
take the picture. after this, the user waits for a while, probably 30
seconds for the software to acknoledge that it got the image. the image
is then manulipated by olegs software, and then passed to the ocr
software. after recognization, the machine starts to read the text. at
this point, the user has a number of commands to control reading.
pressing 1, starts and stops reading. it does not sop reading
immediately, it took perhaps 4 seconds for the device to shut up.
pressing 1 again, starts reading again. pressing 5, puts the device into
read by word mode. pressing 1, moves forward one word and speaks it.
pressing 3, spells the word. pressing 4, moves back one word and reads
it. pressing 5, puts you into a mode where you can type a number which
skips that
many words.
i didn't see how to skip backwards a number of words.
pressing 0, get out of word mode.
I you are now back in
a mode where you can move back or forward by
sentence.
I forget which number to press, perhaps 4,
then you can type a number to which will skip
that many sentences.
when scanning a book, each page is stored separately,
and at present there is no way to concatinate the pages
to read the whole book at one time.
now, if you need to read a single paper,
you detach the camera fromt he book holder, and screw the legs into the
camera. you can change the length of the legs, and oleg is working a
modification to change the angle of the legs. I wasn't able to test this
mode, he said he only had on mounting ring with him. i am not sure what
that exactly meant. the p2rd can also be used to recognize colors. if
you want to read a computer monitor, you would mount he camera on a
tripod.oleg said that it would be possible to developt a holder for the
lack of a better name so the p2rd could read a round object, by using a
series of mirrors that would surround the round object which would
reflect the entire image to the camera.
as for the display, he is still working on one.
he said he is now into phase 2 of the development.
oleg did say something very interesting concerning the p2rd.
he said that it would be possible to use the p2rd to read something at a
distance, such as writing on a blackboard or wall. the problem is to
point the camera in the right direction and to align it. he is working
on a solution for this problem.
all in all, i think the p2rd has
some potential, but the user interface needs a lot of work.
and as I pointed out to oleg, it still
doesn't come close to replacing the optacon. he agreed with this. he did
say however, that there was another company that tried to come up with
an optacon like device here in the u.s. in the past few years, but
failed completely. he would not give me the name though. oleg is trying
to get the manufacturer of the camera to give him some info so he can
load the software into the camera directly and eliminate the computer.
the computer does run windows xp by the way, and could be used for
general purpose work.
i hope this gives some sense of hte p2rd.
phil
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