We're entering a really cool era with SBCs where people are combining Raspberry Pis with AI models. We've seen a lot of really cool implementations with AI on the SBCs, from the useful to the silly. Now, we can add another notch to the "can genuinely help people in their daily lives" side, as someone has created this amazing Raspberry Pi project that uses AI to describe the world to visually impaired people.

The "Third Eye" project gives the visually impaired a guide through life

As spotted by Tom's Hardware, this project was the idea of Md. Khairul Alam on Hackster. While technology has a lot to offer for those who have trouble seeing, Khairul wanted to focus on using the Raspberry Pi because it makes the hardware really cheap to make. As it turns out, that's super important when making tools to aid people who have issues with their vision:

Globally, Around 2.2 Billion people don’t have the capability to see, and 90% of them come from low-income countries. So, an easily accessible and low-cost solution is very important for the visually impaired people of these low-income countries.

The idea behind this "third eye" project involves the patient wearing glasses with a little camera on them. This camera feeds information to a Seeed Studio XIAO ESP32S3 Sense and a Raspberry Pi 1 Model B+, which uses object recognition to work out what's in front of the person. The boards then convert a text-based description of what's going on in front of the wearer and relay it via text-to-speech through the headphones to the wearer.

If you're interested in using AI for your next SBC project, why not check out the new official Raspberry Pi AI board? Ayush Pande recently got their hands on a Raspberry Pi AI board and he had some nice things to say about it.