OVERVIEW

Overview

Elderly people often suffer from conditions such as arthritis, this can cause huge pain when trying to use small remotes, gripping these small remotes, and pressing hard on the small buttons can aggravate the users joints, and prove hard to do so.

My Role

Research Lead, Programming Lead

Length

3 Months

Tools

MPLAB IDE, DesignSpark

Team

University Project with a partner

My Contribution

I took the role of the researcher and main designer, the programming and electronic hardware stage of the project was a 50:50 split with my partner.

RESEARCH

Needs

A new method of controlling which will get rid of controllers is needed, the method needs to remove the interaction with small, hard to press buttons. The solution uses a glove, which removes the need for buttons, replacing the individual buttons with sweeping actions and finger gestures.

Overseeing some structured interviews with potential users led to some key insights and quotes to take forward into the persona.

• “It all seems so complicated, I’m not really sure what the buttons mean!”
• “Pressing one or two is ok, but after searching for a long movie title or something, they start to ache a little bit”
• “The volume buttons on my remote are so fiddly to press, I just can’t do it reliably.”

Easy ways to type search criteria without repetitive button presses.

Accessible to all users with dexterity problems

Use a range of sensors to detect movement

Settings for gestures must be easily changed.

The prototype glove was designed, coded and built from scratch, it uses a series of components including accelerometers, hall sensors, LEDs and an LCD, with over 900 lines of C code. The final product created is an early prototype, made with limited time and resources to show off the functionality only.