Eye Tracking Checkers with a Universal Gripper
Our project is Eye-Tracking Checkers with the help of a universal gripper. The purpose of our design is to help those who may not have the physical capabilities to do simple maneuvers. Our design will implement a new method to the way we play checkers between a human player and a computer. We will use camera to detect when the eye moves left, right, up, or down, similar to the movement of a joystick. A universal gripper will be used to pick up the checkers pieces and move them to the desired position.
The checkerboard will have LED’s on each box and one in the center of the board. At the start of each move, the user will look at the LED to position the eye to the center point. Once that point is confirmed, the center LED will light up. When the user moves their eye in any of the four directions; for example, up, will light up the LED one box up from the center point, then right would light up the LED to the box on the right of the previous position, and so on. With each eye movement in either of those directions, the LED’s on each box will light up.
We will use a number of voluntary blinks in a small amount of time to allow the user to confirm the piece they want to move and where. The universal gripper will be on a platform attached to aluminum rods that will move along an X-Y plane above the checkerboard. It will pick up the pieces through suction and move them based on where the user chooses to move their piece to. After the user’s move is over, the system will make its own move based on the data it has stored in an array where each piece is and will move according to that. By using this method, the user be able to play a game of checkers by simply using their eyes and only that. It will allow users who are unable to use their motor skills, particularly individuals with neuromuscular diseases (i.e. Parkinson’s Disease, ALS, etc.) to play checkers. The scope of our design will be to target a simple game of Checkers, with the foundations laid for further development and implementation to other games or uses.
