When a hard of hearing person has a face to face conversation, they are likely to use a combination of listening and lip reading to understand what the other person is saying to them. During telephone conversations this extra visual information is not available, so they have to rely solely on what they can hear. To increase the accessibility of voice telephones for hard of hearing people, we took part in this collaborative research project, funded by the European Union.

The Synface project aimed to help hard of hearing people use voice telephones more efficiently. We developed a prototype talking face that is controlled by the incoming speech sounds from a phone line. The system converts the incoming sounds to realistic lip movements on the face. This means that the hard of hearing telephone user can listen to their caller as normal, but will also have extra visual support to help them to follow the conversation.

Partners

Various partners were involved in this project, bringing together a wide range of different skills and knowledge. Our other partners were:

Project outline

The project had three main parts:

Early in the project, we helped with a large market research survey and provided input and advice while the prototypes were being created. We tested many prototypes and towards the end of the project carried out extensive evaluation work with end users, including home based trials. We looked at how easy it is to lip-read the face, and whether the layout of the software makes it easy to use. We also tested whether people actually liked the system, enjoyed using it, and gained benefit from it.

In a project like this it is vital to carry out evaluations with the people for whom the system is being developed; in this case hard of hearing people. In this way we can ensure that the final product is as good as it possibly can be.

Synface is action

We have prepared a short video showing Synface in action. You can download this video to your computer by right clicking on the link below and choosing "Save Target As...".

Large video clip, 9.2mb

Further information

You can read more about the Synface project on the KTH website (external link, opens new browser window). Or you can contact us by email at ict@rnid.org.uk.

Future

The evaluations finished at the end of 2004 with mixed results. It was clear that the system had the potential to be of great use, and that users enjoyed using the system. However, the performance of the system, for example the level to which the lip patterns accurately reflect the incoming speech, was not good enough to be developed into a commercial system without further investment. 

There are further developments occurring with the technology to see if the performance can be improved, we will keep you updated on progress.

Volunteering

If you are interested in volunteering to participate in evaluations of this or any of our other technology projects, please fill in our online form.