Crystal Clear OPS

What comes to mind when you hear the word, or acronym, ‘OPS’? From an espionage perspective, you might consider ops to represent “operations.” However, my view of the nickname could be from more of a medical point of view, the common phrase of ops being “optics.” This project is a little bit of both, being an optical prototype system implementing research, coding, and design elements from the prior project (which concluded in the spring of 2024), Crystal Clear. The upgraded version of this project, Crystal Clear OPS, stems from the inspiration of the Marvel Cinematic Universe‘s E.D.I.T.H. “smart glasses,” a piece of Stark Industries technology given to Spiderman in the franchise’s second film, Spiderman: Far From Home. Obviously, smart glasses exist in the 21st Century, created by innovators from companies such as Google and Meta. However, these particular models seem quite expensive, carrying various, “extra” features, when it comes to fulfilling only the single purpose of serving the hearing impaired community.

The Crystal Clear projects’ purpose was never to serve as an alternative or replacement to the already existing, high-technologically advanced tools society has invested millions into today. Instead, the initial, main goal was to provide an additional, inexpensive tool to support the hearing impaired community in any way we could. According to feedback from the 2024 i2 Showcase, visitors advised that our second version of the Crystal Clear prototype should be easily transportable, one of the disadvantages of the flat-screen model developed in the year prior. So, with inspiration from the MCU and the technological acceleration of modern society, the plan for Crystal Clear version 2.0 was confirmed, within a newly improved prototype of optical lenses, in which “subtitles” could be displayed on the lens of a pair of glasses, captured from audio via a shotgun microphone. Controlled primarily by a Raspberry Pi 3B+ model connected to both a mini OLED screen and a USB microphone, the raw circuitry of this prototype allows for both accurate and quick transcription, even in a crowded environment. The software, Vosk speech recognition, allows efficient usage of Crystal Clear OPS offline, so hearing impaired users aren’t required to connect to the Internet to access this tool of communication.

Thank you to all for the support given, through the feedback provided at the Showcase, and all the encouragement given to make this creation a reality. Our community is better served, thanks to our participants, judges, and attendees! Enjoy!

Also, to learn more about this project, or for more information on how to create this project at home, continue reading my multi-episode project journal From MAX to OPS (blogs available on my profile page,) listed here: Part I,  Part II,  Part III, Part IV.  More episodes coming soon!