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EyeWriter: Enabling People to Draw with Their Eyes

What’s a visual thinker to do when an injury or disease robs them of their ability to use their hands to create visuals? Tony Quan, aka TemptOne, a legendary LA graffiti writer, publisher and activist faced just that situation as he was stricken with ALS, better known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease in 2003. Now, unable to move his body, eat or even talk, but with an otherwise entirely healthy brain Tony was faced with a lifetime trapped inside his own body.

The one thing he can still control? His eyes.

This is where a collaborative team of people from Free Art and Technology (FAT), OpenFrameworks, the Graffiti Resarch Lab, and The Ebeling Group came together to start working on a solution to help give people like Tony an creative outlet.

Working together, this international team is aiming to create a low-cost, open source eye-tracking system that will allow ALS patients to draw using just their eyes. Their vision is to establish a network of software developers, hardware hackers, urban projection artists and ALS patients from around the world who can combine locally available materials and open source research to enable people to make eye art.

The team was recently awarded the 2010 Brit Insurance Interactive Award for their work.

Check out the video below for an example of the technology in action:

For more on the Eyewriter check out http://eyewriter.org – they’re currently looking for additional collaborators/hackers I believe so if this is of interest to you be sure to get in touch with them.

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