We need £10,000 to develop EyeWink, a wearable device that connects to your smartphone and allows you to control it with eye winks! We would like to change the way in which we interact with the technology, also helping people with disabilities to communicate and act on the world. We have already developed a first working version of EyeWink, but we are raising money to make it wearable and ready for the market.
EyeWink is a wearable device that allows users to control the smartphone with their eyes. It improves the entire user experience by being hands- and voice-free. This means that you do not need to see the smartphone or hold it in front of you to operate it. Winkers can then remain focused on other activities while they are operating their smartphones, improving productivity and reducing stress!
EyeWink is customisable through a smartphone app that allows you to select which command you would like to perform with each eye. For example, you can choose to play/pause the selected playlist on the music player by winking with the left eye and skipping the current song by winking with the right one.
EyeWink is also designed for people with severe mobility impairments to help them to use the smartphone that, otherwise, they could not use. Therefore, EyeWink could also be used for assisted living technologies: for example, in case of need a person with no hand control can use the smartphone to call the carer by just winking with one eye.
Our vision is to create a new way to engage with technology and change communication. We would like to create an interface that can be applied to many different contexts (apart from the smartphone) and simplify people’s lives. For example, EyeWink technology can be used to change the slides in a presentation or to control a robotic wheelchair to help people with disabilities to move around.
By donating to this project, you will join us in revolutionising the way we communicate with our devices. You will help us make the existing EyeWink prototype wearable and ready for mass production. You will also support us in making an affordable, high-quality device available to everyone. Without your help, we won’t have the necessary resources to make this change happen!
The device is equipped with two electrodes that detect the muscular activity around the eyes. These are placed either above the eyebrows or on the corner of the eyes, and will be fully integrated with the wearable device and invisible to the user. The technology used is similar to that used for EEG and, therefore, totally safe and non-invasive.
Data registered from the electrodes are sent to the smartphone, where our algorithms extract information regarding the occurrence (or not) of eye winks. Each eye wink is then converted to the command specified by the user through the app.
In order to continue the development, we need to hire a consultant to design the product and make it appealing, and buy the hardware and equipment we need for completing the new version of the device. For these two goals we need a minimum of £3,000.
Our main goal, however, is to raise £10,000 in order to really boost the development of EyeWinkdirectly for mass production. We will use the money to cover the following costs:
Any extra money (e.g., if you are so generous and donate more than our target) will allow us to produce more devices in the first batch and further reduce the end-user price.
We also want to build a community behind EyeWink. This is why we will keep you updated on the progress of the campaign weekly. Moreover, we will use our social media to publicly thank every supporter. Also, every supporter will have the chance to send us their pictures winking to be featured in a thank you video at the end of this campaign. You will forever be in our hearts!
Almost everywhere, as EyeWink is very social ;-)
The main hub of information is our website eyewink.net, where you can also subscribe to ournewsletter to remain updated on our progress.
We are also on Twitter (tweet us @eyewinkapp), Facebook (like us on our fancy page!), Google Plus (we may deserve to be in your circles), LinkedIn (because we are also very professional).
Join our community on the social media to be a complete winker!
There are many different ways in which you can help us to reach our goal!
The first and most important is to sponsor us. You will help us take a big step in the development of the device to bring it to the market. Every little bit counts! Please support us and be part to the revolution!
Another invaluable action to help us is to share this campaign with anyone you think would be interested and happy to support us. It doesn’t really matter if you use Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus, LinkedIn, emails, WhatsApp, telephone or smoke signals. You will help us by letting people know about EyeWink and, indirectly, you will have an active role in our success!
You can also give us some feedback about EyeWink by filling this 5-minute online survey. Your views are very important for us to design our product based on your requirements. If the survey is too restrictive for you to elaborate, feel free to drop us an email with your comments atinfo@eyewink.net.