Inspiration
Who are the most frequent hands users?
Visually impaired individuals use their hands the most to explore and navigate their surroundings in public places such as streets, public transportation, at home, school, and work. They strive to look beautiful and well-groomed like everyone else when participating in social life, even though makeup seems to be a purely visual thing, it means a lot to visually impaired people. They are searching for methods to apply makeup without seeing it.
Visually impaired individuals who have discovered many techniques and tips for themselves share them with others, even becoming blind YouTubers. However, thanks to our team member Gamze, we realized that even though accessible methods for many makeups have been discovered, there is still no accessible method for applying nail polish that looks beautiful and doesn't smudge. Gamze has been searching for methods for years but has not yet found a solution for applying nail polish that looks good and doesn't smudge.
When we came together for the hackathon, Gamze shared this insight as a professionally employed visually impaired woman, and we spoke with other visually impaired individuals and realized that this problem is not just Gamze's problem but a problem for all visually impaired individuals.
What it does
Through our understanding of Gamze and other visually impaired people insights, we have identified three fundamental problems:
- The ability to apply nail polish smoothly and without smudging.
- The ability to obtain information about how the nail polish looks after application, including whether touch-up is necessary.
- Understanding the visual culture within the makeup concept.
To address these issues, we have developed an application for visually impaired makeup enthusiasts to have on their phones. With NailPrint, you can:
- Create 3D nail polish templates that fit your hand by taking a photo of your hand. You can purchase these templates as a subscription package from our affiliated brands such as Esteelauder, or obtain the necessary file to print them from a 3D printer in your area.
- Enhance your visual culture through inclusive content created by our expert team on producing accessible content. You can learn about which nail polish colors are suitable for different skin tones, as well as accessible makeup techniques. You can also improve your skills by learning tips from other members of the social learning community.
- The visual assistant feature will be added to the application in the future, which will analyze the condition of your nail polish and assist you with other makeup-related tasks when you take a photo of your finger.
We have released the application for free to reach more users. For visually impaired users who wish to purchase 3D models, we have included a subscription package. Research shows that disabled people are willing to pay 5% more for inclusive and accessible products. Therefore, our affiliated brand Esteelauder can sell a new inclusive product.
In addition, we have added a feature that allows users to create their own templates using the 3D file generated by the application. We know that visually impaired individuals share tips and accessible methods with each other, which allows more visually impaired individuals to participate in society. In the social section called "Tips and Tricks," users can share methods that are useful for them, and people can inspire each other.
How we built it
We started our NailPrint development process by learning about the problems of our target audience. Through our team members, Gamze and Atakan, who are visually impaired, we reached out to other visually impaired individuals of different ages and education levels to conduct interviews and determine the features they needed.
Next, we began developing the application. Firstly, we created our image processing technology to understand the hand sizes and measurements of individuals. We created our dataset using photos of hands from different people in our surroundings and then automated the process of creating the necessary file that allows for printing on a 3D printer after detecting the boundaries.
We tested our outputs with different visually impaired individuals and then began developing our iOS mobile application to make this technology accessible to all visually impaired individuals, as we observed that they typically prefer using iOS. We first developed our iOS application but we will also develop our Android application in the future.
Our content team created accessible content by compiling the most frequently asked questions by visually impaired individuals and added a social area to our application for sharing content.
After completing the entire application, we conducted tests in the field with different visually impaired individuals. You can find Amine's comments from our beta users in our demo video.
Challenges we ran into
During the development of NailPrint, our first challenge was to understand how we could detect the boundaries of users' nails. To achieve this, we tried using sensors that are currently available on phones, such as Lidar, but we realized that we could achieve the most successful results through image processing. To solve this challenge, we conducted trials using hand photos of individuals with different hand structures.
Afterward, we worked on optimizing the design of these 3D models to ensure they could be easily perceived and used by the visually impaired. To do this, we used playdough and ceramic clay for modeling and tested them with different visually impaired individuals in the field. We ultimately decided to implement the most easily understandable design.
Accomplishments that we're proud
Throughout this entire process, what motivated and made us most proud were the feedback we received from our users. During the testing phase, we provided our users with the 3D templates and they used them in their daily lives, sharing with us the positive comments they received from their surroundings with excitement.
Moving forward, we will continue to work to reach more visually impaired individuals around the world and create this change in them.
What we learned
During this process, we significantly increased our experience with 3D printers. We learned how to perform the necessary analyses using image recognition technologies. In addition, we had the opportunity to test the theoretical knowledge we had on design principles in practice.
What's next for NailPrint
With the funds we earned from the hackathon, we aim to open the application publicly and to deliver the accessible nail polish experience to more people. In addition; We plan to expand the solution by working together with different visually impaired non-governmental organizations (RNIB, APH, NFB...) around the world.
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