Vision on tap : an online computer vision toolkit

Abstract

In this thesis, we present an online toolkit, based on a combination of a Scratch-based programming environment and computer vision libraries, manifested as blocks within the environment, integrated with a community platform for diffusing advances in computer vision to a general populace. We show that by providing these tools, non-developers are able to create and publish computer vision applications. The visual development environment includes a collection of algorithms that, despite being well known in the computer vision community, provide capabilities to commodity cameras that are not yet common knowledge. In support of this visual development environment, we also present an online community that allows users to share applications made in the environment, assisting the dissemination of both the knowledge of camera capabilities and advanced camera capabilities to users who have not yet been exposed to their existence or comfortable with their use. Initial evaluations consist of user studies that quantify the abilities afforded to the novice computer vision users by the toolkit, baselined against experienced computer vision users.