Sign Language Translation Approach to Sinhalese Language

Abstract

Sign language is used for communication between deaf
persons while Sinhalese language is used by normal hearing
persons whose first language is Sinhalese in Sri Lanka. This
research focuses on an approach for a real-time translation from
Sri Lankan sign language to Sinhalese language which will
bridge the communication gap between deaf and ordinary
communities. This study further focuses on a novel methodology
of enabling distance communication between deaf and ordinary
persons. Once the sign based gestures captured by depth sensing
camera, series of feature extraction techniques will be used to
identify essential attributes in gesture frame. Identified feature
frame will be compared with pre-trained gesture dictionary
based on classification techniques, in order to identify gesture
based word. Detected word will be displayed for ordinary user or
could be used for communication between two individuals in two
different geographic locations. Proposed prototype has provided
an overall recognition rate of 94.2% for a dictionary of fifteen
signs in Sri Lankan sign language.