Creating an animated character for a computer sign language translation system

Abstract

In recent years, much attention has been paid to people with disabilities around the world. Creating a barrier-free environment and the necessary conditions for their training and communication is one of the important tasks of any modern state. Since everyone should have equal opportunities to communicate with the outside world. In our country, it is also important and necessary to create a system of automatic sign language translation from Kazakh to sign language for people with hearing disabilities. This article reveals the prospects of using an animated character (avatar) to demonstrate gestures, the features of creating an animated character and applying sign language notation to control it. The avatar is aimed at showing the results of translating the Kazakh text into sign language based on the previously created dictionary of notation of gestures of the Kazakh sign language (KSL). When developing an automatic sign language translation system, the meaning of the translated text is revealed, it is translated into the grammar of the KSL. The compiled dictionary is then used to search for words in the dictionary, present them as notation, and display them using an avatar. To create an avatar model, software tools such as MakeHuman, Photoshop, and Blender are used in stages. Gesture animations are set up in the modern cross-platform graphics package Unity3D using libraries of "clips" created based on the dictionary of notations of gestures of the KSL.