visiball

identifying a problem

In the MASTERPIECE season, FIRST asked us to find a unique way to share our hobby our passion. The possibilities were endless! So we had to find a place start.

our passion

First, we had to identify our passion! We all wrote hobbies and passions we have down on Post-It Notes and put them on the wall in the Robozo Lair.

A lot of us are on baseball teams and really love the sport, so baseball won the vote.

how to share it

Next we had to think about how we wanted to share our passion. We thought about the Core Values and how we could use those in our project. Inclusion and Impact stood out to us. How could we find a way to make an impact and show inclusion? Could we share baseball with a group that doesn't normally get to play?

One of the kids on our team has a friend who is visually impaired. We thought about that and how it's probably hard or impossible for visually impaired people to play baseball. Maybe that was something we could solve!

How could we share baseball with the visually impaired?

research and design

we took a field trip

We visited the Children's Center for the Visually Impaired and talked with experts about how visually impaired people experience the world.

The people at CCVI told us that a lot of visually impaired games use a rope attached to the ball, so the person playing can follow the rope to retrieve the ball. They showed us how people navigate around their building, using touch and sound instead of sight.

They also told us about Beep Baseball, an existing game where visually impaired people play baseball with a ball that beeps. That helps them to know when to swing, and also how to field the ball. The game is a little different than baseball because the bases also beep, and the runner runs to 1st or 3rd base depending on which one beeps. Sighted people can play too, but everyone has to wear a blindfold!

we narrowed our focus

We talked about our favorite parts of baseball, and we all agreed that getting a big hit is the BEST feeling. We love going to the batting cages and practicing hitting.

Beep Baseball sounded really fun, but it takes a lot of people to play. Maybe we could make something that focuses on batting that a kid could play at home on their own?

we gave it a try

We started by blindfolding ourselves and trying to simulate being visually impaired.

We thought about SOUNDS.

We hit lots of different things off of a tee like water bottles and other containers, but eventually we decided that nothing beats the crack of the bat hitting a real baseball.

Then we thought about how you don't really know how far you hit it, and we kept wanting to peek. So we thought maybe we could play some sounds to tell them how it was going.

"How do I know where to stand?"

We realized it was hard to figure out where to stand at the tee when you're blindfolded. We had an idea to put some turf next to it. We put it on both sides for left or right handed hitters.

We thought we could use touch and sound to help. We had an idea to put plastic water bottles under the turf, so when you step on it it makes a crunching sound. Then you'll really know you're in the right place!

we asked for advice

We wanted to make it fun by adding audio to the game. In our testing we were using a sound effects app and playing them through headphones. There were a lot of fart sounds and explosions. We needed a little help figuring out how to choose the sounds to play.

We talked with Zach Hames, an Audio Engineer at Garmin. We asked him how he decides what audio to use when he's working on products.

He told us it really depends on the feeling you're trying to give people. Do you want to make them feel happy or sad? Excited or calm? He gave us a lot of examples and good ideas on how to pick good sounds.

the aud squad got to work

Two of us were in charge of choosing audio for the game, and we called ourselves the Aud Squad (like audio).

We looked for sounds for when you step up to the plate, when you get a big hit, when you get a strike, and when you strike out. We wanted it to be funny and fun, and not to make anyone feel bad, so we picked silly sounds like Patrick Star saying "Stee-RIIIKE" or Super Mario saying, "You are out-a!"

We thought it was so funny, and we thought if we liked it other kids would too.

the SOLUTION

visiball

A batting practice game for the visually impaired.

It has turf pads with audio feedback to let the batter know where to stand.
It has a ball attached to a tee by a rope. When the batter hits the ball, they can find it and bring it back with the rope.
You can use your own bat and headphones.
The headphones attach to an app on a phone that plays fun sounds.

testing AND FEEDBACK

Our friend Luca who is visually impaired tried out our prototype, and he LOVED it.

He had so much fun hitting the ball and listening to the fun sounds. He kept saying "play my song again!" so we would play "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" so he could have another at-bat.

We were thrilled that we made something he had so much fun playing. When we saw the smile on his face, we knew we had a BIG hit.

We also brought our Visiball prototype to our robotics competitions, and Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas even tried it out!

AWARDS

INNOVATION PROJECT AWARDS

Our Visiball prototype won the Innovation Project Award at both the North Kansas City Qualifier, and the Kansas City Regional Competition in the MASTERPIECE season.

Next Great idea

We submitted our Visiball project to the Next Great Idea Competition for the Shawnee Mission School District in 2025. We won the competition, and won $1000 in prize money and $1500 to make our idea a reality. We're still working on bringing it to life!

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