1. eSIGN eSIGN – HPSG-assisted Sign Language Composition zThomas Hanke, Hortensia Popescu, Constanze Schmaling zUniversity of Hamburg, Inst. Of German Sign Language zwww.sign-lang.uni-hamburg.de

2. eSIGN Sign Language & the European Deaf Community zSign language is the closest-to-native language for the Deaf community z0.1% of the European population zNo written form of sign language zWritten language competence of many Deaf people poor yBilingual education spreading slowly

3. eSIGN Project Idea: Virtual Signing into eGovernment initiatives zVirtual Signing reduces bandwidth problems with digital video zRelatively easy=cheap and flexible production process zEnsures Deaf people’s integration into a key component of tomorrow’s Information Society (cf. anti-discrimination acts) zMultilingual focus: British Sign Language, Deutsche Gebärdensprache, Nederlandse Gebarentaal

4. eSIGN Virtual Signing on World Wide Web

5. eSIGN Builds on ViSiCAST animation and language technology zMotion capture yResults in highest-quality animation yCompresses far better than video yRequires expensive equipment zSynthetic animation yMore “robotic”, yet still easy to understand yEven lower data rates yMore versatile

6. eSIGN SiGML: XML application 

7. eSIGN eSIGN Translation into Sign Language zHave a signed sentence in mind zPick signs one-by-one from lexicon yCurrent lexicon size: 6500 entries zModify parameters if defaults don’t apply zImmediately view the sentence signed by the avatar

8. eSIGN eSign Editor Demo

9. eSIGN HPSG Lexicon: Different kinds of entries yInvariable: HamNoSys fully specified

10. eSIGN Lexicon zVariable: HamNoSys only partially specified: to be inferred

11. eSIGN Outlook zHPSG grammar to be used to suggest most likely unifications