According to the BBC, a smart phones become more accessible, some with built in speech and Braille output, it is possible for people with sight loss to get slivers of visual assistance when there's no one else around to ask.
Want to know what colour your shirt is? Use a colour detector app. Want to know if it is still daylight outside? Use a light detector app. Want to read a notice on your work's noticeboard? Use a text recognition app, of course.
The most recent visual assistance product to hit the app store is VizWiz. As well as giving you automated image recognition from intelligent software, it throws your questions open to a small band of volunteers standing-by on the internet - a human cloud, willing to donate ten seconds of their time here and there to describe photos which come in.
Read More: Textually
ALBANY - Mark DeMontis sits in an RV parked alongside the Trans Canada Highway at the Albany 'Y'
He's dressed in a jersey, carries a hockey stick and is wearing in-line skates.
What is he doing here?
"Just trying to Rollerblade across the country," DeMontis says as he emerges from the recreational vehicle.
When he was 17, DeMontis was an up-and-coming hockey player, skating toward a scholarship at an American college.
But just before graduating high school, DeMontis was diagnosed with Leber's Optic Neuropathy, leaving him legally blind.
"I can only see around the eye, peripherally," he explains. "Things like large shapes, shadows, minor depth perception and colour."
Instead of giving up on his hockey dream, however, he has become a champion of blind hockey programs.
With the help of Courage Canada, an organization he founded, the 24-year-old man is in-line skating from Halifax to his home in Toronto.
It's his second journey to encourage more support for blind hockey programs across Canada. In 2009, DeMontis skated from Toronto to Vancouver.
In the coming year, he hopes more blind hockey programs for youth and adults spring up around the country.
"Blind hockey is very similar to sighted hockey, aside from one major modification being a noise-making puck...so players can hear it," he said. "There are a number of Canadians who are blind or visually impaired from coast to coast, in every province or territory. I think it's important that we work together...so they can get the chance to learn how to skate and play hockey."
The skate from Albany to Borden-Carleton was the culmination of Day 9 of a 64-day trek.
DeMontis was eager to cross the Confederation Bridge, even if he'd have to ride in the RV instead of skate across it.
"It would've been great to in-line skate the Confederation Bridge," he said. "None the less, we're looking forward to seeing it, and using my peripheral sight to see the water on each side."
sbrun@journalpioneer.com
Via: journalpioneer
We've seen a number of devices - such as the UltraCane and EYE 21 system - that combine sonar and haptic or audio feedback to let the visually impaired "see" their surroundings through the senses of touch or hearing. Tacit is a similar device that also uses sonar to measure the distance to objects and provide users with a 'view" of their surroundings through haptic feedback. But unlike previous devices we've looked at, Tacit is mounted on the wrist so it doesn't impair a user's hearing or interfere with the use of other assistance devices such as canes.
The prototype Tacit device developed by Steve Hoefer at Grathio Labs consists of four ultrasonic range finding sensors connected to a microcontroller that calculates the distance to objects by reading how long it takes for the ultrasonic pulses to return to the device. The distances are then translated into force feedback on the back of the user's wrist through servo motors, with the force of the pressure indicating how near or far the detected objects are. By waving their arm around an area, the wearer is able to get the lay of the land and navigate complex environments.
Read more at: Gizmag
I have a hero-loving blind nephew who has a vocarious appetite for CDs and other audio product. I now know what to get him for his birthday.
Marvel has just announced that its superhero Daredevil — aka the blind attorney Matt Murdock — is coming to fans in audio form.
The Man Without Fear is now also The Man With an Audiobook.
Daredevil #1 Audio Edition was the braindchild of Marvel senior editor Steve Wacker, who says he and writer Mark Waid wanted to issue the new format so visually impaired fans could appreciate Daredevil’s new adventures in 2011.
Says Marvel: “Up to this point, those deprived of sight themselves have had to rely on friends reading them copies of Daredevil in order to experience Matt Murdock's adventures.”
On the audio, Waid describes the panels and Marvel editor Tom Brennan voices Daredevil.
Daredevil made his debut in 1964, with his creation credited to Bill Everett and Stan Lee (Jack Kirby, whose estate continues to fight over copyrights and compensation, is said to have aided and abetted the character design). Wally Wood, Frank Miller and John Romita Sr. are several of the legends who helped guide Daredevil over the decades.
And to many non-comics fans, of course, the Hells Kitchen superhero is best known as Ben Affleck’s character in 2003’s “Daredevil” film.
You can hear the audio edition by clicking right here.
Via: Washingtonpost
Entered in the 2011 IDEA Award, the Omnifer is an innovative cover for the iPad that aims to make tablet usage available to those who are visually-impaired. The technology behind it consists of three panels that contains a braille overlay raised by gas pockets when light from the iPad expands the chemical. When the light source is extinguished, the braille dots lower to its thin, flat surface. With a programmed app for the iPad, illuminated dots would appear in designated areas, letting the visually-impaired population to “read” their iPads.
The visually impaired girls in Maharashtra's Pune city on Tuesday made sacred thread commonly known as 'rakhis' for soldiers in the Indian Army ahead of the Hindu festival of 'Raksha Bandhan', which celebrates the relationship between brothers and sisters.
The festival will be celebrated all across the country on August 13 this year.
The students expressed their joy at being able to make the festival memorable for the soldiers.
"We are happy that the rakhis made by us will be worn by our brothers in the army, who protect our country," said Bharti Tapkir, a student at the Home for Blind Girls.
The girls used various coloured threads, beads and ribbons for the rakhis, relying on their sense of touch to execute their work to perfection.
They appealed to their 'brothers' in the army for protection.
"Just as brothers protect their sisters, I would ask our soldiers to protect us and our country," said Purnima Shelke, another student.
The teachers helped them to choose the colours for their sacred threads and other material.
They encouraged the girls to have faith in their potential.
"Our School's Secretary, Dr Rajni Indulkar, says these girls must never look at their disability as a hindrance. They should be confident enough to take care of themselves," said Archana Sarnobat, a teacher.
Raksha Bandhan occupies a special place in the Hindu religious calendar.
The central ceremony involves the tying of a rakhi (sacred thread) by a sister on her brother's wrist. This symbolizes the sister's love and prayers for her brother's well being, and the brother's lifelong vow to protect her. (ANI)
Via: NewsTrackIndia
