6,608 research outputs found

    Weaving Lighthouses and Stitching Stories: Blind and Visually Impaired People Designing E-textiles

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    We describe our experience of working with blind and visually impaired people to create interactive art objects that are personal to them, through a participatory making process using electronic textiles (e-textiles) and hands-on crafting techniques. The research addresses both the practical considerations about how to structure hands-on making workshops in a way which is accessible to participants of varying experience and abilities, and how effective the approach was in enabling participants to tell their own stories and feel in control of the design and making process. The results of our analysis is the offering of insights in how to run e-textile making sessions in such a way for them to be more accessible and inclusive to a wider community of participants

    Include 2011 : The role of inclusive design in making social innovation happen.

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    Include is the biennial conference held at the RCA and hosted by the Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design. The event is directed by Jo-Anne Bichard and attracts an international delegation

    Interdependence as a Frame for Assistive Technology Research and Design

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    In this paper, we describe interdependence for assistive technology design, a frame developed to complement the traditional focus on independence in the Assistive Technology field. Interdependence emphasizes collaborative access and people with disabilities' important and often understated contribution in these efforts. We lay the foundation of this frame with literature from the academic discipline of Disability Studies and popular media contributed by contemporary disability justice activists. Then, drawing on cases from our own work, we show how the interdependence frame (1) synthesizes findings from a growing body of research in the Assistive Technology field and (2) helps us orient to additional technology design opportunities. We position interdependence as one possible orientation to, not a prescription for, research and design practice--one that opens new design possibilities and affirms our commitment to equal access for people with disabilities

    Using Wii technology to explore real spaces via virtual environments for people who are blind

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    Purpose - Virtual environments (VEs) that represent real spaces (RSs) give people who are blind the opportunity to build a cognitive map in advance that they will be able to use when arriving at the RS. Design - In this research study Nintendo Wii based technology was used for exploring VEs via the Wiici application. The Wiimote allows the user to interact with VEs by simulating walking and scanning the space. Finding - By getting haptic and auditory feedback the user learned to explore new spaces. We examined the participants' abilities to explore new simple and complex places, construct a cognitive map, and perform orientation tasks in the RS. Originality – To our knowledge, this finding presents the first virtual environment for people who are blind that allow the participants to scan the environment and by this to construct map model spatial representations

    Constructing sonified haptic line graphs for the blind student: first steps

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    Line graphs stand as an established information visualisation and analysis technique taught at various levels of difficulty according to standard Mathematics curricula. It has been argued that blind individuals cannot use line graphs as a visualisation and analytic tool because they currently primarily exist in the visual medium. The research described in this paper aims at making line graphs accessible to blind students through auditory and haptic media. We describe (1) our design space for representing line graphs, (2) the technology we use to develop our prototypes and (3) the insights from our preliminary work

    MultiVis: improving access to visualisations for visually impaired people

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    This paper illustrates work undertaken on the MultiVis project to allow visually impaired users both to construct and browse mathematical graphs effectively. We start by discussing the need for such work, before discussing some of the problems of current technology. We then discuss Graph Builder, a novel tool to allow interactive graph construction, and Sound Bar which provides quick overview access to bar graphs

    Computer Entertainment Technologies for the Visually Impaired: An Overview

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    Over the last years, works related to accessible technologies have increased both in number and in quality. This work presents a series of articles which explore different trends in the field of accessible video games for the blind or visually impaired. Reviewed articles are distributed in four categories covering the following subjects: (1) video game design and architecture, (2) video game adaptations, (3) accessible games as learning tools or treatments and (4) navigation and interaction in virtual environments. Current trends in accessible game design are also analysed, and data is presented regarding keyword use and thematic evolution over time. As a conclusion, a relative stagnation in the field of human-computer interaction for the blind is detected. However, as the video game industry is becoming increasingly interested in accessibility, new research opportunities are starting to appear

    Enabling audio-haptics

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    This thesis deals with possible solutions to facilitate orientation, navigation and overview of non-visual interfaces and virtual environments with the help of sound in combination with force-feedback haptics. Applications with haptic force-feedback, s
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