Blind and Visually Impaired Community
↑
15
↓
Rotating Braille Generator (self.Blind)
submitted by daltontogreen
My colleague and I are taking a microcontroller class where we're attempting to create a haptics device for our final project. The project is a PDF/text reader that outputs braille for a blind person to read. We did some research and found that 40 character refreshable braille displays are available on the market, but are priced at around 5K-15K. We wanted to make a device that is more accessible for those without thousands to spend, allowing them to apply for jobs that ask them to regularly read off the computer. Our idea simplifies the display to only output one character (6 pins), with each pin being controlled by an actuator (micro linear actuators/ micro servos?). Ideally, we wanted to create a cylinder that changes the pin configuration with every rotation. The cylinder would rotate at an appropriate speed (possibly adjustable) for the person to read without any trouble. We had a few questions about the idea and its implementation. First and foremost, do any of you believe this device can actually be of use to the blind? I was talking to our lab manager and he expressed concern with the mechanism due to the fact that the person would be reading large documents one letter at a time. We had thought that braille was meant to be read character by character, unlike English where a person can read word by word. Another issue was the complexity of the mechanical design. We were given 5 weeks to complete this project and we have little mech e knowledge (I have some experience with solidworks but that's about it). As mentioned earlier, we were considering using miniature actuators to push the pins through the 6 holes, and we were hoping to get some recommendations based on materials others have seen. Finally, are there many devices like this on the market? If you have seen many similar devices, could you suggest some other avenues we can pursue?
Thanks everyone
Thanks everyone
EulerTheToiler 3 points
Why would it need to rotate? I don't know much about braile but I think it would be much easier to program if you have a static character which changes every "x" seconds (determined by the user, possibly with a knob linked to a potentiometer from 0-5V and use an A/D process to correlate that to a speed from maybe 0.25s to 4s or so).
Now that I think about it you could have two lines of text, say maybe 24 characters each, so you would have 48 sets of one braile character outputs. You could have two pushbuttons for the user--one to indicate that they would like the next 48 characters of braile and the other to indicate they want to go to the previous 48 characters.
After drafting this response I see that this post is a bit old--how did your project go?
Now that I think about it you could have two lines of text, say maybe 24 characters each, so you would have 48 sets of one braile character outputs. You could have two pushbuttons for the user--one to indicate that they would like the next 48 characters of braile and the other to indicate they want to go to the previous 48 characters.
After drafting this response I see that this post is a bit old--how did your project go?
[deleted] 3 points
I wanted to mimic the act of moving the finger along the text without having to actually move the finger. The project actually went pretty damn well for the budget we had. We had the device print out a character per revolution, which was damn slow. If we had funding, we would want there to be holes for linear actuators along the entire circumference of the cylinder. That way with each rotation more characters could be read.
EulerTheToiler 3 points
Out of curiosity, what was the project for? I'm assuming you're attending university for engineering and it was a project for a class but that's just a guess.
[deleted] 3 points
Yeah you're right, it was for my embedded systems and microcontrollers class. We used mbeds and it was a pretty good learning experience
EulerTheToiler 3 points
Just got finished with that class--so many days spent in the lab past midnight trying to get code to function properly. It was an enjoyable class and I learned a ton but I'm glad for it to be over.
a11ynerd 1 points
Take this with a grain of salt because my wife is blind, not me.
First of all, awesome project. Refreshable braille displays are way too expensive!
FYI, most refreshable braille displays have 8 pins per character, not 6. You only need 6 to display things, but the other 2 are to make it usable as a computer - they represent things like the flashing cursor or insertion point, or they indicate text that's bold or italic, for example. So it's optional, but something to be aware of.
I'm a little unsure about the idea that you could feel a word as it rotates past your finger. My impression of how blind people read is that they feel the shape of an entire word at a time.
I guess my main advice is that you should have a blind person who reads braille fluently discuss the idea with you. What city do you live in?
First of all, awesome project. Refreshable braille displays are way too expensive!
FYI, most refreshable braille displays have 8 pins per character, not 6. You only need 6 to display things, but the other 2 are to make it usable as a computer - they represent things like the flashing cursor or insertion point, or they indicate text that's bold or italic, for example. So it's optional, but something to be aware of.
I'm a little unsure about the idea that you could feel a word as it rotates past your finger. My impression of how blind people read is that they feel the shape of an entire word at a time.
I guess my main advice is that you should have a blind person who reads braille fluently discuss the idea with you. What city do you live in?
[deleted] 1 points
I go to school in Philly and we're trying to get a hold of someone from ABS. The rotation method was a way to limit the number of motors needed to push the pins up, thereby driving down the cost. It might not work as well as I had hoped, but it has given me other ideas as well as a lot of experience in prototyping devices
This nonprofit website is run by volunteers.
Please contribute if you can. Thank you!
Our mission is to provide everyone with access to large-
scale community websites for the good of humanity.
Without ads, without tracking, without greed.
scale community websites for the good of humanity.
Without ads, without tracking, without greed.
©2023 HumbleCat Inc • HumbleCat is a 501(c)3 nonprofit based in Michigan, USA.