May 15, 2007 — Before venturing out into an unfamiliar area, most people scope out a map. But for the blind or visually impaired, using a map to get oriented is not an option.
An interactive computer program in development could change that. It paints a picture of a city, not with images, but with sounds. Not only could the technology aide the visually impaired by giving them a sense of place before they explore the unknown, it could also offer sighted people audio cues when in "blind" situations.
"A firefighter could get a signal through a helmet headset as soon as he is losing track inside a dangerous building or if he needs to be directed to a doorway or a victim," said professor Susanne Boll of the University of Oldenburg in Germany.
The interactive map allows a person to explore a city either from a bird's eye perspective or by walking through a virtual, three-dimensional environment. The traveler explores the city by moving a stylus across a tablet PC. The stylus and the edges of the PC help the person feel the extent of the map and develop a mental model of the space.
Geographic features such as buildings, parks, lakes and tourist sites are represented by corresponding sounds. For example, a park sounds like singing birds, lakes sound like dabbling water and sightseeing spots sound like camera shutter clicks.
"There is no other project that really does a transfer from a visual map with its geographical relations and distances into a non-speech sound environment," said Boll.
