Does anyone know this engineer? Sounds like an interesting approach to
drawing. I wish he was coming to our convention instead of going to
Scotland. I found this article posted on the Lynx development list.
>
> Computer-drawing program allows blind to 'see'
>
> Copyright © 2002
> United Press International
>
> [1]E-mail this story
>
> By LIDIA WASOWICZ, UPI Senior Science Writer
>
>(June 30, 2002 11:33 a.m. EDT) - Frustrated by the difficulty of
>incorporating charts into his school reports, Hesham Kamel, a blind
>engineering student at the University of California at Berkeley, has
>designed a computer-drawing program that permits the visually
>impaired to create - and "see" - illustrations, graphics and other
>images on the screen.
>
>Kamel, a doctoral candidate in the Department of Electrical
>Engineering and Computer Sciences, has set his sights on refining the
>prototype, dubbed Integrated Communication 2 Draw, into a viable
>commercial product.
>
>"There's nothing else out there that can help me create and view
>graphics," said Kamel, 40, who lost his vision 17 years ago through a
>surgeon's error. "With the IC2D, blind people can use screen readers
>paired with voice synthesizers to literally hear text on the computer
>screen."
>
>Taking advantage of the universal familiarity with the layout of a
>telephone keypad, the program divides the screen into nine squares,
>each labeled with the corresponding numbers "1" through "9." Moving
>from square to square is just like dialing a telephone number. Each
>time a user enters a square, he or she has the option of subdividing
>it into another three-by-three grid, zooming in on increasingly finer
>details in the drawing. The program is capable of repeating the
>progression 81 times for a total of 729 possible squares.
>
>The recognizable keypad arrangement replaces the traditional computer
>staple of pull-down menus - which present a challenge to blind users
>- for controlling commands, shapes, lines and colors. When pointing a
>cursor at a particular cell, the navigator can ask for audio feedback
>that describes the location - for example, square 1 - or the shapes
>or pictures represented within.
>
>The system can enable the blind to draw and create animations for
>school, pleasure or work, said Kamel, who has been showing off the
>evolving project at conferences on human-computer interaction and
>assistive technology since 1999, in the United States and Europe. He
>will present the latest model July 8-10 at a meeting of the
>Association for Computing Machinery in Edinburgh, Scotland.
>
>When he describes his software, Kamel likes to involve the audience
>in an exercise that demonstrates the struggle the visually impaired
>face when drawing, particularly on a computer. Standing in the center
>of the room, palm extended toward his listeners, he asks them to
>point at his hand, close their eyes, move their finger to another
>object, then return it to its original position, site now unseen.
>
>"Nine-nine percent of the time, I get the whole audience laughing
>because they're not on target," Kamel said.
>
>Therein lies the challenge for those who cannot see. Once they pick
>up their pen or move their mouse, how do they locate the next point
>or return to the previous one to continue drawing?
>
>Kamel used the simplified phone keypad patterns to help blind users
>locate those points. In place of the impractical pull-down menus, he
>converted and organized the program's functions into four more
>blind-friendly palettes, also set up in telephone keypad formation.
>One palette includes file options, such as saving a picture. A second
>is devoted to predefined colors and a third to shapes. The fourth
>palette contains functions that allow users to create animation.
>
>Kamel is asked often why those without sight would need to draw
>something they cannot see.
>
>"There are many people out there who can't understand that blind
>people have imaginations, just as sighted people do," he said. "For
>me, it's all about independence."
>
>It is a lesson learned over his sightless years.
>
>"After I became blind, I found out that most sighted people think
>that blind people have little or no independence. For example, the
>prevailing attitude is if you cannot see a piece of steak, then
>someone has to cut it for you. If you're going to an unfamiliar
>place, then someone has to travel with you. And if you cannot see the
>computer screen, then someone has to do the work for you," Kamel told
>United Press International.
>
>"I wanted to make a little contribution and change some of that. One
>of the main ideas behind IC2D is providing a method for blind people
>to deal with graphical output without the assistance of a sighted
>person. It was also important to make the software not dependent on
>bulky, expensive external devices in order to increase the user's
>mobility and make the application more widely available."
>
>The IC2D software is a remarkable achievement, said James Landay,
>associate professor of computer science at Berkeley and Kamel's
>thesis advisor who inspired and guided the project.
>
>"It has been amazing to see some of the drawings that Hesham's blind
>research participants have created," Landay told UPI. "These are
>drawings they never could have made before. One man blind since birth
>drew a side view of a car that's as good as anything I could draw!"
>
>Victoria Hahn of Susanville, Calif., who has been testing the product
>since 1999, is sold on the software.
>
>"I think the program is fantastic and extremely usable," said Hahn, a
>blind mother of five grown children who is pursuing a degree and
>career in art. "It takes a matter of minutes to pick up on the
>system, on how it works and how to use the different levels and
>access the different shapes and colors. Each time you move your
>cursor, the program tells you what colors you have chosen. This makes
>it accessible to visually impaired or color blind or totally blind
>people."
>
>The audio portion detailing every step enables her to visualize what
>she is creating but cannot see, Hahn told UPI.
>
>"As a visually impaired person, I see great things happening if this
>system becomes commercially available, with a wide variety of uses -
>by students for charts or graphs for their presentations, by
>professors for teaching materials, by business people for instant
>illustration at company meetings," Hahn said.
>
>The computing industry has made some strides in developing software
>for the blind, but programs - especially for drawing - remain few,
>and many of them are expensive and require unwieldy equipment to
>operate.
>
>"When you look at technology, the trend is for things to get smaller,
>faster and cheaper," Kamel said. "That hasn't been true for
>technology for the blind. The devices we need to use computers - such
>as a 50-pound Braille printer - are large, expensive or both."
>
>IC2D is portable and compatible with any computer screen reader for
>the blind.
>
>"I must have tried everything on the market, and there isn't any
>other program like this," Hahn said.
>
>It was this limited availability that inspired Kamel four years ago
>to pursue his project. As a graduate student, he became frustrated
>one day when he failed to meet an assignment deadline because he
>could not produce the graphics. The person who was supposed to draw
>the illustrations for him was on vacation.
>
>"I had to ask for an extension to turn in the report," Kamel
>recalled. "Later, at a meeting with my adviser, discussing drawing,
>he looked at me and said, 'Why don't you work on something so you can
>draw by yourself?' This sentence was literally what started my Ph.D.
>research, which evolved into IC2D."
>
>Kamel said he inspected every detail of digital drawing by the blind,
>which he compared to a situation as challenging for a sighted person
>as using a computer with the monitor turned off.
>
>"I studied the advantages and disadvantages of currently available
>drawing tools for the blind, some of which mimic a pencil and paper,"
>he recalled. "I wanted to let the blind user have control over the
>screen, so that they could move a cursor to a specific location and
>know exactly where it is. I also wanted them to be able to move the
>cursor away to perform another task and then relocate the original
>point exactly."
>
>The resulting program underwent a number of transformations, many of
>them guided by input from the 22 volunteers, ages 19 to 55 - some
>sighted, some blindfolded, some visually impaired, some blind - who
>have tested the system over the years.
>
>"In my final usability study, blind participants' own responses
>indicated that the grid interface was intuitive," Kamel said. "Most
>of them remarked that they appreciated the interface because it
>allowed them to know where they were at all times."
>
>The artwork produced ranged from a cube and the side view of a car to
>a cartoonish pig and a detailed Christmas tree.
>
>"IC2D allowed the users to make precise drawings and view drawings
>done by other users, both sighted and blind," Kamel said. "The
>animation feature, which has not yet been formally user-tested,
>allows blind users to make computer-based animations for the first
>time."
>
>Eventually, Kamel said, he hopes the software will enable other blind
>users to master such projects as designing Web sites and he would
>like to sell the program commercially.
>
>"The visually impaired people who tried it were interested in getting
>it, so I think this could become a commercial product for a limited
>segment of the population," Landay said.
>
>"I think there might be enough (interest) to make a viable small
>business," John Freeman, Helzel Professor of Entrepreneurship and
>Innovation at the Haas School of Business at Berkeley, told UPI.
>
>"Kamel's product sounds very interesting and potentially very useful
>to the visually impaired," added John Myers, professor emeritus at
>Haas.
>
>"The current depressed economic environment is not the best time to
>be launching a product, but if there is demand for it and the product
>is 'good,' it can still be done," Myers told UPI.
>
>Kamel said his ultimate goal transcends commercial viability.
>
>"More than anything, I want to change the way people think when they
>develop technology for the visually impaired," he said.
>
>"What Hasham has accomplished is amazing," Landay said. "He felt he
>could have a lot of impact because of his different perspective, and
>what he's achieved can have an impact on all of us, the blind and the
>sighted."
>________________________________________________________________
>
>
>References
>
> 2. http://nandotimes.com/front/v-text/index.html
> 3. http://nandotimes.com/front/v-text/story/451682p-3615613c.html
>...
Braille is the solution to the digital divide.
Lloyd Rasmussen, Senior Staff Engineer
National Library Service f/t Blind and Physically Handicapped
Library of Congress (202) 707-0535 <lras@loc.gov>
<http://www.loc.gov/nls>
HOME: <lras@sprynet.com> <http://lras.home.sprynet.com>
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