[Blindmath] Tiger Max braille embosser

Sat Sep 27 15:45:05 UTC 2014

Hi Dan, I can add a bit to Jonathan's comments.  There are lots of things
you can do all by yourself, but it will be a lot faster to get just a bit of
sighted help.  If you know exactly what the sighted help is supposed to do,
they are a lot more likely to help you.  Jonathan is right that you can run
the embosser, but some software manipulation to get the image into good form
is not something a blind person can always do.  If you do have IVEO tools,
there are many things you can do by yourself, but again, sighted help is
lots faster.

First of all, understand that the Max is an embosser with a very intelligent
printer driver, but it is not magic.  The printer driver can convert a
visual image into a tactile image so that dark things become big dots and
light things become small dots.  White is no dots.  It can convert ViewPlus
BrailleASCII fonts to braille equivalents, permitting sighted people to see
ASCII characters on screen. The Max does not convert text to braille
however, and I recommend strongly you try using the TIGER29 fonts, which
convert to DotsPlus braille.  I promise you that you can read it, and there
is no conversion.

One big hint.  If you emboss graphs and find a textured background, it means
that the graph is printed with a slightly off-white background.  In the
Tiger Tab there is an undocumented feature called contrast set at 0 by
default.  Set it at 1, and off-white backgrounds then emboss with no dots.
You can just leave it set at 1, because the effect on anything else is
negligible.

Finally, for most existing graphics, Jonathan's advice about Word is
correct.  Paste the image into Word, stretch to maximum size (you can do
this yourself actually), and then have a sighted person overlay any bit map
text with a Word text box. Try having them use Tiger29 font set a point size
29.  It should work just fine.  If you do want "real braille", they should
use any standard font, but big, say size 30. Then use Tiger Formatter to
translate.  One can put MathType equations above and below the graph if you
wish, and it will also be translated. However you can also read math
equations in DotsPlus just fine too.

Good luck.

-----Original Message-----
From: Blindmath [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Godfrey,
Jonathan via Blindmath
Sent: Friday, September 26, 2014 5:26 PM
To: Dániel Hajas; Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Tiger Max braille embosser

Hi Dan,

I've just taken possession of an EmBraille and am also investigating its use
with graphics and braille at the moment.

I've already use Tiger embossers to get images out of R and I'm pretty
confident that I could do the same out of other software without having to
take the images through other software, whether that be using TSS in a Word
document or the IVEO viewer etc.

The graphs I generated do not have braille of course. They are just the
visual image bashed out on paper, but there was plenty of information in the
content of the graphs I've tried thus far without the text being readable.
In particular, I want to know that a label has been printed where I expect
one to be when I take the image and put it in a document for the sighted
world. 

If you want braille in the images, then you will need a human to intervene.
They'll need more than the TSS to do this. IVEO creator for them and IVEO
viewer for you.

So, my advice is to get some of the software you'll use, generate some
images and then emboss them using the Tiger. If that means taking someone
from the department to the place where the embosser is so that you can test
it then perhaps that is what you'll need to do.

If you want to have a tactile version of the images someone else is making
then try the above, but be prepared to put them into a Word document  if you
don't have the right software. 

It seems to me that you will have more trouble with the software used to
make the images  than the embossing process. Depending on the software you
need to test I may be able to help. I'll soon have a ViewPlus Premiere 100
on the network at work and will get others to send images from software I
don't use. I can probably track down a few physicists if needed but
mathematicians are easier for me to come by. Send requests to me directly in
that case at a.j.godfrey at massey.ac.nz

Good luck.
Jonathan

-----Original Message-----
From: Blindmath [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Dániel
Hajas via Blindmath
Sent: Saturday, 27 September 2014 10:11 a.m.
To: 'Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics'
Subject: [Blindmath] Tiger Max braille embosser

Hi all,

My university just bought a Tiger Max braille embosser. It should also come
with the Tiger Software Suite.

Could you please give me some advice how to use it efficiently for producing
diagrams needed in physics and mathematics?

The embosser is going to be used by myself for purposes of printing
mathematical figures and an other blind person mainly for printing braille
text.

As I have never used any embosser and have a very limited knowledge on them,
I am asking for your experiences and technical tipps. I am really new in the
topic of creating tactile figures using an embosser.

May be a few explicit questions to get started:

1.       Can I produce diagrams 100% individually using the software and a
screen reader? Not necessarily by producing them directly on TSS but lets
say import from an svg or pdf file? Or I will still need someone to adjust
graphs from a file to a tactile print view?

2.       What can the software do? Is it only for settings of the embosser
or it is a sort of editor for image sas well?

Many thanks,

Dan

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