[TAGS] hands-free haptic braille display

[Jerry Kuns]

Thanks for the thoughtful response. I do not have the same awareness or technical skill to have created this useful perspective.

Hope you and your lady are healthy and sane.

JerryOn Jun 18, 2020 2:27 PM, Noel Runyan via TAGS <tags at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>
> Cheryl,
> Thanks for sharing this news bit.  I've read the researchers' full report and have discussed the technology with Deane Blazie and others in the tactile display development field.  Our general consensus is that, unfortunately, braille readers should not be getting their hopes up much for this as a braille reading technology.
> It is clearly not a "hands free" braille display.  You do wave your hand in the air over the unit, in order to feel the tactile sensations on your open palm.  It uses arrays of ultrasonic sound emitters to focus sounds on an area about a hand span above the surface.  The tactile sensations are said to feel something like light puffs of air on your palm.  Because of the low resolution of the system, you don't feel the tactile "dots" as braille on your fingertip; rather as braille cells the size of your palm. 
> The testing the researchers did with a four character prototype showed that it could only be read very slowly.
> Their might be a few very limited applications for such a display, such as a time-of-day clock or other application in which you might need to read only a few characters.
> Ultrasonic haptic tactile displays have, in the past, shown some promise as a method for presenting 2D and 3D tactile images.  Tactile graphic images applications seem to be much more likely than acoustic braille text displays.
> The ultrasonic transducer arrays used by these researchers for presenting a "magic floating line of braille" use ultrasonic transducer arrays that have been developed for gamer virtual reality display systems.
> Although I don't hold out hope for ultrasonic tactile displays for braille display uses, I'd still like to get an opportunity to actually feel a good ultrasonic tactile image system.
> Cordially,
> Noel
> -
> Noel H. Runyan
> Email: Noel at PersonalDataSystems.com
> Phone: 1-408-866-7564
> -
> At 08:12 AM 6/17/2020, Cheryl Fogle-Hatch via TAGS wrote:
>>
>> Hello everyone,
>>
>> I'm passing along this link to an article about a hands-free braille
>> display being developed in Germany. Somehow it converts braille dots
>> into sounds. There is a pdf to download.
>>
>> https://hackaday.com/2020/06/07/hands-free-haptic-braille-display-is-making-waves/ 
>>
>> Happy reading. :)
>>
>> -- 
>> Cheryl Fogle-Hatch, Ph.D.
>> Archaeologist and Museum Professional
>> (443) 939-8217
>> c.k.fogle at gmail.com
>> https://museumsenses.org
>> https://www.linkedin.com/pub/cheryl-fogle-hatch
>>
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