[accessibleimage] Re: what about?

Hi Lisa et al,
I think it would be possible to add supplementary information to existing maps. The interesting thing I noticed from the articles was that people were identifying navigation points based on their features. This differs from the typical cartographic practice of just communicating objects, which can be thought of as a collection of features. It may be that the articles just picked up on the aspect of features and that people do use objects as navigational points; however, I would think it likely that people do use individual features to differentiate between two objects of the same type.
It would be interesting to do some experimentation around what features and objects people actually use to navigate environments. I think this is definately an area where blind people are at a disadvantage. The visual system has the potential for greater variability than other sensory systems and the variability makes for easier differentiation between similar objects. For example, there may be two shops producing similar auditory, olfactory, haptic, and kinesthetic stimuli. In these situations the features of the two shops are that similar that an attempt to identify the type of the shop will lead to ambiguous results. There are other factors that can held to disambiguate object identities, such as keeping track of location, but these are reliant on memory and local knowledge, neither of which may be available.
As for a system, my little haptic drawing tool could be used to explore monochrome maps and it is certainly technically feasible to add additional features to aid a person with map exploration; however, to get the best system I think we need to know a few factors. Firstly, whether blind people use the same objects and features to navigate as sighted people. We also need to take into account sensory and memory limitations when choosing an output medium given that a lot of information contained in maps is encoded in spatial relationships. 

Will
----- Original Message ----- From: "Lisa Yayla" <fnugg@xxxxxxxxx> 
To: <accessibleimage@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, December 28, 2006 12:59 PM
Subject: [accessibleimage] what about?



Hi,
What about then taking these two mails and combining them in a way?

I
mean from Google's map directions one gets a type of line map and from Rachel Magario map information. Couldn't visually impaired persons make their own maps with the aid of a GPS and share them over the net? I might be talking through my hat since I don't have a GPS only covet one but from what I have read is that one can plot in ones own point of interest (POI) and then create a trace file and the create a map from this. Either swell out or emboss with a Tiger. At the points of interest one could add the extra information, sound, smell etc. One could end up with two types of maps, a line (list) map like the Google direction information except it would have the added information and a geographical map from the GPS trace file. Or what about a site where local way finding information is on line sent in from visually impaired? One doesn't need a GPS for this, just perhaps a note taker to help remember what one notices. 
Any thoughts?
Best,
Lisa

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