Image edges locator dedicated to visually impaired people — An experimental application for mobile devices

Mobile smart devices are standard equipment of an average person. While being designed to be used by a fully fit person, they can be helpful for impaired ones, even those who due to blindness are considered unable to operate a touchscreen. In this paper we present an experimental “Image edges locator” application, developed for mobile devices with Android OS. The idea was “if you can´t see it, try to touch it and imagine how it could look”. There are a lot of things that blind people could touch without the aid of application - because those things are within arm´s reach. But also there are many which are too high, too wide, too far, to be touched or just don´t have features to be distinguished by touch. We imagine that we take a photo of such an object, and next we make it touchable - by vibrating the device when the user moves his finger through the edges acquired from that object image, thus providing the sensation of “feeling” its edges.