3D Sound Coding Color for the Visually Impaired

Abstract

Contemporary art is evolving beyond simply looking at works, and the development of various sensory technologies has had a great influence on culture and art. Accordingly, opportunities for the visually impaired to appreciate visual artworks through various senses such as auditory and tactile senses are expanding. However, insufficient sound expression and lack of portability make it less understandable and accessible. This paper attempts to convey a color and depth coding scheme to the visually impaired, based on alternative sensory modalities, such as hearing (by encoding the color and depth information with 3D sounds of audio description) and touch (to be used for interface-triggering information such as color and depth). The proposed color-coding scheme represents light, saturated, and dark colors for red, orange, yellow, yellow-green, green, blue-green, blue, and purple. The paper’s proposed system can be used for both mobile platforms and 2.5D (relief) models.

Keywords

• visual impairment
• accessibility
• aesthetics
• color
• multi-sensory
• museum exhibits