visually impaired as a design challenge
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VISUALLY IMPAIRED AS A DESIGN CHALLENGEDesign Considerations & Practical solutions
The problem lies in our point of view
Content List
Overview
Design Considerations
Design Ideas & Practical solutions
Case Studies
Overview
Other96%
Visually Impaired
4%
Overview
Problem Statement (until June
2012): 285 million people are
visually impaired worldwide: 39 million are blind and 246 have low vision.
About 90% of the world's visually impaired live in developing countries.
Low Vision86%
Blind 14%
Overview
Definition: are a people who suffer from a severe reduction in vision that cannot be corrected with conventional means , such as refractive correction or medication and reduces a person's ability to function at certain or all tasks.
Overview Measurement Standards: Eye care
professionals measures vision according to 2 main Standards:
Measurement
Standards
Vision Clarity
Snellen chart
Visual Field Degree
Overview
1. Vision Clarity: indicates how well a person's central visual status is.
Visually Impaired - Overview
Snellen chart: Vision Clarity is normally measured using a Snellen chart. It has letters of different sizes that are read, one eye at a time, from a distance of 20 ft. People with normal vision are able to read the 20 ft line at 20 ft (20/20 vision).
Overview
2. Visual Field: indicates how a person's entire area of vision range is.
Overview
Degree: Visual Field is normally measured in terms of degrees from the center. People with normal vision are able to to see:- 95° towards the ear from the
center.- 60° towards the nose from the
center.- 60° above from the center.- 75° below from the center.
Central Visual Field(30°)
Fixed Eyes Visual Field (120°)
Overview
Symptoms:
1. Inability of the person to see objects as clearly as a healthy person.
2. Inability of the person to see as wide an area as the healthy person without moving the eyes or turning the head.
3. Inability to look at light (Photophobia).4. Double vision (Diplopia).5. Visual distortion.6. Visual perceptual difficulties.7. Any combination of the above
features.
Overview
Categorization: The World Health Organization (WHO) defines impaired vision in 5 categories:1 •Low vision 1: is a best corrected visual acuity of 20/70.
2 •Low vision 2: starts at 20/200.
3 •Blindness 3: is below 20/400 or visual field between 5° and 10°.
4 •Blindness 4: is worse than 5/300 or visual field less than 5°.
5 •Blindness 5: is no light perception at all.
Design Considerations
Design Considerations
Visually impairedLow vision people:
when they use buildings, rely quite entirely on their ability to see.
Blind people:when they use buildings rely entirely on other senses, ie. touch, hearing, smell and touch.
In relation to the to design considerations Visually impaired people are divided into 2 categories:
Design Considerations
BuiltEnvironment
Lighting
Colour
Texture
Acoustic
Smell
Legibility
Design considerations for Visually impaired people include the following elements of built environments:
Design Considerations
Lighting: Adequate lighting is the single most important aid to vision.
The lighting needs of persons who are visually impaired vary according to the individual and their particular eye condition.
Design Considerations
The 3 principle light sources are :light sources
Natural Incandescent Florescent
- Each source has their own attributes and weakness when considering lighting situations for persons who are partially sighted.
Design Considerations
The key for the designer is to utilize these light sources optimally and considering the following:
Design Considerations
1. Avoid glare and reflection, which are often caused by shinny or glossy surfaces.
Design Considerations
2. Place light sources in locations to avoid creating shadows. Shadows can create optical illusions.
Design Considerations
3. Distribute light levels throughout different spaces as many people have difficulty adjusting to fluctuations in light levels.
Design Considerations
4. Include task and spot lighting to augment the overall lighting system.
Design Considerations
5. Use of dimmer switches allows light levels to be adjusted to suit the unique needs of users..
Design Considerations
Colour: The key for the designer is to utilize the contrast colours optimally and considering the following:
Design Considerations
1. A colour contrast of 70% is generally accepted in many countries as the preferred amount to define items.
Design Considerations
2. Colours to avoid using together include:
red/black, yellow/grey, yellow/white, red/green, black/violet and blue/green.
Design Considerations
3. Be consistent in use of colour to convey messages.
Design Considerations
4. Limit use of colour and keep colour schemes simple and avoid large-scale patterns. Keeping in mind that too many Colours used in design can create confusion.
Design Considerations
Texture: Texture can assist in providing orientation clues about a space. The key for the designer is to utilize the Texture optimally and considering the following:
Design Considerations
1. Using materials easily identified in terms of texture.
Design Considerations
2. Using detectable warning surfaces which have a texture that can be felt under foot or detected by a person using a long cane to alerts a person who is visually impaired to a hazard.
Design Considerations
3. Using tactile signs.
Design Considerations
Acoustics: Sounds can assist in providing orientation clues about a space. The key for the designer is to utilize the Acoustics optimally and considering the following:
Design Considerations
1. Providing different reverberation especially for floors so visually impaired can obtain a feel of the space.
Design Considerations
2. Provide acoustically well-defined position items such as escalators, fountains, and elevators to create useful sounds.
Design Considerations
3. Avoid noise sources from mask sounds intended to provide directional cues.
Design Considerations
Smell: Smells can assist in defining a space for visually impaired. Smell may be natural or artificial.
Design Considerations
Legibility: its refers to the degree to which building is understandable or recognizable. The key for the designer is to making the building easy to understand and considering the following:
Design Considerations
1. Clear and easily understandable floor plan.
Design Considerations
2. Continuity in the path and completely free of any obstacles.
Design Considerations
3. Using readily comprehensible graphic symbols.
Design Ideas
Design Ideas
Ideas recognized by feet
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Ideas Recognized by contrast colors
Ideas Recognized by borders
Visual impaired facilities
Design Ideaslinear units to determine the route. Used in a metro’s stations
Ideas Recognized By Feet
Design IdeasThe round units to give warning at the end of the pavement so as not to overcome.
Ideas Recognized By Feet
Also to alert people with visual impairments of their approach to streets and hazardous drop-offs
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized By Feet
Design Ideas
Different texture floors at the crossing to give the necessary guidance and known to the right way
Ideas Recognized By Feet
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
The wall is laid with different textures and in different configurations.
Fragrant, richly textured plants also invite touching and smelling.
They cascade over the wall and grow in easily reached niches
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
The label gives the visually impaired an access to the information of the plant
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
richly textured plants also invite touching and smelling.
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideas
Visually impaired visitors are able to detect changes in air temperature and humidity from the water wall.
Ideas Recognized by Touch, Sound & Smell
Design Ideaslinear units with contrast colors to determine the route for visual impared .
Ideas Recognized By contrast colors
Design Ideas
Contrast colors at the pavement for visual impaired .
Ideas Recognized By contrast colors
Design Ideas
Handrails at the both sides for blind people.
Ideas Recognized by Borders
Design Ideas
Ideas Recognized by Borders
borders with a low kerbs
Design Ideas
Traffic light aid for the blind
Visual Impaired Aids & Facilities
Design Ideas
Visual Impaired Aids & Facilities
Design Ideas
Visual Impaired Aids & Facilities
Design Ideas
Visual Impaired Aids & Facilities
small camera linked to powerful wearable computer. It sees what you see and through your finger-pointing understands what information you seek
Case Studies
Anchor Center for Blind ChildrenDenver, Colorado
Concept
In plan, the building is a succession of three "pods" connected by a linear hallway. The pods "Blue," "Yellow" and "Red" — play off the themes of mind, body and spirit and house the various classrooms and activity spaces, as well as spaces for staff, teachers and parents
The poetry of this building comes from designing an environment where you enrich the experience by embracing as many senses as possible.
The 15,600-square-foot building (named for a longtime supporter) and surrounding two-acre campus incorporate learning experiences at every turn, through light, sound, touch, smell — and even taste
Form
form
three classroom pods connected by a central circulation spine are flooded in diffused light through a series of filtered clerestory windows just below the angled roofline.
Entrance
entrance, pavement scoring draws wheelchair users toward the front door, and a subtle Braille-like motif enlivens the exterior brickwork. The gate at right opens into the Sensory Garden
High ceilings and skylights bring in light, and
clerestory lights in the hallway's pod entry ones
are correspondingly tinted blue, yellow and red. Along
the side wall, a Trail Rail and Light Walk provide additional way finding.
Through specific wall placements and flooring selections carpet, rubber and hard-surface materials all the classrooms are acoustically engineered to minimize noise and give directional sound cues. Benjamin's Niche, a classroom for children with both vision and hearing loss, is the only one with a wood floor it resonates, allowing the children to "feel" the sound.
Light
Color and contrast are integral to the design. In the Motor Room, vertical punctures of tinted glass and sunlight invite children to play within child-sized cubbies. Photograph by Ron Pollard
their realization that the project was all about light, not darkness, "Because the children have varying degrees of vision impairment, some can distinguish light and dark, as well as colors. So contrast and color play an important role in the design
Light
Sound, touch and light cues help children navigate the Grand Hallway. At the entrance to each pod, hardwood flooring gives way to tile, so children not only feel the texture change, but hear the sound change as their canes and footsteps resonate on the different surfaces. Acoustic baffles are also strategically suspended from the ceiling
Anchor Center for Blind Children incorporates sensory cues inside and out to help visually impaired children engage with and learn about the world around them..
Garden :
The Sensory Garden, located to the right of the entrance, is a feast for the senses. It features meandering pathways, a dry streambed with a small bridge, varying surface textures, bench seating, and native plantings selected for their texture, scent and color. "It's fairly sturdy stuff, so the kids can touch it and pull on it," An interactive fountain feature allows children to rearrange its stones, feeling their smoothness and changing the sound of the falling water. A slatted cedar fence surrounding the garden offers another tactile experience, with different-size pickets that play with light and shadow and change pitch when canes are run across them
Sculpture for the garden. created three interactive, kid-size bronze sculptures modeled . All elements on the sculptures, from a book with a readable Braille surface to the differently shaped buttons on a girl's blouse, are meant to encourage exploration through touch
Hazelwood School
Location: Glasgow, Scotland
Design Team: Gordon Murray and Alan Dunlop
Age (student): (3-18) years
circulation
The distinctive curving interior spine meets the complex demands for an intuitive way finding system
the curved form of the building reduces the visual scale of the main circulation spaces and helps remove the institutional feel that a single long corridor might create
Focus room
The focus-learning rooms offer viewing for staff and visitors without disturbing the children. These areas also offer quiet time as needed
Classrooms are oriented north facing to take advantage of a more even level of light and open onto the quietist part of the grounds, the classroom garden spaces
Large classrooms with ample storage space and adaptable areas between the classrooms
Hydrotherapy pool
The design of the games hall, hydrotherapy pool created opportunities for children to explore, extend their skill &gain confidence through engagement in relatively independent activity.
A separate residential unit, is used to teach the children basic life skills but also provides respite accommodation.
Life skills house
The playground and playground furnishings enable children the freedom to play and take risks at their own level playground
Mature trees, walkways, and a play yard with wooden climbing structures and swings create a park-like setting for the school grounds.
High-level windowsare used as some of the students with visual impairments can be easily distracted by (movements/activities occurring outside.)
The external structure and the cladding were all considered in terms of sensory stimulation. The structural glulam* timber frame casts shadows within the building to establish a clear pattern along the internal street of the school
Materials used
-zinc on the roof-timber-brick-glass
The “trail rail” wall
The unique sensory trail wall weaves throughout the school and enables children to practice mobility and orientation skills, which lead to increased confidence, sense of mastery, and self-esteem.The trail rail wall is clad in cork, which has a warm feel and provides signifiers or tactile cues to assist children with orientation and navigation through the school
The defining component of the interior design is the cork-clad ‘trail wall’ that meets navigation needs on one side and the extensive needs for storage on the opposite side. It runs the length of the building and enables children to navigate independently
Each bay of sensory trail wall is individually shaped. This helps children orient along the length of the circulation space in the school
Within two weeks of exposure to the trail wall system, they were successfully moving around the building independently.
Corridors are designed as streets, which also assist with orientation and mobility
Educational Method
The school evaluates pupils' skills & likes but focuses particularly on English Language & communication and mathematics
Royal Academy for the visually disabled people
Location: Tabarbour- Amman
The concept of the project:
Engineering design philosophy of the Royal Academy for the visually disabled peopleVisually impaired people, in their movements, depend on what is called Spatial Mental Map Design. Such requires easy simple design of construction, especially; in making clear lines for main movements and functional separation in divisions/departments. This is to draw a spatial map for such building in their minds; thus, it will be easy for them to move easily, safely and independently.
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Circulation
Ground floor
Entrance
The building takes the (L) shape so the circulation is linear and straight
the Lighting in the school
The school has a skylight which gives a blue light (strong blue light and from my readings this light bothers blind people and is not comforting them so it’s one of the disadvantages of this school
Building Way finding for the blind
1-The handrail along the corridors and the stairs
2-On the handrail of the stairs there is a circle to tell them which the floor they are
3-Also there is a circle on the wall in different shape ,to tell them (the num of the floor)
4-There is Contrast between the wall and the doors, but the Doorknob is not legible because its with the same color
5-but it’s not clear enough in the stairs even the texture is not enough for preventing people from glide, and the floors soft
6-The titles of every space or room very legible for the visually impairment or for the blind, because it’s wrote by Braille and there is a simple drawing logo for each title expresses the function of the room and they can recognize it by touching that logo
The gym on the Basement floor beside the Fitness and warm water therapy The floor made of the rubber ,but there is a high echo in the gym
warm water therapy
The library
Plugs under ground for the computers
It's a room for visually impairments which still have sight and can read but only large letters. This room strengths their sights and the room is colored by black for reading easily
Playing field
kindergarten
The corridors are wide but becomes narrow in the kindergarten section
these seats are located in the garden of the school and they were put to close the void behind it; but I found that it's not safe for blind students and the slope of the location is very high around 15m
The titles of the rooms wrote in Braille
they are learning computer programs on a special system made specifically for the blinds, even the keyboard has numbers and letters in Braille
The bottoms of elevator wrote in Braille