P3D Re: vertical 3D, etc.

["William J. Carter, Ph.D." <wc@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 04:14 PM 9/1/98 -0600, Jim Crowell wrote:

>I don't know what to call them, but I've read a few reports of experimental
>"haptic vision" systems for blind people.  They involve hooking up a CCD
>camera to an array of vibrators on the subject's back; 
<snip>
>...  Claim was that after a while people were
>able to get a fairly strong sensation of the surrounding space.

Back in the 60/70's, I shot "training" films for the Presbyterian Medical
Center; the users of this system. After learning to recognize simple shapes,
we went on to numbers and certain important objects such as telephones. It
seemed very slow and difficult at first, but at the end of about two months
(if I recall correctly) the blind guy I was mostly working with could
maneuver fairly easily on unfamiliar streets (he rode in a wheel chair that
had the buzzers, and a vidicon camera over his shoulder), and the last I saw
him he was heading from San Francisco through the Southwest "sight seeing"
from the back of a station wagon.


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