Audio image rendering for the severely visually impaired

In this paper, a solution is proposed to render both rough and detailed images information using only audio-range sound. The procedure is implemented in consecutive stages with stage-dependent parameters selected by the user. The first stage consists of edge detection and tracking of the boundaries of the objects to obtain the sketch of the image. In the second stage, the user can selectively access the details of the image, such as brightness, texture and spatial position of the objects. Practical methods are proposed and tested which accelerate the training process. As a particular application, an educational module is presented which assists students of a special school for the blind by vocalization and description of geographical maps.