Enable Blind Users' Experience in 3D Virtual Environments: The Scene Weaver Prototype

Abstract

Three-dimensional virtual environments are currently inaccessible to people who are blind, as current screen-reading solutions for 2D content are not fully extensible to achieve the needed embodied spatial presence. Forefronting perceptual agency as key to any access approach for users who are blind, we offer Scene Weaving as an interactional metaphor that allows users to choose how and when they perceive the environment and the people in it. We illustrate how this metaphor can be implemented in an example prototype system. In this interactivity, users can control how and when they perceive a virtual museum environment and people within it through a range of interaction mechanisms.