Braillecast The Braillists Foundation

Wouldn't it be wonderful if you could just pick up a tablet of sorts, draw on it, and have the drawing in a tactile form? And wouldn't it be even more wonderful if you could simply erase the drawing and start over if you didn't like it?



The Braille Doodle does just that, and we catch up with the Touchpad Pro Foundation to find out more.

Have you ever downloaded a book from Bookshare or Reading Services, but struggled to extract the zip file? Have you ever had a BRF file emailed to you, but not been able to copy it to your braille display? Does your braille display only support text or BRF files, but you want to read Word or PDF files on it?



If you can answer “yes” to any of these questions, this episode is for you!



Matthew Horspool was in the presenter’s chair on Tuesday 19 September 2023 and took us step by step through extracting zip files, converting files from one format to another, and copying files from your computer to your braille display. Demonstrations using a screen reader formed an integral part of the presentation, and as ever there was plenty of time for questions at the end.



N.B. most of the demos were carried out on Windows, but the concepts discussed should apply equally to other operating systems.

Whether you're new to braille or an experienced braillist, reading is an important and fundamental process. To fully appreciate the brilliance of braille for use in daily life, reading is something you should enjoy and feel comfortable with. But what can you do to improve your reading skills once you have learned all the letters and perhaps some contractions as well? How can you enhance your reading speed and accuracy even if you've been doing braille for a while?



On Tuesday 20 June 2023, Chantelle Griffiths, Co-Founder and CEO of New Zealand's Tactile and Technology Literacy Centre, shared some practical tips and tricks to get you on the right track with your reading, no matter how much braille you've done or where you are on your braille journey. There is something here for everyone.



We learnt:




What actually happens when we read and how reading by touch is different — or not — from reading visually.



How to press the “reset button” for your fingers and brain when you're just not feeling it. Literally.



The fundamental braille technique you didn't know you knew and how it enhances your reading.



The three C's of braille reading; what they are and how they work together to help you connect the dots between your brain and fingers.



How playing the viola relates to reading in a straight line and how you can experience something similar yourself, even if you're not a musician.



How to start from exactly where you are and enjoy the process.



Lots more practical tips, ideas and experiments you can try on your own.




This was a very practical session. If you'd like to follow along with the recording, please have some hardcopy or electronic braille handy and a couple of random objects that feel nothing like braille.



For further information please visit the Braillists Foundation Media Page.

The Orbit Reader range is now very extensive and comprises the Orbit Reader 20, the Orbit Reader 20 Plus and the Orbit Reader 40. On Tuesday 30 May 2023, James Bowden, Braille Technical Officer at RNIB, talked us through what these products can do, how they work, and the differences between Orbit Readers and other braille displays and notetakers.



We learnt:




The differences between the Orbit Reader 20, 20 Plus and 40



How Orbit technology differs from traditional braille display technology



How to find and open files



How to find text within a file



How to use the editor



How to transferr files between the Orbit and a computer




For further information please visit the Braillists Foundation Media Page.

“This new braille has so many extra dots!” This is something we hear a lot, and it’s often followed by the question, “What do they all mean?”



This Masterclass will help to solve the mystery. James Bowden, Braille Technical Officer at RNIB, Chairman of the Braille Coding Group of the UK Association for Accessible Formats, and the UK Representative to the Code Maintenance Committee of the International Council on English Braille, described the common indicators in UEB and gave some real world examples of their use.



In particular, we covered:




Capital letters and block capitals



Making sure a word or symbol is not misread as a contraction



Italicised, bolded and underlined text




This session was recorded on Tuesday 16 May 2023. For further information please visit the Braillists Foundation Media Page.

Dave Williams, Chairman of the Braillists Foundation, and Ed Rogers from Bristol Braille Technology discuss the braille products to emerge from this year's event.