Projects
Since going blind, I've immersed myself in a variety of projects highlighting accessibility, making accessible websites, games for the blind, and ultimately showcasing my knowledge of appropriate design for overall inclusivity. I've also started learning how to draw again using SVGs in order to make tactile printed graphics.
SVG Tactile Graphics and BlindSVG.com
Scalable Vector Graphics, or SVG, are graphics rendered using code written directly in an XML or HTML file.
Utilizing primitive shapes, paths with quadratic and bezier curve functions, CSS, and layering techniques, scalable drawings can come together purely through code and be printed out using embossers and other methods to create tactile graphics that can be explored and understood by touch.
Following up from discussions stemming from the BLind SVG Study Group headed up by the NYPL Andrew Heiskell Braille and Talking Book Library, I drafted a Google Doc study guide to help folks new to the coding and drawing space get into using SVG for their projects.
I've now updated and vastly expanded that info into a full-fledged website. THis site contains code samples, resources, and everything you need to know from file setup to final output after building an SVG drawing.
Come check out BlindSVG.com!Accessibility Study Guides
Python Coding Projects
- Github Repositories
- Hit The Deck - a Terminal-based Blackjack Game
- Oh Craps - a Terminal-based Craps game
- Burt Baccarat - an accessible Terminal-based Baccarat game for fine, fancy folks.
- Balls To The Wheel - A fully-featured accessible Roulette game for Terminal
- Invoicerator - generate Word invoices from Terminal
Hand Coded Websites
Accessible Board Games
After going blind, I took it upon myself to add braille and QR code labelling to a variety of board games so I could play them again with my friends. Cards Against Humanity and Exploding Kittens were the first I worked on, paintsakingly using Seeing AI and KNFB Reader to do optical character recognition on each card and typing the braille directly onto each one using a Perkins brailler.
Dominion was always a favorite of mine, but was considerably more advanced and required a different approach. Each deck in the game had a specific value and set of actions which were too numerous and difficult to braille entirely on each card. My solution was to create a 4-cell braille code for each card and then build an accessible compendium website that I could have open when playing so I could quickly read what each card did, no longer having to constantly ask my sighted friends each time my turn came around if I happened to forget the card actions. Each game style for the base game has an independent page listing all the cards that make up that particular tableau, and I also built a deck chooser where you can interactively set up a custom page to read through custom decks when setting up a random tableau.