From mountain ranges to rolling hills, views make any road trip memorable, but for blind passengers, this is part of the experience that they do not get to witness.
A prototype smart car window aims to change this – by enabling blind or visually impaired people to visualize the passing scenery via touch.
‘Feel The View’ takes pictures from an attached camera that are converted into high-contrast monochrome images. These are then reproduced on the glass using specialized LEDs.
“We seek to make people’s lives better, and this was a fantastic opportunity to help blind passengers experience a great aspect of driving. The technology is advanced, but the concept is simple – and could turn mundane journeys into truly memorable ones,” said Ford Europe’s spokesman Mac Alu Saffi.
By touching the image on the window, different shades of grey vibrate with a range of 255 intensities, allowing passengers to touch the scene and rebuild it in their mind the landscape in front of them.
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Feel The View was conceived and developed by GTB Roma and Ford’s team in Italy, in collaboration with Aedo – a local Italian start-up that specializes in devices for the visually impaired.
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