Related papers: Document Navigability: A Need for Print-Impaired
Readability is on the cusp of a revolution. Fixed text is becoming fluid as a proliferation of digital reading devices rewrite what a document can do. As past constraints make way for more flexible opportunities, there is great need to…
Document retrieval has been an important research problem over many years in the information retrieval community. State-of-the-art techniques utilize various methods in matching documents to a given document including keywords, phrases, and…
Data visualizations are ubiquitous in all disciplines and have become the primary means of analysing data and communicating insights. However, the predominant reliance on visual encoding of data continues to create accessibility barriers…
For individuals with blindness or low vision (BLV), navigating complex environments can pose serious risks. Large Vision-Language Models (LVLMs) show promise for generating scene descriptions, but their effectiveness for BLV users remains…
Astronomy, a captivating field that draws upon science, mathematics, and engineering, has traditionally relied on visual representations to convey the wonders of the cosmos. While this approach effectively engages the sighted population,…
In today's world, time is a very important resource. In our busy lives, most of us hardly have time to read the complete news so what we have to do is just go through the headlines and satisfy ourselves with that. As a result, we might miss…
An estimated 253 million people have visual impairments. These visual impairments affect everyday lives, and limit their understanding of the outside world. This can pose a risk to health from falling or collisions. We propose a solution to…
Visually impaired persons have significant problems in their everyday movement. Therefore, some of our previous work involves computer vision in developing assistance systems for guiding the visually impaired in critical situations. Some of…
We present Vision-based Navigation with Language-based Assistance (VNLA), a grounded vision-language task where an agent with visual perception is guided via language to find objects in photorealistic indoor environments. The task emulates…
Our previous interview study explores the needs and uses of diagrammatic information by the Blind and Low Vision (BLV) community, resulting in a framework called the Ladder of Diagram Access. The framework outlines five levels of…
There is a growing abundance of publicly available or company-owned audio/video archives, highlighting the increasing importance of efficient access to desired content and information retrieval from these archives. This paper investigates…
Designing keyword-based access paths is a common practice in digital libraries. They are easy to use and accepted by users and come with moderate costs for content providers. However, users usually have to break down the search into pieces…
Large Vision-Language Models (VLMs) excel at understanding and generating video descriptions but their high memory, computation, and deployment demands hinder practical use particularly for blind and low-vision (BLV) users who depend on…
We propose a cross-media lecture-on-demand system, in which users can selectively view specific segments of lecture videos by submitting text queries. Users can easily formulate queries by using the textbook associated with a target…
"Scene description" applications that describe visual content in a photo are useful daily tools for blind and low vision (BLV) people. Researchers have studied their use, but they have only explored those that leverage remote sighted…
Online interactions and e-commerce are commonplace among BLV users. Despite the implementation of web accessibility standards, many e-commerce platforms continue to present challenges to screen reader users, particularly in areas like…
Audio descriptions (AD) make videos accessible for blind and low vision (BLV) users by describing visual elements that cannot be understood from the main audio track. AD created by professionals or novice describers is time-consuming and…
Audio description, a form of trans-modal media translation, allows people who are blind or visually impaired access to visually-oriented, socio-cultural, or historical public discourse alike. Although audio description has gained more…
Many blind and low vision (BLV) people are excluded from professional roles that may involve visual tasks due to access barriers and persisting stigmas. Advancing generative AI systems can support BLV people through providing contextual and…
Because of the increasing number of electronic data, designing efficient tools to retrieve and exploit documents is a major challenge. Current search engines suffer from two main drawbacks: there is limited interaction with the list of…