Aaron Buckley and Yu Lin Vivian Tay
Abstract
Our topic is creating an affordable 2D multipixel tactile display through electrovibration, which is targeted at visually impaired users who would otherwise have difficulty using a standard display. We create the display through a PCB etching proccess. The convential method for displaying information on digital devices relies upon the sense of vision. Unfortunately, not all people have excellent senses of vision. Those whose vision is impaired are thus unable to experience their devices the same way as others. The tactile display is a concept that allows the visually impaired to use devices by relying on their sense of touch instead. The most common method is to use electrovibration. This is an emerging field so there are very few products on the market. The current products are incredibly expensive and have only a single pixel. Our aim is to use printable circuit boards (PCB) to create an inexpensive alternative multiplex sensation for visually impaired users with tablets devices.
Our goal is to create a series of boards whose configurations are set to specific shapes. This allows us to test out the experience of touching a multipixel display. We first used Photoshop to layout the different patterns for the PCB. Then, we create the PCB boards by using the etching proccess with UV photoresist method on a copper clad board. In the future, we plan to see a minimized multi-pixel display screen that could be attached on a device wirelessly and also allows two fingers to move on the screen at the same time. RepRap.org provided safety guidelines and measurements for the UV photoresist transfer method and referred to procedures on Instructables.com for etching PCBs.
Specials thanks to Mr. Chin Sung Lin for creating this opportunity to research, Ms. Nadya Nikulina and Mr. Peter D’Amico for providing materials and guidiance on the chemical process.
