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NEWS: Japanese Volunteers Transcribe Manga for Blind People




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GATSU



Joined: 03 Jan 2002
Posts: 8412
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 9:34 am Reply with quote
It's nice to see a positive story like this for once, instead of the usual condescending bs. Thanks.

Last edited by GATSU on Wed Jul 25, 2007 12:37 am; edited 1 time in total
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JC90



Joined: 21 Jul 2005
Posts: 18
Location: Oh, just here and there....
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 10:57 am Reply with quote
this is really cool Anime smallmouth. although I don't quite understand how they can make images readable in Braile, it's great to know that people are doing things like this
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Lady Multi



Joined: 11 Dec 2004
Posts: 119
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 12:01 pm Reply with quote
That's actually interesting in a rather great way~ It actually makes me happy that people are doing this....thinking of people unable to help their conditions.
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pat_payne



Joined: 28 Jul 2006
Posts: 168
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 4:31 pm Reply with quote
A beautiful idea. I hope they get all the support they need to keep doing it.
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marie-antoinette



Joined: 18 Sep 2005
Posts: 2626
Location: Toronto
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 6:45 pm Reply with quote
JC90 wrote:
I don't quite understand how they can make images readable in Braille


I have to admit, I'm not quite sure of this myself. But if it does work (and one will presume it does) than it sounds like a great thing to do.
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Urd



Joined: 17 May 2006
Posts: 318
Location: Paris, France
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 8:32 pm Reply with quote
Good initiative ! I think only dialogues will be in braille, the braille system is only an alphabet... let's wait and see.
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Egan Loo



Joined: 25 Feb 2005
Posts: 353
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 9:05 pm Reply with quote
marie-antoinette wrote:
JC90 wrote:
I don't quite understand how they can make images readable in Braille


I have to admit, I'm not quite sure of this myself. But if it does work (and one will presume it does) than it sounds like a great thing to do.


Urd wrote:
Good initiative ! I think only dialogues will be in braille, the braille system is only an alphabet... let's wait and see.



That's right — the text is transcribed into Braille, while the images are encoded as dots. Anyone has fond memories of The Very Hungry Caterpillar? The club has some sample images, and so does the Edel software page.

If you're a child of the Eighties, imagine coverting manga onto a black-and-white Lite Brite and running your fingers over it.

If you're a child of the Nineties, imagine taking pictures of manga with a Game Boy Camera, printing them out on a Game Boy Printer, and embossing all the black areas.

If you've taken art history, imagine manga as if it was held by someone inside Suerat's Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte.

In a way, comics are the perfect media to transcribe into this form. Some manga are iconic enough that they can be stripped down to mere dots and still be recognizable, like the dot-picture of Chibi Maruko-chan in the article. Manga already leaves much to the reader's imagination — this just brings new meaning to the term "mind's eye."
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Urd



Joined: 17 May 2006
Posts: 318
Location: Paris, France
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 9:22 pm Reply with quote
Thank you. You confirmed what I thought it was, except that I thought it would remove more details in pictures. I'm quite impressed by this method and I'm now convinced the blind will be able to enjoy their manga. Smile
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the_silent_child



Joined: 03 Aug 2006
Posts: 145
Location: Florida
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 9:31 pm Reply with quote
Wow. Thats really cool. I know it it's pretty expensive to print in braille too. Im laughing at the thought of a shin chan though! I can picture the reader feeling a bit confused after feeling him doing the elephant dance!
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Proman



Joined: 19 Nov 2003
Posts: 922
Location: USA
PostPosted: Tue Jul 24, 2007 10:10 pm Reply with quote
GATSU wrote:
It's nice to see a positive story like this for once, instead of the usual condescending bs. Thanks.


I agree 100%.
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tasogarenootome



Joined: 24 Feb 2007
Posts: 262
PostPosted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 12:33 am Reply with quote
Wow, I'm amazed and very intrigued. I would have loved to have read commentary from some of the blind consumers to see how the manga works out for them and what they think.
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marie-antoinette



Joined: 18 Sep 2005
Posts: 2626
Location: Toronto
PostPosted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 7:34 am Reply with quote
Egan Loo wrote:
while the images are encoded as dots.


I fully realize that. I just don't 100% see how that would work, because I know I couldn't tell what a picture was necessarily just from touching dots around it. Also, I'm not sure if anyone who has been blind all their life would really be able to transfer an image in raised dots and know what it was supposed to be.
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Viga_of_stars



Joined: 17 Aug 2006
Posts: 1232
Location: Washington D.C. in the Anime Atelier
PostPosted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 10:14 am Reply with quote
I always wondered how can blind anime fans could enjoy manga outside of having someone read to them. amazing!
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Damius
SubscriberSubscriber


Joined: 06 Jul 2006
Posts: 76
Location: Montreal, Canada
PostPosted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 10:30 am Reply with quote
That is a really interesting initiative.

I hope it will have enough funds.
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anime_miz



Joined: 18 May 2007
Posts: 3
Location: New York
PostPosted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 8:47 pm Reply with quote
I would truly love for this idea to work as well.. but I wonder how many volumes would mangas provide. What I meant is that if it's braille, then there would be much volumes needed to be published for translating one manga. Simple children books can be translated, but an visually impaired acquaintance of mine had actually mention how hard it is to translate a chapter book into these thick encyclopedia size and weight books.
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