Braille

Staff Time
Braille is a tactile system of raised dots that can be read by some people with visual impairments and others. The production of Braille formats are usually accomplished by contracting for the service outside your organization. Staff time will be required to locate and contract with a brailling service, as well as prepare materials for brailling.

Equipment
If the Brailling service is contracted with an outside service, you need no additional equipment. If, however, you wish to produce your own Braille materials, you will need to consider the purchase or rental of a computer, Braille transition software, and a Braille printer. In addition, a scanner can be obtained that will convert a printed page into electronic digital form. This will not be needed if you already have the material in a word processed, electronic form.

Costs
The costs of contracting for Braille service varies by location in the nation, however, services usually charge for the original production of a page (usually less than $2 per page) and for each "reproduced" page (usually around $1 a page). If you have a generous time frame for development, you may be able to locate a source for your Brailling that is free or reduced cost. If you are acquiring a system to produce Braille for your organization, costs will range from $350 to $500 for the software, and around $1,500 for a low-end Braille printer.

Effort
The production of Braille formats requires staff time to locate, contract, and evaluate the job performed by an outside contractor. If appropriate equipment exists the conversion process from the word processed version to the Braille version involves only the preparation of material for the Braille printer.

Resources
The free National Library Service directory cited previously includes a section describing Braille resources and services available by state and locality. Many of these resources will provide free or low-cost services. If limited local resources exist, your state vocational rehabilitation agency for people with blindness can be contacted for information about vendors and services that will assist you in producing Brailled materials. Some of these state agencies can assist you directly in this effort. In addition, many major colleges and universities are providing access to equipment that can be used to scan and produce Braille copies.

Helpful Hints About Preparing Material for Brailling

1. Convert symbols, icons, and other abbreviations to text.
2. Omit the use of "number" (#) signs because they are automatically inserted in front of numbers in Braille.
3. Do not include extra blank lines in your text. Indicate new paragraphs with the use of one tab.
4. Determine what commands your Braille software reads from your word-processed version. Commands may include: center, tab, indent, (hard) return, and page break.
5. Convert columns to continuous text. Tables, graphics, and pictorial representations need to be converted to text.
6. Eliminate the use of stylistic factors such as bold type, underlining, and special symbols. Italics are the only stylistic type form that typically translates into Braille formats.
7. Use both upper and lower case letters in words; the use of all upper case, for example, doubles the pages or space needed for the braille.
8. Convert any bullets used in the text to an asterisk (*) or a hyphen (-).

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Last Updated: Tuesday, 29 January 2008 at 04:12 PM,
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