The purpose of the master thesis is to addres the problem of the availability of museum collections for people who are blind or visually impaired, as well as to offer the opportunity to improve the experience of visiting the museum using an audio application. For the purpose of designing the application that will meet the needs of its users, we first have to understand what experiences and expectations the blind and the visually impaired have while visiting a museum, and how they interact with smartphones. The study was carried out in three stages; the first stage included an overview of the existing adaptations for the blind and the visually impaired visitors in the Slovenian museums; the second stage was a qualitative research; and the third stage was a quantitative research with the blind and the visually impaired. We have discovered that only a few of the museums in Slovenia have adaptations for accessibility of the blind and the visually impaired. There is only a single museum that offers an audio guide for the blind and the visually impaired with visual descriptions of exhibited displays. Furthermore, we found that the very same audio application can be used by the blind and the visually impaired, as well as by the sighted. For the blind and the visually impaired, the visual descriptions of the exhibited objects, the information about their locations and the provided direction for the museum path are all a big advantage. The same applies to the use of a context-aware system that automatically executes the appropriate content. However, at the same time, it is also necessary to enable the user a manual input. We have designed an audio application that will be aware of the surrounding environment, while, at the same time, will allow the user to choose the desired content. The application will provide information about the museum's exhibits, as well as visual descriptions for the blind and the visually impaired. The use of such audio applications and other adjustments in the museum space can attract new visitors who have previously felt unwelcomed, or those who stopped visiting these premises due to a bad experience.
|