DISSERTATION

ON
PHOTOGRAPHY BY THE VISUALLY IMPAIRED

ABSTRACT:
No matter where you live, no matter who you are, spending
time outside with nature does wonders for your soul. Each one of us
has love for nature hidden inside us. We all want to capture our
surroundings but due our busy schedule only few of us manage to
do so by their abilities, like photographers. It’s their passion and art
to capture the beauty of GOD in one frame. What about those who
have this passion, but are visually impaired? This research of mine
emphasis upon that the visually impaired person also can achieve
his/her dream of capturing nature in one frame like others by
his/her will. Where photography deals with seeing and clicking, a
person with no vision can also see and click pictures much better
than a person with vision, only through his imagination, willingness,
dedication and with the help of technology. This study reveals why a
visually impaired person would take pictures. An interviewing
method of research is opted to reach the concrete results. A well-
known photographer is interviewed for the study. A telephonic
interview is done for the research process which ends up with the
conclusion that if one has true determination to achieve something
in life , than even a physical disability of a person cannot hinder
his/her path.
INTRODUCTION:
Visually impaired people face many challenges in their life such as
navigating a physical and social world that is not designed with
them in mind. Visual impairments include not only complete
blindness but also poor vision. Like sighted people they also want to
see the world in which they live. Various technologies have
developed to help visually impaired people access the world.
Photography is all about seeing: seeing light, birds, landscapes,
sculptures, monuments, creative vision etc. There are
photographers with really bad vision or no vision at all, for example
Steven Hazlett, Nils Karlson, Walter Rothwell, Francesco Nacchia,
Partho Bhowmick, Pranav lal etc. This study is based on How
visually impaired people describes the world not only by their
writings but also by their photography? What help them to achieve
their passion? From where they took their inspiration? What helps
them to stay motivated? What exactly they felt about their work?
What message do they want to give? etc. The study reveals the
journey of a visually impaired photographer, who was formerly a
cyber security professional but emerges as a photographer and
published author, showing the world that disability is just another
word and definitely not the one describing him.
REVIEW OF LITERATURE:
Many researchers have established their findings on the topic. After
studying them I came across that most of the work reveals only the
fact: Why would blind and visually impaired people want to take
photographs? Central to any response to this question must be an
understanding that photography is not just the creation of a visual
product, but a communicative process that involves all the senses
and whose key enabling purpose is as a tool for analysis of ourselves
and dialogue with others. Photography is a tool that enables us to
talk to each other and allows us to experience the world from
different perspectives. Photographers, regardless of their visual
abilities, take photographs to explore, acknowledge, document and
communicate. The shutter is pressed not only because of what we
see but because of what we feel, and because we have something we
want to commemorate or express. This potential of photography
exists for everyone. For blind or visually impaired people, therefore,
photography goes beyond its technical and visual aspects. It is about
a process of creation, expression and communication that can help
address feelings of isolation and provide the means to engage in
society, as well as creating a forum for dialogue between the seeing
and non seeing world. The very concept of photography by blind
and visually impaired people provides an opportunity to explore
ideas around vision, blindness, sensory experience and imagery, and
to create the means for dialogue and understanding between blind
people, visually impaired people and sighted people. The question:
Can photography be a passion for an impaired person? Still remains
unanswered. Thus my research is the answer to this question. For
this I, Interview Mr. Pranav Lal, who is visually impaired and was
formerly working as Cyber security professional but later on focuses
on his passion and found a way to achieve it. He holds the Business
Management degree as well. It’s been now 18 years for him living
his passion. In 2001, he stumbled upon a software called the
“VOICE” that claims to give a visual experience to the blind. With the
help of this software Mr. Lal was able to share his ideas with the
world.
METHODOLOGY:
There are two types of research methods:
Quantitative and Qualitative.
Quantitative research resolves problem through numbers,
emphasizing on collection of numeric data, summarizing them and
drawing interferences through it.
Qualitative research on other hand is based on words, feelings,
emotions, sounds and other non- numerical and unquantifiable
elements.
Thus for my research, I choose the Interview method of qualitative
research methodology. This method of collecting data involves
presentation of oral verbal stimuli and reply in terms of oral verbal
responses. So I took a telephonic Interview of Mr. Pranav Lal.
RESULTS AND FINDINGS:
The results of this research may be summarizing as follows:
 The visually impaired people are curious to share what they
see or what is their outlook towards the world.
 They also want to be recognized the same way the sighted
people do.
 They also can achieve their passion, if they have proper
support and guidance.
 Today, in the modern world, they can also use technology to
excel their skills.
 They can also equip themselves with modern technology to
achieve their dreams.
 Their disability can’t define their personality, it’s their own
skills, will, dedication and determination that can properly
describes them.
 A true hard work can even led a visually impaired cyber
security professional to an immense photographer.
One of the challenges faced while doing photography by a blind or
visually impaired person is sharing the concept. The common
perception is that sight is importance in life to interpret the ideas
and thoughts .We can only describe what we have seen earlier or
what we are presently watching. Software like VOICE allows visually
impaired people to demonstrate the possibilities of seeing and to
recognize the capacity of our senses. The research ends up
concluding that visually impaired person can describe the world
much better than a sighted person. Photography is just a tool for
shaping their imagination to excel their inner world of thoughts and
capability.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS:
Differently disabled people have to face many challenges through
their life span. They didn’t get all the opportunities like normal
people, sometimes due to their disability and sometimes due to
proper support and guidance. They are forced to feel a neglected
part of society. This study of mine reveals that if the person has true
dedication to pursue his/her passion than no disability can come in
his/her way. Mr. Pranav Lal is true example of this. He was forced to
take commerce instead of science after passing 10th boards, due to
his disability of seeing the world. But his passion for technology
makes him learn about programming. Also, his parents assure that
nothing comes in his way. After learning programming, he was
appointed as a cyber security professional. But his willingness to
explore more and keep on trying different things leds him to explore
software called “VOICE” that converts images to sound by scanning
them from left to right. This software not only helps him to see the
surroundings but also give him a path to share his imagination with
the world. The journey was not as easy as it seems to be. It is his
determination that turned him to be a photographer. Now days
there are much such software like “VOICE” that helps the visually
impaired people to see what others can. Some of them are: NVDA
(windows), Serotek System Access (Windows), ORCA (Linux),
BRLTTY (Linux) etc. Pranav is an inspiration for all those who wants
to follow their dreams but due to their disability not able to follow
their dreams. According to him one should never give up his passion
and should remain self motivated. Even he gave challenge to
developers to develop a photography helper app that have following
features:
 Allow to tag the images
 To carry over the tags when transport images out of the device.
 Allow to perceive the scene.
 Detecting the level of light falling.
 Help in framing the object of interest.
  Give warning about camera orientation.
 Feedback on colour.
Thus, this study concludes that if photography can be done by a
visually impaired person then there is nothing that can stop a
differently disabled person to achieve in this world if he/she is
determined to pursue so. The motto should be:-
“Never give up your passion, keep on exploring and trying
different things”.