Converting

Next time you open the bathroom cabinet, take a moment to think how you’d tell the difference between the contents of your aerosols if you couldn’t see to read the name.

Of course, you can always test it by spraying, and, in any case, if you end up trying to shave with deodorant, it is only slightly irritating. But what if you try to apply something more hazardous, like household cleaning products? If you get that wrong the consequences are likely to be far worse.

Standardisation has become commonplace in many production processes for the simple reason that it keeps costs down, but, for the visually impaired, the ‘one size fits all’ approach to design can cause problems.

Since 2005, Braille has been mandatory on new pharmaceutical products, and existing ones have until 2010 to show the name of the product in Braille on the outer casing. European legislation on Braille is, however, the start rather than the end of the process – exact specifications for height and size are still needed – and Braille will perhaps move into other areas. Furthermore, it begs the question, how else can packaging better serve the visually impaired?

Costly undertaking
In the UK, there are some two million people who would describe themselves as having difficulty seeing, and around one million of these have sufficient sight problems that they could officially register as blind or partially sighted, according to the Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB). Compared to those figures, the number of Braille readers is actually quite modest – somewhere between 10,000 and 20,000.

This makes the inclusion of Braille on packaging a relatively expensive undertaking, but the service it provides is indispensable. Lisa Jones, honorary general secretary of the National Federation of the Blind, believes the importance of Braille is that it helps those who can read it be much more independent.

“I don’t choose a product based on the advertising, but more on ease of access,” she says. “Putting product information on a pack in Braille means I instantly know what it is.”

However, even for products where it is mandatory, as is the case with pharmaceuticals, a lack of definition to the Braille characters can make it a wasted exercise.

“It is important to get the production of Braille right, and it is not just a question of getting the sentence correct,” says Alison Roberts, a director at Cwmbran-based PIA, which produces clear plastic self-adhesive labels. “You have to be able to read it.”

Braille is typically applied to packaging through embossing, which is the common process for pharmaceuticals, or with the addition of a screen-printed label. Labels tend to be more robust than embossing, which can be flattened during transport, or fail to achieve sufficient dot height because the board is too thick.

European authorities want to determine exact specifications for Braille dimensions, but it could be a long process given the volume of research required to create the minimum Braille height that everyone can read.

But even if the Braille text is readable, manufacturers are faced with the task of finding space on the product to actually put it, given that one sheet of A4 text takes up approximately eight of Braille. Likewise, finding the appropriate location can be difficult.

Another challenge with embossing over print on a box is that the nature of the board can cause cracks in the surface. If this is too severe it can impair legibility and the visual appearance for sighted people.

“A compromise must be reached where both the blind and sighted reader can read the title,” says Pharmabraille director Gary Steel, who has developed a range of fonts to ease the process of putting Braille on packaging.

When developing packaging for the visually impaired, it is important not to forget that not everybody can read Braille, and there are many more people who would benefit from other improvements, which are perhaps easier to achieve, such as clearer, less cursive fonts for text. But, as with Braille, part of the problem is finding space on pack.

“Packaging is getting smaller, but at the same time there is more information to include,” says the RNIB’s chief scientist Dr John Gill. “The result is small print or print on a patterned background, or one without contrast.” For example, it can be very difficult to read black type on a dark blue background or pale blue on white. Even something as simple as black on white is not necessarily the best – an off-white can be better as it reduces the glare. Glossy labels can also be a problem. “The key is for a label to be readable in the light of an ‘average’ household,” says Gill.

Furthermore, when it comes to printing text, bigger is not necessarily better. According to Mike Parr, the chairman of the UK Association of Braille Producers, the optimum size is 14 point. “If people have a slight visual impairment, they are likely to be able to read it,” he says. “Those with a bad impairment will probably use magnifiers and anything bigger can be too big.”

Extended appeal
Better labelling and use of Braille is something that, for the RNIB, would be useful on any product that potentially could be used by the elderly, who make up some 85% of the visually impaired in the UK. However, Ditone Labels sales manager John Howarth, who sits on the British Standards Institute’s Braille advisory committee, suggests that, because of the extra costs incurred, further legislation would be required to expand the use of Braille, despite growing interest. “We are seeing interest from veterinary and healthcare products,” he says. “It is even extending to under-the-sink products and food and drink.”

Of course, there might be concerns that too much legislation could end up restricting what manufacturers are able to produce. And while that could be true to some extent, it is also an opportunity to create a greater variety of packaging, moving away from ‘one size fits all’. Dangerous products, such as bleach, currently show an embossed triangle to identify them as such, which the RNIB’s Gill sees as the best compromise if good labelling is not always possible. But he says there used to be more easily identifiable bottles.

“A bottle with poisonous content, which had ribbing covering 65% of its surface area, was a much clearer symbol of harmful substances,” he says.

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OTHER TECHNOLOGIES
Software
When designing for the visually impaired, whether it is in packaging or for a magazine, it is easy to fall into the trap of making the text bigger, but this approach fails to take into account different eye conditions.

So how does someone who has good eyesight understand what it is like for someone who has not?
London-based Wire Design is working with Cambridge University and Adobe to develop a computer program that shows designers how people with a range of sight problems will view their product.

“Graphic designers felt their hands were tied and their design values compromised,” says Wire Design managing director John Corcoran. “By talking about structure and shape, the Consider program helps designers appreciate how people are affected by eye conditions.”

Corcoran says that part of the problem is that designers often work to strict briefs and are unaware of what the audience’s exact needs are. Evaluations are often done retrospectively, when it is too late to do anything about it. Consider allows designers to get to grips with the issues earlier on.

By feeding the program with the specific breakdown of the potential user, for example by age and eye condition, the designer can get a much clearer idea of how the product will be received, and what alterations are required.

“The program really makes you realise that simple changes can have big results,” says Corcoran. “It allows us to look at classic audience breakdown and connect to the useful information.”

RFID
In the US, pharmacists are using RFID technology to create ‘talking’ pharmaceutical packages, which benefit not only the visually impaired but also a range of people who have problems reading, which, according to research, is one person in every three.

EnvisionAmerica has developed the ScripTalk system, whereby a machine reads out the information contained in an RFID tag, which is placed under the usual information label. Although it better enables patients to fully understand their prescription, the technology is, at the moment, clearly limited because of the availability of machines, but its use does appear to be expanding, at least in the US.

The big advantage that it has over Braille is the potential to help many more people such as dyslexic and illiterate people and sufferers of Parkinson’s who, for example, can find it difficult to read the print on soap powders and tiny tubes of ointment.

“For this reason intelligent packaging is a hot topic,” says Dr Peter Harrop, the chairman of RFID research company IDTechEx. “It’s all about improving human interface.”

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Illustration: Jason Bennion