VerClimb

What it does

VerClimb aims to address the problems such as positioning difficulties and poor communication that visually impaired encounter during rock climbing. Through auditory and haptic feedback for position indication, the goal is to enhance their movement autonomy.

Your inspiration

I met some rock climbing enthusiasts with low vision when rock climbing. Their sports performance is seriously influenced by their partners. Due to the difficulty in locating the rock points, it is hard to establish effective communication. They often have to stop to repeatedly communicate and confirm or explore, resulting in an unsmooth experience. This design starts from here, hoping to provide more accurate and real-time route information and feedback support through modular design and multi-sensory feedback, thereby enhancing their movement autonomy, and striving to have more efficient interaction with visual instructors.

How it works

The product mainly includes two major functional modules: the tactile map and the multimodal rock climbing wall. The tactile map is several rock sign placed corresponding to the climbing wall route. Through its shape and symbol, it helps visually impaired climbers complete route cognition and strategic planning. The multimodal rock climbing wall still provides real-time information on the position and distance of rock points for visually impaired climbers by integrating audio, vibration, texture and other tactile and auditory feedback on the wall surface through intelligent sensors. The core feature of the modular ripple wall is the gradient decreasing raised texture around the center. It provides information on the relative position of the rock points. By expanding the surface area of the rock points, it helps visually impaired climbers quickly and independently find the position of the next landing point.

Design process

The design goal begins with enhancing the exercise independence of visually impaired rock climbers. However, through on-site insights into barrier-free rock climbing activities, it was found that visually impaired rock climbers and visual instructors have a stronger need for communication. Existing solutions include high-intensity oral communication or physical assistance, which have high communication thresholds and heavy cognitive loads on users, seriously restricting the smoothness of movement and the depth of experience. Based on this, the design direction has evolved to take into account interpersonal communication efficiency while ensuring user autonomy: On the one hand, a real-time multimodal guidance mechanism of tactile and auditory feedback is introduced during the climbing process. Combined with the laser pen sensor, the visual instructions of the coach are converted into perceiable signals to broaden the information input channel and reduce communication pressure; On the other hand, by providing global route cognition and planning support through modular tactile route maps, it not only enhances users' autonomous prediction ability of routes but also establishes standardized tactile language for coaches' guidance and enthusiasts' communication.

How it is different

Different from the one-way optimization of oral instruction transmission in traditional auxiliary schemes, this design innovatively constructs a two-layer guidance architecture of "haptic global navigation (haptic map) + real-time haptic auditory feedback (intelligent rock point)" : The tactile map converts the types of rock points and the distribution characteristics of routes into touchable standardized tactile symbols, enabling visually impaired users to independently complete route understanding and motion rehearsal before climbing, significantly enhancing motor autonomy and strategic thinking. The multimodal climbing wall, through real-time interaction signals of hearing and touch, expands the information acquisition channels for visually impaired people, reduces their reliance on oral instructions, disperses communication pressure and reduces misunderstandings. Help visually impaired users make autonomous perception and decision-making.

Future plans

I will continue to develop VerClimb, improve the prototype and contact the rock climbing gym, and continue to hold accessible activities for further research. It is hoped that in the future, data connection can be carried out between the tactile map and the multimodal climbing wall to achieve an integrated feedback process and improve its movement smoothness.

Awards