We're excited to have embarked upon a wonderful project. As part of our Access Project, we have worked closely with a company called VocalEyes who specialise in creating audio description and provide opportunities for blind and partially sighted people to experience arts and heritage organisations across the UK.
Audio description is a means of conveying, by the use of vivid, succinct and accurate language, the visual aspects of an artwork or artefact that a blind or partially sighted person would otherwise miss.
Through this partnership we have created audio files with content such as introductions to the Town Houses and descriptions of the top 30 items in our collection.
Creating a script about these items takes specialist knowledge when describing them to audiences who are unable to touch or see the object. One example of this is the Hornbook in our collection which dates from 1666-1700.
VocalEyes have brought it to life through their descriptive language where audiences can visualise its fragile nature.
The face of the hornbook has a sheet of paper attached to the wood. It's yellowed with age, marked with brown patches, and in places has been torn. On it is the alphabet - two rows of lower case letters, followed by two rows of upper case. Beneath these are vowels, and some simple words that demonstrate vowel sounds - either before a consonant such as "ad, ed, id, od, ud" - or following the consonant, such as "ba, be, bi, bo, bu". The main part of the Hornbook is taken up with the Lord's Prayer
— Hornbook Audio Description excerpt
We will be uploading the object audio descriptions on our SoundCloud profile.
Check back regularly to see what hidden tales you will encounter and let us know what you think.