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The optophone is a device, used by people who are blind, that scans text and generates time-varying chords of tones to identify letters. It is one of the earliest known applications of sonification. Dr. Edmund Fournier d'Albe of Birmingham University invented the optophone in 1913, which used 
"Optophones and Musical Print."
Sounding Out! (2015) Blindness equipment Auditory displays {{sound-tech-stub
The optophone is a device, used by people who are blind, that scans text and generates time-varying chords of tones to identify letters. It is one of the earliest known applications of sonification. Dr. Edmund Fournier d'Albe of Birmingham University invented the optophone in 1913, which used selenium
Selenium is a chemical element; it has symbol (chemistry), symbol Se and atomic number 34. It has various physical appearances, including a brick-red powder, a vitreous black solid, and a grey metallic-looking form. It seldom occurs in this elem ...
photosensors to detect black print and convert it into an audible output which could be interpreted by a blind person. The Glasgow
Glasgow is the Cities of Scotland, most populous city in Scotland, located on the banks of the River Clyde in Strathclyde, west central Scotland. It is the List of cities in the United Kingdom, third-most-populous city in the United Kingdom ...
company, Barr and Stroud, participated in improving the resolution and usability of the instrument.
Only a few units were built and reading was initially exceedingly slow; a demonstration at the 1918 Exhibition involved Mary Jameson reading at one word per minute. Later models of the Optophone allowed speeds of up to 60 words per minute, though only some subjects are able to achieve this rate.
See also
* OptaconReferences
External links
* * Mills, Mara"Optophones and Musical Print."
Sounding Out! (2015) Blindness equipment Auditory displays {{sound-tech-stub